As the name suggests, CrisisVu was developed with the aim of helping companies better monitor the discussions around their brand in a crisis. This web-based tool gives you real-time insights and a live view of what is being tweeted and retweeted about your brand and the targeted keywords you’ve specified it to monitor. The tool really focuses on the important real-time aspect, giving you a “vu” of what’s happening on Twitter within a 40 minute time period.

Using the keyword “McDonalds” and many more keywords that involve the McD’s brand, here is a glance of the CrisisVu’s “vu”:

The Twitter stream

On the left of the tool’s “vu”, you see each and every tweet that mentions one or more of your monitored keywords. What’s cool about this is that you can pause and play the Twitter stream, in order to not get overwhelmed with a crazy influx of tweets. This allows you to read each tweet and reply to those that you want to reply to, straight from the tool.

The Vu

The Vu was designed to give you a good understanding of what’s being said about your brand on Twitter in a crisis, at a single glance. Let me give you the lo-down on what you’re looking at:

• Size: The large circles contain more tweets of a specific word, mention and/or keyword than the smaller circles
• Lines: The circles that are joined by lines indicate that there’s a connection of some sort
• Color: Trending tweets and new topics are bright red (when trending, the small red circles will gradually become larger)
• Trending: As topics stop trending, the red fades to brown, then to green before it disappears when it has completely stopped

Additional features:

• You’re able to move around the Vu, zoom in and zoom out
• The Vu is adaptable for color blind people. The color palette helps you activate this function
• You can change the colors within the vu to match those of your brand

Who CrisisVu is for

CrisisVu was designed to be for agencies and brands alike. One good aspect of their service is that, since you don’t need the tool all the time (it’s really developed to help you navigate through an online crisis), you can keep CrisisVu on retainer for “crisis-mode”, where you can simply and quickly active your account when the need arises. You can also choose to only use the tool when faced with an online crisis situation, and with an interface that is extremely easy to use and get the hang of, not more than a few minutes is needed to get brushed up on the monitoring tool’s functions.

Benefits for brands:

• Clearly see what is going on on Twitter in a crisis, at a single glance
• Manage the overwhelming influx of tweets in a crisis
• It can provide you with a way of spotting issues before they escalate

Options and benefits for agencies:

• Can be used to monitor all clients and spot crises / issues in real-time
• Can be integrated with existing platforms
• Option to white-label the tool for clients
• They offer commission and reseller opportunities

My notes and comments after trying out the tool

It’s certainly an interesting tool that’s worth taking a 30 day trial and testing out. What I did notice, however, is that unless you’re a brand with lots of online mentions in a crisis situation, the tool may not be beneficial to you. It really benefits those who have an influx of tweets at the same time. For this, the tool is great. It helps you manage the incoming tweets while keeping a birds-eye-view on the overall mentions and chatter around your brand, including what’s new and what’s trending.

However, for the smaller online issues and crises that may get a bunch of tweets over a week’s period, for example, rather than within 24 hours, it won’t be useful to you since the tool is really real-time focused (which is excellent), and deletes tweets older than approximately 40 minutes. For these situations, a tool like Hootsuite would be better suited.

The downside: At the moment, you need to have a person/monitoring team monitoring the Vu, as alerts have not yet been integrated into the platform. Apparently, this is something that they’re working on.

The upside: As CrisisVu is a new company, they’re open to feedback, suggestions, comments and criticism, and they take it all very openly with the aim of perfecting their tool for their clients. The fact that they’re still a start-up is also on your side at the moment in terms of price-point.

All in all, if you have the need, I definitely recommend giving CrisisVu a test-run.

What about you? Have you used this monitoring tool before? If so, please share your feedback with us below in the comments section!

And that’s how it’s done, ladies and gentlemen!

I often elaborate on, and explore, the differences between a social media issue and a social media crisis. More often than not, what ends up developing into a crisis could have been avoided, had the brand addressed and dealt with the issue while it was still in the “issues” phase. The fact that so many fires can easily be avoided by evaluating the risks, identifying the red flags and potential of the issue on-hand, and by responding appropriately, is a reason in itself why every company out there needs to be prepared with a proper social media issues and crisis management plan, as well as proper training for the brand’s executives, frontline employees and crisis management teams.

Because both posts explain within themselves the potential threat and the reason why this issue was quickly resolved and never escalated further, I need not post more than the two screenshots below. Read both the initial provocation and the excellent reply by DKNY, and then ask yourself the following:

If faced with a similar situation, are you confident that your team would:

a) Be one of the first to become aware of the situation, in real-time?
b) Be able to extinguish this potential fire before it began to go viral, quickly escalating into a potential crisis?

