The following blog post is provided by Chris Syme, former CoSIDA New Media Committee Chair. You can see more of Syme's work on
her website and follow her on
Twitter. Her new e-book,
Practice Safe Social: How to Use Social Media Responsibly to Protect Your Reputation and Build Loyalty, is available now at Amazon.com.
Chris also authored an earlier e-book where she outlines the best ways to handle real-time crisis communications (
Listen, Engage, Respond).
One of the biggest communications mistakes a business can make is to take on too much when it comes to social media. Every time a new channel pops up, some businesses jump in before any kind of content strategy or audience research is done. Is it any wonder that many company social media channels wither and die? Jay Baer calls this trend
rampant social participation proliferation, a term he got from
Jeremiah Owyang. Unplanned social media growth is a threat to effective engagement, and if applied to crisis communications, can do more harm than good.
In a crisis, dissemination of information is a high priority. But if someone tells you just to plaster your messages all over every popular social media channel, they are mistaken. Where social media strategy is important in business, it is more important in crisis. Here are some principles to follow that will help you figure out how to plan for crisis communications using social media.
1. Stay within your established platforms.
This is the most important guiding principle to remember. For instance, if you have a Facebook page, a Twitter account, and a YouTube channel, stick to those channels when planning any kind of crisis responses. This is where your fans are and this is where your detractors will want to voice their opinions.
There are several reasons for doing this but the most obvious is that a crisis is not the time to build an audience or plan strategy for a new channel. Second, every channel you post on, you have to monitor. Think of your resources, personnel, and time. Third, you don’t have to answer every negative post that pops up on every channel. You’ll be playing whack-a-mole and you’ll be sorry. Stick to the channels where you have established a fan base, and enlist your advocates to help you amplify your message. You may want to use an amplification tool, but don’t try to build a presence on a new channel during a crisis.
2. Stay within your primary broadcast or customer service channels.
Even if you love Vine, it isn’t an effective crisis communications channel. Neither is Pinterest. Primary broadcast channels are Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, blogs, podcasts, message boards, text alert systems, and customer care channels. I can guarantee you will have your hands full trying to keep up responding to your fan base on your regular broadcast channels. Don’t waste time trying to get your message out to every nook and cranny on the internet.
Prioritize your messages and prioritize your channels. Concentrate on channels where messages will be amplified for maximum reach and media coverage. Be strategic to gain reach, don’t try and create it by adding superfluous social media posts.
3. Spend priority time monitoring instead of multiplying your message channels.
Set up a series of Google Alerts or use a monitoring app such as
Mention,
Radian 6,
Meltwater Buzz,
Hootsuite or others to catch the mentions of your brand or keywords on the internet. Again, time pressure in a crisis is ever present. Your ability to set up an editorial strategy that includes posting to social media, traditional press releases, answering media requests, and digital monitoring is going to be hampered in a crisis. What you think you can handle and what you can really handle are probably different.
4. At the first sign of crisis, call a reputable crisis management firm in your sector.
The trouble with social media crisis communications agencies today is that many of them are social media people with no communications or public relations background. Knowledge of social media is no good in a crisis unless it is informed by an understanding of effective media relations. All social media agencies do not have media relations background. Check their bios.
Most professionals I know will give you a free consultation up front, and even if you don’t hire them, they can give you a realistic idea of what you’re up against and what it’s going to take to mitigate the event. It’s the most important call you’ll make. Feel free to contact me (email
chris@cksyme.org) if you need recommendations for crisis communications agencies in your area.