NetReputation: Bringing order to a multi-million dollar agency's product chaos
They were building the right tools the wrong way. I gave the build a leader.
The challenge
NetReputation was already building the internal tools they needed, reporting, CRM systems, client portals, but nobody was actually leading the build. No technical translator between the business and the developers. No real prioritization, so anyone could call something "priority" and jump the line. No project management system tracking any of it. No consistent communication with developers, so requirements drifted from what was asked for to what got built. The people overseeing it were doing it part-time behind a hundred higher-priority responsibilities. The result: slow, buggy, out-of-order builds, and a team that could only say "I hope it's being built correctly."
The solution
Came in as a fractional Product Lead to run product development the way it should've been run from the start. Installed GitLab and a real project management system with proper bug ticketing, feature requests, and weekly development reports. Ran weekly product calls with key staff, and protected the roadmap by actually verifying priority claims instead of letting the loudest voice win. Led development of the full product suite: a client portal, an internal CRM (Client Manager), a Zoho sales integration, automated ORM reporting, a Google Indexing API tool, review management across six+ platforms, an automated sales quote tool, a search result tracker, and a link suppression requester.
The outcome
"I hope it's being built correctly" became a team with real documentation, real reporting, and someone accountable for the roadmap. Projects shipped in the order that actually mattered instead of whatever felt urgent that day. Requirements stopped drifting between the ask and the build. NetReputation had good developers the whole time. What they were missing was someone making sure that talent pointed at the right target, and once that gap closed, product development finally matched the size of the business it was supporting.
At a glance
Company: NetReputation.com, multi-million dollar reputation management agency
My role: Fractional Product Lead (brought in as a contractor)
Timeline: 12-18 months
What I did: Organized and led product development that was already underway but had no one actually running it
Who they are
NetReputation is a multi-million dollar reputation management agency. Like Brand.com, they needed internal tools to run the business: reporting, workflow automation, ways to stop drowning their team in busywork. Unlike Brand.com, they'd already started building it. The problem wasn't the idea. It was everything around the idea.
What was broken
NetReputation was building the right things the wrong way, because nobody was actually leading the build.
No internal technical person translating what the business needed into what developers should actually build.
No prioritization. Projects got worked on in whatever order felt urgent that day, not in the order that mattered. Anyone could call something "priority" and it would jump the line.
No project management system tracking any of it. No proper bug ticketing, no feature request process, no documentation. Work existed, but nobody could see the state of it.
No consistent communication with the developers. Requirements drifted between what was asked for and what got built.
The people responsible for overseeing these builds were doing it part-time, squeezed behind a hundred higher-priority responsibilities. Nobody had the bandwidth to actually run it.
The honest summary of where they were: "I hope things are being built correctly and efficiently." Hope isn't a process.
What I did
Organized the production process
Installed GitLab and a real project management system. Set up proper bug ticketing, feature request intake, and weekly product development reports, so "I hope it's going well" became "here's exactly what shipped, what's in progress, and what's next."
Ran the roadmap like it mattered
Hosted weekly product development calls with key staff. Reported progress, answered questions, and surfaced real issues that needed to become real priorities. And I protected the roadmap. Any time someone said something was "priority," I checked that against what was actually true before I let it jump the line. That's the difference between a roadmap and a wish list.
Built and shipped the actual product
Client Portal — Login access for clients into their own account.
Client Manager — Internal CRM to track and manage client campaigns, run custom online reputation reports, and deliver services.
Zoho integration — Connected the sales team's CRM directly to Client Manager, so sales data flowed into service delivery without manual re-entry.
ORM Report — Auto-generated client reports straight from Client Manager, showing what's done, what's due, and a forward-looking forecast of what needs to get fulfilled.
Index Checker — Connected to Google's Indexing API so account managers could push newly published assets straight to Google with one click.
Review Management — Pulled in reviews from Zillow, Clutch, Google Business Profile, Glassdoor, Angi, Yelp and more, with tracking for new reviews and removals.
Customer Quote tool — Took a prospect's name, location, and target keywords and generated a real quote the sales team could use on the spot.
Search Result Tracker — Tracked search results by keyword, location, and search engine, and flagged which results were the company's own published assets versus negative assets that needed suppression.
Link Suppression Requester — Let clients view their own search results and request a link be suppressed or removed, directly from the platform.
The result
Product development stopped being an unmanaged side project squeezed into someone's already full week, and became something with an actual owner. Projects shipped in the order that mattered, tracked in a real system, with documentation and reporting behind every decision. Requirements stopped drifting between what was asked for and what got built. And instead of hoping things were being built correctly, NetReputation had someone making sure of it.
This is the exact gap most agencies don't know they have. They hire developers. They don't hire anyone to make sure the developers are building the right thing, in the right order, correctly. That gap is expensive, and it's invisible until someone points it out. NetReputation had good developers the whole time. What they didn't have was someone making sure that talent pointed at the right target.
The honest note
NetReputation is proof that the fix isn't always "hire more developers" or "start over." Sometimes the fix is putting one person in the seat that was empty the whole time.