The DKNY social media issue that never escalated

Brandon Stanton, of Humans of New York, posted the following to his Facebook Fan page:

Within a few short hours, DKNY posted the following post to their Facebook fan page:

Crisis well-averted, DKNY, props to you and your team! Now how bout you? Are you confident that your team is able to avert a social media crisis by promptly and appropriately responding to an online issue or problem?

This infographic was created by SDL

photo by: kimdokhac

So what should DKNY do?

Honestly, it depends on them. If they want to match the donation and calm the cries, then they could, though this would only lead to more banter about how they only did it because everyone made them. The fact of the matter is, DKNY handled the initial mistake beautifully. They immediately corrected the error, issued an apology, complimented the photographer and decided to make a donation of 25K to the YMCA. The initial request for a donation of 100K was a little extreme, in my opinion, and one would have hoped that the brand would have been praised for their quick response and rectification of the situation AND for their generous donation. Unfortunately, such was not the case.

Though I talk often of the “court of public opinion” and as it’s important to consider this court prior to and during any crisis response/management, brands can also not succumb to bullying when they’ve done everything in their power to sincerely right a wrong. In my opinion, DKNY is doing right by standing by their initial response and decision.

Let’s not forget that the positive end to this entire situation remains that the YMCA has received $100,000 in donations and that Humans of New York were not only righted for the wrong done, but have also gained exponentially in brand-awareness.

Below the infographic, you’ll find additional links to past posts I’ve written that take you deeper into actually putting the excellent advice within this infographic to use. Take a look:

The Ultimate Guide to Monitoring Your Online Reputation

This infographic was designed by Avalaunch Media and was originally posted here.

Basically, it allows you to create a tweet and then it generates a link for you to insert into your online copy, allowing others to easily tweet out your message. Wanna see what I mean? Click here.

What is the potential of Click to Tweet for your crisis communications?

In a crisis we want our audience to help spread our message. Some even go as far as blatantly asking their audience to retweet specific tweets from the company’s account. Personally, I’ve never been a fan of these types of requests – if someone wants to retweet and share your message, they’ll do so on their own. However, there’s nothing wrong with making it easy for them to do so on their own – and ClicktoTweet allows you to do just that!

Your crisis communications should be created around key message points that you want to communicate with your stakeholders. By using a tool such as ClicktoTweet within your online crisis communications, you make it easy for your brand advocates to share these key message points.

Don’t go “click to tweet” crazy!

Be careful! Don’t go and fill up your entire page with “click to tweet” or “tweet this” links everywhere! You’ll want to concoct one (max two) strong tweets that really relay your key message point in a crisis. Be crafty and subliminal, not overwhelming or demanding.

The downside of the tool

So far, it seems best to shorten your links yourself, since the tool doesn’t seem to do that for you, using up a big portion of your 140 available characters on the link. However, the tool is still in its infancy, and I hope that this is just a minor hiccup that ClickToTweet will soon resolve.

Have you experimented with ClicktoTweet, whether in your crisis communications, marketing communications or blog posts? If so, share your experiences and evaluations of the tool with us below!

At the time of this writing (Tuesday, late afternoon), Jeep and Twitter had both to yet release statements. Jeep should have been quicker to release the typical “we’re on it statement” and Twitter should be bracing itself for the high possibility that all of these hacks will end up reflecting poorly on the social media brand in the end. Therefore, Twitter should be preparing and issuing statements regarding the importance of their users’ passwords and account protection, as well as what they’re currently doing to look into these series of hacks and how they will better protect their users in the future.

Advice to all you brands out there – Twitter included

Nothing online is 100% safe from hackers. Not your banking information and certainly not your social media accounts. This is true for every single brand that is online in one shape or form. That said, there are a number of precautionary measures that you should be taking in order to protect and prepare your brand for such threats and risks – a risk assessment being at the top of that list.

Online hackings are a risk that we can all prepare for (and do our best to prevent) before they happen. All these brands who have experienced a Twitter hacking in the last few days – and even Twitter itself – should have been prepared with a plan-of-action and a social media crisis communications plan prior to Monday.

Here are two articles on preventing and preparing your online accounts from being hacked:

• How to Protect Your Accounts from Hackers
• Your Social Media Account Has Been Hacked. Now What?

It will be interesting to see what Twitter does now. And don’t worry, if it’s interesting, ridiculous or educational in any way, you can rest assured that I’ll be blogging about it!

Have you evaluated the risks that social media and the Internet present to your brand? I sure hope so. However, if you haven’t and don’t know how, here’s a good place to start. Now hop-to!

