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With more than 48,000 tweets and counting, the #BoycottNRA hashtag is trending and brands are listening. In response to the outcry following the Feb. 14 Parkland, Fla. school shooting, several national brands have rescinded their NRA membership discounts in support of gun control, including Best Western, Wyndham Hotels, Alamo Rent A Car, Enterprise Rent-A-Car and First National Bank of Omaha, among others.

With the 24-7 news cycle, the speed of social media and the demands of the C-suite, it sometimes feels as if PR pros move from crisis to crisis. Nisha Morris, executive director, communication at Providence St. Joseph Health, offers five tactics that can help communicators escape this roller coaster and promote their brands through proactive media activities.

Your employees can be your best and most authentic ambassadors, helping to spread awareness and build excitement around your brand. But finding the right influencers from within your ranks can be a challenge. In the just-published PR News Influencer Marketing Guidebook, Lisa Apolinski, founder and CEO of 3 Dog Write Inc., provides seven useful questions to help identify the best person for the job and how to craft your strategy around that person’s strengths and your existing customer base.

There’s an old courtroom expression: “Never ask a question if you don’t know the answer.” But after last night’s CNN town hall debate about gun control—when survivors of last week’s Parkland, Fla. school shooting met with Sen. Marco Rubio, Parkland Rep. Ted Deutsch, Broward County sheriff Scott Israel and National Rifle Association spokesperson Dana Loesch—perhaps a new version of that quote is in order: “Never answer a question without first reading the room.”

Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has had a rough week. On Tuesday, Sports Illustrated published a bombshell investigation that detailed a culture of sexual harassment among the Mavericks’ corporate culture for the better part of a decade. The report seemed to catch Cuban—and the Mavericks organization—off guard, highlighting the need for all organizations to engage in crisis planning. And it’s yet another example of how all brands need to be prepared for allegations of this nature in the wake of the #MeToo movement.

Hunger prevention, hurricane relief, academic scholarships: These are just a few of the worthy causes spotlighted by the 2018 PR News’ Nonprofit Awards finalists. The awards—which benchmark and celebrate the past year’s top nonprofit communications campaigns and the storytellers behind them—will be announced, along with the winners of PR News’ CSR Awards, at a luncheon March 20, 2018 at The National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

KFC ran out of chicken in Britain earlier this week, closing over half of its 900 U.K. locations Monday in a move that will likely keep some stores closed throughout the week. But KFC got out ahead of the issue and practiced the tried and true “acknowledge, align, assure” mantra—a go-to blueprint for brands needing to engage in efficient, actionable conflict resolution.

While Snapchat’s redesign has caused a fierce resistance among its user base—prompting an online petition with 1.2 million signatures asking Snap, Inc. to revert to the original design—creators and brands are poised to benefit from the facelift. Over the last month, the platform has rolled out a suite of analytics, started growing an e-commerce platform and opened up its advertising API while offering new advertisers free credits to give Snapchat a test drive.

Our weekly roundup of trends, news and personnel announcements in the world of communications and marketing. This week’s stories include the shooting in S. Florida, Facebook’s involvement with Robert Mueller’s 13 indictments for the Russians, Jamie Foxx and Shaun White make us wonder if they have PR people and Carnival Cruise Lines becomes bruise lines off Australia.

Marvel’s long-awaited “Black Panther” has already shattered box-office pre-sale records and is shaping up to be the most successful movie with an almost all-black cast ever released. But the source comic book was not always as infused with such resonant ideas about racial identity, class and power. Here’s a look at the influencers who helped reframe Black Panther’s brand and identity as a powerful avatar for black representation on the big screen.