
10 Common PR Mistakes Made by Start-Up Companies
Avoid these 10 common PR mistakes that sink startups: publishing press releases without strategy, starting campaigns too late,…
Read articleTrack sentiment across every distributor market and channel, and see what a slipping narrative is quietly costing you in recruits, retention, and revenue.
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Two ways to win
Both paths run on the same RE² Engine. The only question is who's on the car — your team with our intelligence, or ours running every lap.
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You build the car · You race it
The RE² Engine is the most complete reputation-intelligence machine ever built — every buyer signal, AI-visibility read, review, and search-control lever in one place. We put it in your hands; your team builds the car around it and races it.
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Most trustedWe build it · We race it · You win
Everything in Get the Intel, then we field the whole team. Our specialists run every lap — on-page copy, earned placements, reviews, and AI citations — and hold momentum through every market shift, all the way to the checkered flag.
Not sure which fits? Start with a free RE² Score — the intel comes first either way.
You have the people to execute — but the buyer signals, AI answers, and search shifts that should direct them are scattered across a hundred sources. We turn that noise into a single intelligence feed your strategists can act on the same day.
Competitors, review sites, and news outlets own your first impression. You react instead of control.
73%
of buyers research before contact
ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity are recommending your competitors. Your brand narrative is being written without you.
62%
of AI answers miss your brand
Every day without control, negative perceptions spread through search algorithms and AI training data.
$4.2M
average cost of reputation crisis
Two live tools, built on the same model our analysts use. Pick one and start dragging.
The same engine, delivered as intelligence. We measure everything and hand your team the benchmarks and prioritized playbook — you supply the strategy and action that moves the score across search, AI, and stakeholder touchpoints.
Intelligence, Delivered to You
The full RE² dataset — buyer signals, AI answers, review velocity, and entity health — packaged as the RE² Score your team can act on the same day.
Your Team Runs the Plays
We hand your strategists the prioritized playbook — what to publish, correct, and suppress — with the data behind every call. Your team executes, because insight without action never moves the score.
Prove the Return, Internally
Board-ready attribution your team can present — tying every point of RE² movement they drive back to influenced pipeline and retained revenue.
Inputs
Outputs
The RE² Score quantifies your reputation equity across all digital touchpoints. Track progress, benchmark competitors, and prove ROI to stakeholders.
Your Current RE² Score
Percentile
Top 15%
in your industry
7 Weighted Score Components
12-Month Trend
+38% improvementYour Brand(You)
72
+14
Competitor A
68
+8
Competitor B
61
+3
Competitor C
54
-2
Competitor D
47
-5
23%
Higher than industry avg
4
Positions gained
Measured across
Google, Bing, ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini & more
Every ranking, improvement, and stat is sourced from established public data libraries—never fabricated or estimated.

Exclusive Certification
BRANDefenders is the only firm approved by the Code Yellow Institute
CYI methodology is not licensed to anyone else. Its six-force discipline is built directly into the RE² auditing engine—so every score you receive is powered by the only endorsed implementation of Code Yellow.
Code Yellow is the discipline behind our intelligence. Every signal we surface is filtered through active watch over the conditions that shape trust, perception, and momentum.
What people are saying. What search results are surfacing. What AI systems are inferring. Where negative signals are building quietly. Where authority is thin. Where a competitor is gaining narrative ground. Code Yellow is the opposite of passive brand management.

“Code Yellow is paying attention. That is it. That is the whole thing.”
Rich Galgano — Creator of the Code Yellow Institute
The Board: Six Forces That Read The World
The real decision-maker, not the stated one
The real problem, not the presented one
Real urgency, not manufactured deadlines
The trajectory—where this is heading
The motive behind the answer
Concrete execution, not plans—decisions
Every RE² engagement closes with a WILL: a committed action, with an owner and a clock. Plans without commitment are Code White.
Every point of RE² Score improvement translates to measurable business impact — but the score only moves when the work gets done. Here's what the numbers your team acts on are worth.
The RE² Value Equation
Step 1
Reputation Movement
Step 2
Trust Delta
Step 3
Conversion Impact
Result
Revenue Lift
This equation only pays out when every piece is executed. RE² shows you exactly what to move — your team writes the on-page copy, earns the third-party placements, and runs the review strategy that convert reputation into revenue. Data points the way; action collects the return.
28%1
Reputation's Share of Value
Portion of S&P 500 market capitalization — roughly $11.9T — attributable to corporate reputation.
82%2
Buyer Trust
Consumers who say trust in the company behind a brand is a deciding factor in whether they buy.
5–9%3
Revenue Per Star
Revenue increase associated with each one-star improvement in a business's online rating.
22%4
Cost of Negative Search
Prospective customers lost for every negative result that ranks on page one of search.
Sources: 1 Echo Research, Reputation Dividend Report (2024) · 2 Edelman Trust Barometer (2024) · 3 Harvard Business School — M. Luca, “Reviews, Reputation, and Revenue” (2016) · 4 Moz, negative search-result visibility study
A leading healthcare technology company was losing deals because of outdated negative press appearing in search results. After 6 months with RE², they transformed their digital presence completely.
"We went from explaining away bad search results to having prospects tell us they chose us because of what they found online."
— VP of Marketing
Brand Search Ranking
Page 3
Before
Position 1
After
AI Recommendation Rate
12%
Before
89%
After
Average Review Score
2.8
Before
4.7
After
RE² Score
47
Before
78
After
Calculate Your Potential ROI
See what controlled reputation could mean for your business
Get your free RE² Score — the reputation report card that shows your team where your brand stands across search engines, AI platforms, and stakeholder touchpoints.
No commitment required. Results delivered within 48 hours.
The Audit Includes
The RE² Path to Controlled Reputation
Free RE² Score
See where you stand
Activation Sprint
Fix the gaps fast
Operating Retainer
Run continuously
Platform License
Scale across portfolio
Free RE² Score
See where you stand
Activation Sprint
Fix the gaps fast
Operating Retainer
Run continuously
Platform License
Scale across portfolio
15+
Years Experience
2,000+
Reputations Protected
4.9
Avg Client Rating
91%
Client Retention
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