Though there are many aspects that I could write about regarding the way Carnival Cruises handled the management of this crisis, I’ve chosen to evaluate and analyze their social media crisis communications (go figure!). The following evaluates both Carnival Cruises Facebook and Twitter crisis communications, from beginning to end of the crisis.

What You Can Learn From Carnival Cruise’s Crisis Communications on Social Media

Timely and consistent updates
I was, of course, glad to see that Carnival Cruises were consistent and timely with their social media updates during the crisis. I counted almost 20 updates on Facebook and countless tweets, ranging from updates to apologies to thank you’s and press releases. Each update was timely and quite informative.

However, I do have to note that some of their updates, especially those towards the beginning of the crisis, tended to be too repetitive. Since each Facebook update is right next to each other, it’s not required to relentlessly repeat the same details over and over again. When there’s no new news to report, it’s OK to say so. Detailed repeats tend to get repetitive, giving the allure that you’re simply trying to speak for the sake of speaking, or worse, avoiding important issues that should be addressed and replacing them with fluff.

CEO Gerry Cahill’s first statement
It took him a while to do so, but when he finally published a statement, CEO Gerry Cahill was informative, apologetic and caring, stating that:

“[...] We’re terribly sorry for the inconvenience, discomfort, and frustration our guests are feeling. We know they expected a fantastic vacation, and clearly that is not what they received. Our shipboard and shoreside teams are working around the clock to care for our guests and get them home safely.”

However, with the conditions that his guests found themselves miserably in, Cahill should have been much quicker to be front and centre of this crisis.

One thing that I would like to address is the format in which Carnival Cruises published Cahill’s first statement. This was well done. They made it visibly clear that the message was from the president and CEO of Carnival Cruise Lines, properly dating and time-stamping the post. Take a look:

Dating and time-stamping their updates
With nearly 20 updates and posts on their Facebook timeline, Carnival Cruises did a good job at dating, time-stamping and declaring each new update. This is especially important to do when:

• A crisis goes on for days
• Multiple updates are being posted
• Updating on a platform such as Facebook where the timeline zig-zags and can often get confusing

Press releases
Within their social media updates, Carnival Cruises announced when their press release was to be held, tweeted and posted soundbites from the press release, announced its end and published both a link to the press release once it was available and embedded it straight into a Facebook post. This was extremely well done.

Confronted wide-spread questions and addressed rumors in real-time
It’s extremely important to be monitoring the online discussions in a crisis. Carnival Cruises showed that they were paying attention when they posted an update addressing a question that was being widely asked and discussed online. They addressed the question, addressed the fact that many were wondering about it and then provided a reasonable answer for their decisions.

On Twitter, they went a step further than this and also addressed some rumors that were beginning to form online, quickly correcting them before they spiralled out of control. The last thing you want in a crisis is for additional rumors to begin to spread. This is another great example of the importance of listening as well as communicating in a crisis.

Communicating resources for more information
Carnival Cruises consistently reminded concerned family members and friends of the correct numbers to call for more information:

“We have contacted the designated emergency contacts for all guests presently on board Carnival Triumph. Concerned family and loved ones of guests and crew may call 888.290.5095 or 305.406.5534.”

CEO’s presence on the scene
The fact that president and CEO, Gerry Cahill was present on the scene when the ship finally docked was extremely important. Announcing his presence via online channels and expressing his gratitude and sincere regret was equally important. Cahill did this well in a couple different social media updates, as was needed.

Thank you’s and marking the end of the crisis
I say this often: it’s important to mark the end of a crisis. People need to know that it’s over and what next steps the brand is taking to make sure that the situation doesn’t happen again. Equally important are sincere thank you’s and apologies where they’re due. Carnival Cruises did this well.

All in all, I have to say that Carnival Cruises did a thorough and sincere job at communicating with their audience throughout this crisis on their social media channels. There are tons of excellent examples and strategies within this case study that I hope you will incorporate into your own social media crisis communications plan.

What additional observations did you make throughout this crisis? Feel free to share your thoughts and experiences with me below in the comments section.

There’s no mistaking the impact of strong negative emotion with which your stakeholders will identify, in a social media incident, that immediately escalates the would-be incident to a crisis level. I say there’s no mistaking it, but really, this critical red flag is mistaken – or just plain missed – quite often.

Let’s take the Applebee’s recent social media crisis as a beautiful example: A waitress violated a customer’s right to privacy by posting a bill with a less-than-polite note and the customer’s signature to Reddit. (For a more thorough look and analysis of the Applebee’s social media crisis, click here.) Normally, this would call for dismissal – especially since the waitress had been forewarned of the potential consequences of such actions.

So what makes this case so different? Why did it explode in outrage and attacks against the Applebee’s brand, online?

