How often have you attended an industry event about PR crises and heard someone recite the maxim attributed to Warren Buffett? “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and 5 minutes to destroy it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.” Probably so often you’ve lost count.
And, surely you’ve heard speakers add a corollary about how quickly digital technology can send news around the world, which means Buffett’s 5 minutes is closer to 2 or 3 minutes now and perhaps not even that long.
Certainly speed counts during a PR crisis. The ability to react quickly, before a situation becomes a crisis, is critical. Part of that quickness depends on how fast communicators can access critical information.
On the other hand, reacting too quickly, before communicators have had an opportunity to gather data and monitor the social conversation, can escalate what might have remained an isolated incident into something larger, even a crisis, says Kevin Elliott, SVP at Hill & Knowlton Strategies’ (PRN, Feb. 6).
The issue of speed during a crisis, impediments to successfully dealing with crisis and, for that matter, what successful crisis management looks like are a few of the questions PR News and Dataminr, a real-time information discovery company, asked PR and marketing professionals.
Some 160 executives participated in the survey during April and May.
Among the survey’s goals was to gauge preparedness for handling breaking information during a crisis, explore hurdles to successful crisis resolution and get a sense of the market’s crisis communications workflow and attitude.
As you can see from charts 1 and 2, responders are a mix of professionals from brands, nonprofits and agencies.
Immediate Access to News Found Lacking
VP, Dataminr
In sum, the survey found nearly 40% of PR professionals lack immediate access to breaking information (chart 8). Roughly the same percentage admits developments about their brand caught them off-guard (chart 4).
Looked at one way, chart 3 poses an interesting glass half-full/half-empty situation. Adding the 4% who say “I do not know” to the 20% who believe they are more reactive than proactive regarding their brand’s online presence and you have nearly 25% of responders being in the dark a bit.
True, it’s not bad for nearly 75% of communicators to say they’re proactive about their brand’s online presence, still it’s unsettling to think nearly one-quarter of responders are more reactive than proactive.
Neil Steinberg, a Dataminr VP, sees the response to question 3 differently. He considers the 20% who say they are reactive to their brand’s online presence as people who were pushed into “an all-hands-on-deck situation...so the response to this [question] makes sense.”
Can PR Pros Afford to be Off-Guard?
The situation could be seen as more troubling in the context of the next question (chart 4), about news catching PR pros off-guard. One might have expected the ratio to be closer to the previous question. Instead it’s nearer 60-40, with 40% saying they’ve been caught off-guard.
Again, there’s room for interpretation. One could argue companies are so large and so much information is flowing at such a rapid pace it’s nearly impossible for even the best communicators, those who monitor events closely using tools and other means, to never be caught off guard.
Brad Ross, executive director, corporate and customer communications in the CEO’s office of the Toronto Transit Commission, doesn’t accept this. “So much of what communications is and where it’s going,” he says, “is having people using data to monitor issues before they become crises.”
Tools are critical, Ross adds, but it’s far more important to have “the right people” analyzing data with the intention of seeking to avoid crises. He admits, though, some crises are inevitable, including those stemming from natural disasters.
What is News?
Steinberg has a different view of question 4. “If you define news as something that runs [in a media outlet], has a byline and hits the trends” section of social media sites, he says, “then I’d think the percentage of people saying ‘No’ should be nearer to 100%.”
He notes there are things “brands aren’t necessarily looking out for,” such as the possibility that a company attracts the ire of a social movement.
For example, Tiki Brand torches became associated, wrongly, with white nationalists who carried them during marches in Charlottesville, VA, in August 2017.
Lamplight Farms, owner of Tiki Brand, issued a statement August 12, 2017, distancing itself from white nationalism. “We do not support their message or the use of our products in this way,” it said. “Our products are designed to enhance backyard gatherings and to help family and friends connect with each other at home in their yard.”
Other similar examples include a neo-Nazi site embracing New Balance athletic shoes in late 2016 as its official shoe. As Tiki Brand did, New Balance pushed back against the site.
Chart 8, where nearly 65% say they have access to information as soon as it breaks, tracks with chart 7, presumably because this group is using a tool to monitor the social conversation.
