Crisis Management

Accusations that Apple slows down the processing power of older iPhones in order to force customers to buy new versions has accompanied almost every new product launch. The rumors never attracted much news cycle traction until this holiday season, and now Apple is paying for it.

The city of Erie received 65 inches of snow from Christmas Eve through Dec. 27—breaking a 59-year-old record for a two-day snowfall in the state. And this PR News reporter just happened to be visiting Erie for the holidays. Here are a few observations on Erie’s communications around the storm.

Knowing how to handle a crisis arguably is the most important skill in a PR pro’s toolkit. When it’s a social media crisis, the need to act quickly often can be paramount, requiring PR pros to have items ready to deploy almost immediately. Here are a few tips that will bolster your efforts at apologizing for a crisis on social media.

Veteran PR pro and former journalist Arthur Solomon continues his series of communications lessons pulled from 2017 news headlines. In this edition, Solomon concentrates on lessons learned from crises that involved Equifax, BP and the White House.

Amtrak is facing a crisis after a derailment caused at least three deaths and dozens of injuries in Washington on Dec. 18. And in the early aftermath, the organization has done an exemplary job of crisis communications, providing frequent updates on social media, opening a microsite for more information and offering transparency by holding a conference call soon after the accident.

Our regular crisis measurement guru Katie Paine considers crises of 2017 and selects the crisis of the year. Can you guess which brand has the dubious distinction? Hint, the brand was handed an awful situation, partly through its own negligence, and then sat on the situation for several weeks before announcing it to the public.

In a nutshell, 2017 has been a year of scandals, viral posts and revelations. Several big brands grappled with major crises, fake news continued to dog the major social media platforms and brands braced themselves for the possibility of being tweeted at by President Trump. But it certainly wasn’t all doom and gloom. Here, we’ve rounded up seven of the most memorable PR stories that defined 2017.

What’s the proper protocol for brands when an event like today’s attempted terrorist attack in New York City occurs? Should a brand go silent and stop sending out any social media promotions as the dust settles or is it best to send out thoughts and prayers in a show of solidarity?

Crisis management, our author argues, is itself in crisis. The causes of this crisis in crisis PR include challenges in philosophy, technology and ethics, not to mention that some crises (see Lauer, Matt and Rose, Charlie) begin and end so quickly that crisis PR barely has time to roll up its sleeves. What’s a company or a brand in crisis to do?

Communications executives have begun in earnest to make their way into boardrooms, C-suite meetings and the critical business conversations at their organizations. But the pace is not fast enough and the courage of their convictions… Continued