Applebee’s, having (unwisely) not been prepared with a social media crisis plan, did not understand, nor were they capable of identifying a major aspect of this situation that was a sure-fire sign that this had “crisis potential” written all over it.

Let me explain.

There is a difference between a social media crisis and a social media issue. Under normal circumstances, this event would have typically been a social media issue. However, do to the strong negative emotional impact the situation had on its audience, Applebee’s failed to see its potential for viral disaster.

One definitive way of detecting a social media crisis vs. a social media issue is by evaluating the emotional impact of the situation on your stakeholders. – tweet this

In other words, if the situation you’re dealing with has a strong negative emotional aspect with which clients, staff and/or your market will identify, it must immediately be escalated to the “social media crisis” level.

Where was the strong negative emotional impact, you ask?

Many people (myself included) have spent time in the service industry. We’ve experienced the highs and lows of working with the public for not very much money, putting up with the many different characters that make up our society, and have even been stiffed on tips – on probably more than one occasion. The note that the pastor left for that poor waitress on the bill AND the fact that, at a glance, one would assume that a zero with a line through it meant she received no tip at all, stirs up a lot of emotion in the vast majority of people. People who have been there in some shape or form, at one time or another.

Had Applebee’s been prepared with a social media crisis management plan before this situation occurred, or, had they hired a professional who truly understood the rules and laws of online crisis and issues management, they would have clearly identified this situation as potentially having a much stronger impact on their audience than anticipated.

What I would like you to take away from this blog post

It’s quite simple and straight forward:

1. Negative emotion with which your stakeholders can identify = potential crisis, make that a potential viral crisis situation
2. Equip your brand and your team with a social media crisis and issues management plan before you need one

A strong online crisis management plan has many components to it that help protect and prepare your brand from online disasters, threats, risks – you name it. The smartest thing a company can do in today’s digitally dominated world is equip themselves to be ready. Are you equipped?

photo by: Mysi(new stream: www.flickr.com/photos/mysianne)

Here’s another video with Whitney C. Gibson, Internet defamation attorney, Chris Anderson, cyber-investigator, and myself discussing what Internet defamation is, what red flags you should look out for and the big mistakes that victims of online defamation tend to make that we want you to be sure to avoid. As usual, you can download the podcast version of this discussion below the video.

What is Internet defamation?

Listen to this recording as a podcast, or download the .mp3 file to listen to in your car or from your iPod

Listen to podcast:

Download .mp3 here: Click here to download .mp3

About Whitney C. Gibson:

Whitney C. Gibson is an attorney in the Cincinnati office of Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease LLP. He has experience representing companies and individuals in cases involving Internet issues, including Internet defamation.

About Chris Anderson:

Chris Anderson, Ph.D, is co-founder of Cyber Investigation Services, LLC. Chris’s firm provides support to both clients and their attorneys who are experiencing a wide variety of internet attacks.

Are you a victim of Internet defamation?

If you’re a victim of Internet defamation, we can help. The sooner you get in touch, the better. Internet defamation doesn’t just disappear on its own. It gets worse and worse until it has a direct negative impact on your reputation and actual sales. Contact Melissa Agnes Crisis Management today for immediate help.

photo by: dominicotine

This Q&A Monday post answers a question posed by reader, Lisa Frizzell:

How can social media be used to manage organized attacks from opponents?

Being attacked by opponents with campaigns on social media that go – or have the potential of going – viral is a fear that many brands share in common. Especially when you look at the attacks that well-organized Greenpeace have successfully launched against organizations the likes of Nestlé and BP.

So what if this happens to you? What if an opponent of yours decides to launch an online campaign with the aim of hurting your organization’s reputation? From fake social media accounts that cause havoc with your online supporters, as we saw with Just Jeans’s social media issue, to more aggressively orchestrated campaigns like Greenpeace’s Kit Kat video campaign. How can you protect your brand against such attacks before and during their execution?

Preventing and preparing for social media attacks from opponents

Step 1: Have your online reputation established beforehand
I say this often: The stronger your online presence is before any sort of online attack, the better it is for your brand. This includes:

• Having strong search engine rankings for your website and all targeted keywords, including but not limited to: company name, products, services, industry terms and executives’ names
• Developing strong relationships of good-will with your market on social media and other online platforms
• Positioning your company as a thought-leader within the industry by publishing studies, reports, blog posts, articles, tweeting and sharing valuable links from others, etc

Why is this a good strategy?
Having no online presence leaves you extremely vulnerable, as does having a weak one. When you find yourself in social media hot water and people start Googling your company name and related keywords, you want your positive messaging to be found as much as possible. Not having a strong online presence will make this task much harder for you to achieve when negative content is being published about your brand by others.