The Bottom Line and Crisis
For Gene Grabowski, a veteran crisis specialist at kglobal in Washington, D.C., and a former brand communicator, the small percentage (4%) who answer they feel like a hero when they’ve saved the company money (chart 6) indicates a “troubling disconnect” between communicators and their relationship to the goals of business.
Steinberg of Dataminr concurs with Grabowski’s concern. “Customer acquisition costs are a large part of a company’s spending,” he says. If a brand can reduce customer flight through proper crisis management and/or corporate reputation management “this can be an incredibly important budget item...and a dollar figure can be attached to it.”
Customer Flight in the Digital Age
Steinberg adds customer flight is more critical today than it was 10 years ago. Dissatisfied customers now can trigger “a domino effect” by describing on social their unpleasant experiences with a brand, which could influence others to abandon the brand.
“The loss of a single customer can grow exponentially [today], so there’s a much finer point you can put on customer retention through proper crisis management.”
On the upside, Steinberg was pleased to see the results in chart 2, where 22% of responders say the C-Suite is one of their top stakeholders. This, he says, shows “communications is getting a larger role at the proverbial table…and tells you communications is in more of a proactive role and is helping to drive the business, which is in stark contrast to the response [seen in chart 6, where just 4% say they feel heroic when their actions save the company money].
Is Speed Key?
Grabowski has concerns about the 22% who say “reacting immediately” to a crisis makes them feel like a hero (chart 6). Similarly he looks warily at the 34% in chart 10 who say success is “responding immediately” to a crisis.
“Speed certainly is important,” Grabowski says, “but immediate reaction to a crisis” often is not the wisest path.
He’s happier with the 25% in chart 5 who believe “the pressure to respond to a crisis immediately” is a roadblock to success. “Managing the narrative is all that counts in a crisis,” he says.
The Assessment Moment
Steinberg agrees with Grabowski on the question of speed in a crisis. Getting information quickly, even 10-15 minutes quicker, allows communicators to have an “assessment moment” where they can look at incoming data and information and decide whether or not a situation is isolate or may grow to crisis proportions. “Even if it’s just a matter of minutes,” having time to assess a situation can prove critical, he says
“Ultimately it’s important for communications to be seen as proactive, but you want to react properly, assess the situation so you’re response is not seen as tone deaf and you’re acting intelligently,” he says.
Crisis Avoidance
Ross of the Toronto Transit Commission believes the question about success (chart 6) is missing a critical option, that is to say crisis avoidance. “Success” in a crisis, he says, “is...gathering enough data to be aware...before a situation escalates to a crisis.”
Steinberg agrees with that assessment, noting again the importance of having ample time for communicators to analyze the data and monitor the social conversation before reacting to a situation, which may or may not have the potential to become a crisis.
“You don’t want to lose customers by rushing and responding with a knee-jerk reaction to a situation...the difference between having just a few extra minutes to consider data can make a big difference” and save or cost the company money, Steinberg adds.
Chart 9 was more heartening for Grabowski since the overwhelming majority of respondents (87%) eschewed a quick response in favor of “working with internal teams” to resolve a crisis once data is gathered. On this question just 7% of responders say they “respond immediately” after gathering breaking news and information about their brand.
Chart 5 was a surprise forRoss. “Yes, there are internal issues during normal times, but siloed departments and poor internal communication should fall away when an organization is in crisis mode.” Grabowski concurs with Ross on this point.
Silos and Crisis Response
Steinberg agrees with Ross and Grabowski and adds a point about the importance of silos either being a thing of the past or at least temporarily falling away during a crisis and even before, during the assessment of a situation that might become a crisis.
Brands, Steinberg says, need to look at their response plans and see how departments are working in tandem on potential crisis events.
For example, it is important to know at what point communications is brought into a situation (if at all) after the digital team discovers something “bubbling” in the social conversation that could rise to the crisis level.
This is even more important, he says, when a brand’s digital team is separate from its communications unit.
For Ross, having more than 60% of responders say silos (25%), poor internal communications (20%) and a lack of information (17%) are major roadblocks to successful crisis response at their brands indicates a situation where a communications leader “does not have a seat at the table and is not reporting to the CEO.”
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