It’s after we leave the house, go out into the world, marry, and have kids of our own that we finally realize what our mothers were saying to us all those years ago, and we grow a greater appreciation of the things they taught us and the sacrifices they made for us.

And, of course, we swear we aren’t going to let our kids turn out like we did. We’re going to break millions of years of tradition and actually be the first people on the planet to have kids who listen to us and don’t make the same mistakes we did growing up.

Reputation management can be the same way. Most companies know about reputation management, they’ve learned its principles and understand the benefits it might have. But it’s not until a crisis comes knocking that they realize they should have created a reputation management strategy when they were told to. And now it’s too late. Hindsight is always 20/20.

But you can fix it. Remember reputation management is like your mother in 4 ways:

1) Reputation management wants to protect you

Just your mother, reputation management wants to keep you safe and out of harm’s way as your company grows. Creating a preemptive reputation management strategy from the start will help you begin to defend against online attacks before they begin. And if your company starts now, you’ll be that much more ahead when a crisis actually strikes.

2) Reputation management gives you good advice

Your mother was always trying to give you advice in order to keep you safe and protected, so you would learn the correct way to act and speak. Reputation management is not much different. A good reputation management strategy dictates that you put policies and actions into place now, before a crisis starts, so that you can build good habits and protect yourself from future embarrassment and lost profits.

3) Reputation management speaks from experience

Many reputation management professionals have seen disasters happen time and time again to companies who were inadequately prepared for an online PR nightmare. And because they’ve seen it happen many times they know how to handle it and what to do. But, most importantly, they recognize the need for a preemptive reputation management strategy, so you may never need to face a large problem.

4) Reputation management knows you better than yourself

Your mother knew all about you, and because she was watching you grow and learn, she could tell what you were feeling before you told her. She knew when something was wrong and she tried to help you correct problems before they got out of hand. Preemptive reputation management is similar in that a reputation management company operates outside your company, so they have a different perspective. And sometimes an outside perspective is what you need in order to fully protect yourself from online threats and PR problems. Reputation management firms can take an objective look at your company and give you the best advice possible to get you back on track.

Now that you’re all grown up, you can see your mother’s wisdom, even if it was hard to understand at the time. But wouldn’t it have been better if you would have listened and understood your mother’s wisdom back then? The same goes for reputation management. It’s better to start now and put policies and strategies into place, so you don’t have to deal with bigger problems later, when it might be too late.

There is a reason that medieval kings and lords spent years building their castles. Because they knew that if they waited to start building until an army attacked them, there was no way they could defend themselves. In today’s world, your company many not be under threat of physical attack, but your company’s reputation is at risk for attack online as long as you have no reputation management strategy in place to protect it.

Too often companies wait until their reputation is under attack until they start thinking about investing in a reputation management strategy. But by that time, the damage has already been done, and it is much harder to fix the problem than it would have been to prevent it in the first place by building your castle defenses well in advance.

If your company has a reputation to defend, then it’s time to start investing in a reputation management strategy, and here’s why:

1. The future is uncertain

Your company may have a great reputation right now, but you never know what might happen in the future. Often times, all it takes is one vocal, web savvy individual to start posting negative comments and articles online about your company. When your customers search for your company name online and the 2^nd result they see—under your company’s official website—is a “scam review of [your company],” the damage is already done, and you are already losing money. Prepare for the future by investing in reputation management now.

2. It will be easier now rather than later

Before a crisis, it is much easier to build your defenses. Before a crisis hits, it’s much faster and economical to build a broad positive online reputation. But if you have no defenses when the crisis hits, you’ll spend all your time and money fighting each negative review and blog post individually instead of having a broad layer of defenses already in place.

3. Get ahead instead of playing catch up

If you have no defenses, your enemy controls the field of battle in an attack. They get to pick where to strike first, how to attack, and when to do it. Then when the attack comes you’re left playing catch up and putting out fires instead of focusing on your larger defense strategy. But if you build a strong, positive online reputation ahead of time, you’ll be ready for an attack and the slings and stones of your enemy will not do as much damage. You’ll control the battle.

4. Invest now, and you may never have to face a crisis

The best part about investing in reputation management now is that, with a strong strategy in place, you may never have to face a crisis. Instead of dealing with an attack on your reputation after it happens, if you are well prepared, those attacks may never have an impact on your business. And if you can prevent attacks from becoming crises before they happen, you’ll save time, energy, and money, without losing any of your customers or seeing a dent in your profits.

Overall, preemptive reputation management is about building your castle of defenses now, before there is a problem. Because if you can get your reputation management strategy in place now and start building your defenses, your chances of dealing with a crisis later can be lessened or even averted completely. So how strong is your castle?