Step 2: Plan for the worst, before the worst happens
This means having a contingency plan in place – and making sure your employees are trained for it. This should include, but is not limited to:

• Having the ability to detect the red flags
• Developing response and communications strategies – including holding statements where applicable
• Creating visual triage charts and making them accessible to each one of your employees for quick referral
• Developing response guidelines and policies
• Establishing escalation protocols
• Developing a contact flow chart
• Establishing and training a social media crisis and issues team

Strategies for dealing with social media attacks by opponents

Every situation is different, but the following are some questions and strategies to consider when preparing for (or worse, reacting and responding to) social media attacks by opponents:

• What types of situations merit or call for a response from your brand, and in what situations will a public response make the situation worse?
• Who within the organization should respond and how? Does it call for your front-line employees in order to connect with your audience, or is it severe enough that your CEO should be addressing the situation head-on?
• What type of response is needed? A video response to confront a video attack? Responding on the original channel and then linking to a more complete response published to one of your own channels?…
• Should you get creative like Bodyform decided to do in response to a Facebook rant on their wall?
• How can you get your loyal advocates and fans to help you through this situation?
• Which high-profile blogs and news sites are, or will be, reporting on the subject, and should you consider going on-record with an interview in order to help get your message out there?
• What does your audience and market need to hear from you? Do you need to apologize for your actions and let them know how you will make sure this situation never happens again? Do you need to stand up and defend yourself? Which strategy will bring you closer to your audience, developing stronger ties and good-will?
• If the campaign is based on rumors and falsehoods, how can you prove the truth and what types of legal actions can you consider pursuing, if any?

The best thing that your company or organization can do, is consider all of the above questions, options and strategies before you find yourself in this type of unfortunate situation. We’re all at risk of being attacked online in one form or another, and it’s a risk that needs to be planned and prepared for in advance.

To weigh out the best strategies for your brand and to develop those strategies into plans of action, contact Melissa Agnes Crisis Management.

photo by: avinashkunnath

What truly impressed me about this crisis was the way Atlanta Public Schools leveraged Twitter to keep parents and the public informed. From their twitter handle, @apsupdate, Atlanta Public Schools:

• Consistently updated the public in real-time
• Tweeted details of how the school was reaching and keeping parents informed
• Answered incoming inquiries on Twitter
• Updated the public in both English and Spanish, accommodating both of their audiences
• Linked to more detailed information
• During the press conference, they tweeted out tweet-able statements made by the leading officer
• Were open to criticism and vowed to learn from their mistakes – which they proved over the next few days
• Continued tweeting and updating their audience well after the crisis was over

However, from what I gathered, there was one main (and very large) concern from parents of Price Middle School: They felt that they were not receiving prompt updates. This leads me to believe that, although the school was utilizing social media very well to communicate with the public, the parents of the students inside the school were unaware.

An important thing to remember for your crisis communications plan

There is no sense in having a crisis communications plan if no one is aware of what it entails. That said, you must make sure that all stakeholders are aware of your crisis communications plan before a crisis occurs, and that everyone is up-to-speed on how, when and where to receive these communications and updates in a crisis.

Tweets tweeted out by Atlanta Public School during last week’s crisis

Take a minute to read the below tweets. There are some very valuable tweets and lessons that should be incorporated into your own crisis communications plan:

An Atlanta Public Schools student has suffered a gunshot injury at Price Middle School.

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

The injured student has been transported to Grady Hospital. Suspect in custody.

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

All parents notified via phone, text, email. #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Price, Carver and Slater are all on lockdown.

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Parent messages went out to all listed in our database at 3:04pm. #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

All schools are following their ApPD/ APS approved safety procedures for this type of emergency. #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Update: we are releasing Price walking students first at normal dismissal time. #aps

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Carpool riders at Price will be released second, followed by buses. #aps

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Press release has been posted on district website. #price #aps atlantapublicschools.us

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Normal dismissal today for Price Middle School. Press conference at 4pm at district headquarters.

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Walkers & carpoolers from Price MS have been transported to Emmanuel Baptist at 1582 Bickers Atl 30315. #aps #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Thanks for your patience. Students are continuing to be dismissed from Price MS. Walkers/Carpoolers being taken to Emmanuel Baptist. #aps

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

@goldietaylor Thanks for understanding. Confirming all facts before press conference. #aps #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Less than 10 minutes away from start of press conference. #price #aps

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

@avjudkins absolutely. All parents, in our database have the ability to receive text/ calls/emails.

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Press Conference now starting. #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Student is expected to be released from hospital tonight according to parents says Supt. #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

Chief Turner confirms that our armed School Resource Officer subdued the suspect & took him into custody. #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

They also kept people updated in Spanish:

Un estudiante de las Escuelas Públicas de Atlanta (APS) ha sufrido una herida por arma de fuego en la….

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) January 31, 2013

They were open to criticism and advice:

@lizgarnermusic We appreciate the feedback. Will share your tweet with our comm team. #price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) February 1, 2013

@mizrik excellent point. Actually brainstorming now w/team member via phone about more ways to express/explain safety plans. #Price

— ATL Public Schools (@apsupdate) February 1, 2013

The tweets continued to go on in this informative fashion until well after the crisis was resolved and all students were safely in their homes.

There are a number of excellent lessons to take away from Atlanta Middle School’s excellent Twitter communications during this unfortunate school shooting. I hope that you were able to take value from this example and incorporate these points of communication within your own company’s crisis management plan.

Picture credit: reddit.com

However, the heat didn’t come down upon Applebee’s until the Pastor, who was embarrassed by the fact that her words were going viral online, called the fast food chain and demanded that the waitress (and, gasp, everyone else on duty that day) be fired.

When Applebee’s complied and terminated the waitress’s job, the wrath of social media and the public was quick to come down on the brand – and hard.

With thousands upon thousands of negative comments flooding in, here’s a (very) small taste of what Applebee’s has been experiencing on their Facebook page alone:

As you can clearly see, the attacks on Applebee’s is due to their decision to fire the waitress, which leads us all to contemplate the following:

Should Applebee’s have fired the waitress?

True: The waitress violated the customer’s right to privacy, and this “right to privacy” is clearly outlined within Applebee’s hand book, as stated within their (weak) initial response to the crisis on Facebook:

“When she was hired, the team member was provided the franchisee’s employee hand book which includes their social media policy and states: Employees must honor the privacy rights of APPLEBEE’s and its employees by seeking permission before writing about or displaying internal APPLEBEE’S happenings that might be considered to be a breach of privacy and confidentiality. This shall include, but not be limited to, posting of photographs, video, or audio of APPLEBEE’S employees or its customers, suppliers, agents or competitors, without first obtaining written approval from the Vice President of Operations. The policy goes on to specify: Employees who violate this policy will be subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination of employment.”

Therefore, the waitress, according to the franchise, was clearly aware of the potential repercussions of her actions.

Rebuttal #1: Many are arguing that the Pastor clearly wanted her words to be seen as she wrote them plainly and added the word “Pastor” above her signature.

Rebuttal #2: Apparently Applebee’s violated this same “right to privacy” rule just a short while ago when they themselves published the following image to their social network:

Image credit: If you can’t afford to tip, you can’t afford to go out and eat!

One also has to consider the decision of firing the employee as an “example to be made”. Professionals who deal with the public on a regular basis have to understand where to draw the social and online lines. You can’t just post the confidential information of a customer every time you are upset by a situation. However, this example would have been better-made had Applebee’s NOT done this exact same thing themselves. Albeit that their posting was of a positive situation, but these sorts of policies cannot have hypocritical standards.

The court of pubic opinion

As is said often in crisis management situations, there are two courts to consider: the court of law (which Applebee’s is technically protected under due to their clearly stated rules and guidelines within their hand book), and the court of public opinion. Unfortunately due to Applebee’s poor decision making, they are being prosecuted – and losing – in the court of public opinion.

So, should the waitress have been fired?

With all of the above in consideration, and mainly two very heavy aspects of this particular scenario in mind:

1. Applebee’s hypocrisy
2. The court of public opinion

Applebee’s would have been much better to announce that the waitress had made a mistake, but although they themselves have not been leading by good example, that they would be reviewing the situation, reevaluating their social media policies and making sure that this type of situation would not happen again, on any front. They should have then included that their customers’ confidentiality is of high importance and that the waitress has been given a warning, apologizes and promises not to take such actions again. They then could have completed this statement with a line on how their servers are valued by the Applebee’s brand and deserve to be treated better than the note left on the table suggests.

Had Applebee’s taken this approach to managing the situation, they would have been regarded as a brand with excellent crisis communications skills and it all would have ended there. Unfortunately, this is not the case and Applebee’s has been drowning themselves in poor decision after poor response for the past few days. For more on Applebee’s many social media crisis communications #fails during this incident, read this article.

What to take away and learn from Applebee’s social media crisis

Lessons for brands:

• Applebee’s is not the first restaurant to face the wrath of social media for one reason or another. Restaurants, and any brand that deals with the public on a B2C level, have a whole set of risks that need to be assessed and prepared for in advance. If your brand is a B2C and you don’t currently have a strong social media crisis management plan in-place, than this is something that needs to go to the top of your to-do list, a.s.a.p.
• Understand and evaluate both the court of law and the court of public opinion before you release your statements and take action in a crisis. Weigh these risks out and evaluate them with your brand’s policies, brand-promise, ethics and voice in-mind. Play devil’s advocate and make sure you are fully aware of the potential repercussions of your actions and reactions in a crisis.

Lesson for individuals and employees:

• Things go viral. Especially interesting, relatable and emotional things. Remember this before you post or publish content to the web. The Applebee’s waitress was quoted saying: “I originally posted the note as a lighthearted joke… I thought the note was insulting, but it was also comical. I posted it to Reddit because I thought other users would find it entertaining.” With all the examples we see take shape online on a regular basis, this waitress should have been more aware of the potential repercussions of her actions. Don’t make her mistake.

That said, it’s important to note that: had she taken care not to reveal the Pastor’s name / signature, this would have been a completely different story. (The image of the bill seen above does not reveal the Pastor’s signature. This is not the original image that was posted to Reddit, it’s a cropped version.) Had the waitress chosen to crop out the signature immediately before posting it to the web, she would be finding herself in a very different situation today.

Lots of lessons and learning opportunities can be taken from other companies’ social media crises and issues. For a list of other social media crises to learn from, visit this page.

The basic functionality of HyperAlerts

HyperAlerts is a free tool used for monitoring your (or any) Facebook page. You can choose to receive alerts for new posts posted to the Facebook page, new comments on posts, the administrator’s comments and posts – and you can choose to receive these notifications in your inbox in real-time, hourly, daily, weekly or monthly. You also don’t require to be administrator of a Facebook page in order to receive alerts for said page.

Who is HyperAlerts good for?

If you’re a small company who doesn’t get bombarded with Facebook comments and posts, than HyperAlerts may be worth looking into since it’s free, easy to use and efficient.

If you’re a larger company that gets many Facebook comments and posts each day, week or month, than you may choose to use HyperAlerts to send you weekly or monthly reports of your Facebook activity, in order for you to evaluate it, use it within your reporting or file it away in your records.

Below is a view of my own account. It’s literally this simple to create and manage your alerts:

If you choose to receive the alerts in real-time, there’s usually about a 30 minute lag between post and notification. This is important to note if/when you’re in crisis or pre-crisis mode.

Here’s a view of how HyperAlerts sends you notifications, straight to your inbox. I’m set to receive the alerts in real-time, and this one came in approximately 30 minutes after the comment was left on my page:

Pro/con list

Pros of HyperAlerts

• If you’re a small to medium sized company that doesn’t get a massive amount of Facebook chatter, this tool will help keep you alert of the activity on your Facebook page 24/7/365
• You can have others monitor your Facebook page without giving them admin access
• It’s free and pretty efficient
• If you get a lot of Facebook activity, you can set HyperAlerts to send you a weekly or monthly recording of all your Facebook activity to review or keep on file
• HyperAlerts provides you with an unlimited amount of alerts and Facebook pages to monitor

Cons of HyperAlerts:

• If you get loads of Facebook activity, real-time, hourly and even daily emails may be overwhelming
• If you’re admin of the page, Facebook provides you with *actual* real-time alerts of your Facebook page activity
• This tool is only designed for Facebook and is very basic, it will only meet basic needs of functionality
• There’s a lag on the “real-time” functionality

So if HyperAlerts sounds like a tool that may benefit your company’s Facebook monitoring needs, then by all means, try it out – and don’t forget to let me know how it goes!

Have you played around with HyperAlerts? If so, what can you add to this review? Leave your comments below.

For more social media monitoring tool reviews, click here.

Why are tweet-worthy messages important in a crisis?

Soundbites are a powerful thing. (For everything you need to know about soundbites, I recommend reading Brad Phillips’s new book, The Media Training Bible) In a crisis, you want your message to be powerful, to the point, memorable and seen by the right people. Being prepared with a strategic and to-the-point soundbite is a good way to accomplish this crisis communications mission. Now, what if your soundbite was so strategically thought-out that it was short enough to fit into a tweet – and better yet, short enough to be retweeted by others?

This would:

• Up your chances of retweets, and thus providing you with the potential for maximum views
• Make your message easy for others to write about, talk about and share
• Leave your audience with choice-words that are memorable and to the point

So, while developing your crisis communications plan, remember to include some guidelines for creating tweet-able soundbites. To be even better prepared, include some generic tweet-ables within your crisis plan’s holding statements section.

Tips to creating and sharing tweet-able crisis communications messages

• Keep it short (aim for 100 characters or less)
• Make it catchy, memorable and to the point
• Keep it in-line with your overall crisis communications messages
• Include a Vine strategy where possible
• Share it with your audience from your own channels
• Make it a “Tweet-able” link from your blog, website and/or newsroom
• Ask your loyal followers to help share your message

So, next time you’re working on your crisis communications plan – or worse, next time you find yourself in a crisis – remember to make your message memorable and tweet-able.

What are your thoughts and/or experiences on creating tweet-able messages in a crisis? Feel free to share them with me below!

Lesson 84. Truth Six: Your Receptionist Needs Media Training

I once wrote an article for the Mr. Media Training Blog to help executives prepare for an unexpected crisis; it included the following suggestion:

“If a journalist calls you and asks you for comment about a breaking crisis that you haven’t heard about yet, you don’t have to comment immediately. Tell the reporter it’s the first you’ve heard about it, that you’ll look into it immediately, and that you’ll return their phone call as soon as you know more.”

I thought that was sound advice, but a journalist wrote in to take me to task. She wrote this pointed response:

“Who cares if executives turn down an interview? I regularly circumvent the executives at the beginning of a crisis. I prefer to start talking to the receptionist instead. He or she always knows more anyway—and they’re usually more willing to talk.”

That’s a good point. Reporters occasionally avoid “official” channels in an effort to get more candid, less scripted responses from staffers lower on the hierarchy chart. And too often, receptionists—notoriously more plugged in to company gossip than most are—inadvertently say something to reporters that they shouldn’t.

It’s always a good idea to train your receptionists how to handle media calls, but it’s even more critical to prepare them for an unexpected crisis.

Receptionists are your frontline personnel. They’re frequently the first people to learn of a crisis, tipped off by a phone call from a reporter, a colleague, or a stranger. There’s little point in investing thousands of dollars to train your executive team how to manage a crisis effectively if your receptionists or administrative assistants undermine your best efforts by saying something they shouldn’t.

And it’s not just receptionists. You should also prepare security guards, who may be the first people to greet uninvited camera crews. If security guards aren’t told otherwise, their first instinct too often is to place a hand in front of the camera’s lens while impolitely telling the cameraperson to get lost. That aggressive footage usually gets aired.

Don’t overlook the spouses of your executives, either. They may answer their home phones during a burgeoning crisis and say something like, “Yeah, I think there was an explosion or something at the plant. But you just missed Dawn—she already headed down there.”

Oops. Dawn’s husband just became the reporter’s confirming source.

You don’t have to enroll your receptionists, security guards, and other support personnel in a media training class. Instead, create a policy that describes the protocol for unexpected contacts with the media. Share it with your entire staff. Don’t just do it once—they’ll need regular reminders.

And remember: When you have temps staffing your phones along the way, fill them in on your media procedures. Those “temps” have your company’s reputation in their hands.

Additional Note from Melissa Agnes: This sound advice isn’t just meant for the traditional media. Reporters and intrigued clients and the public can easily reach out to different members of your staff via Twitter and other online channels in a crisis. Make sure that your policies include when, where and how to respond to such online inquiries. A simple question sent via Twitter can be less threatening than a reporter calling the office or showing up at the receptionist’s desk, so it’s important that your staff realize that the consequences can be just as dire by replying to the “innocent” tweet.

> To read my full review of Brad Phillips’s book, The Media Training Bible, click here.
> To order a copy of The Media Training Bible, click here.

photo by: Suburban Eye Care

However, it also presents a new form of an already existing risk for brand online: the risk of someone recording a form of negativity and uploading it to the Internet. With Vine, this type of situation risks going viral faster than a tweet that links to the same video on YouTube, because it’s right there in everyone’s stream, right on Twitter. Think back to the crisis FedEx experienced when one of their delivery guys was caught carelessly throwing a package over the recipient’s gate, on camera. This video has over 8 million views on YouTube and went viral almost instantly. Imagine how many more views it may have reached had it also been a 6 second looping video trending on Twitter.

What should your brand be doing, right now, with the launch of Vine?

Vine is definitely an app that your company or organization needs to:

• Get familiar with
• Include within your social media crisis communications plan
• Understand the risk that it presents to your brand
• Plan for that risk within your social media crisis management plan

It’s never been a secret that your social media crisis plan needs to be evaluated and updated regularly. With the launch of Vine and the potential opportunities and risks that it presents to your organization online, now is one of those times to evaluate and update your online crisis plan.

If you’re interested, here’s a Mashable post that elaborates on how to share Vine videos on Tumblr.

Editor’s Note:

Hi Melissa, can you please write something related to how brands can overcome damage already incurred to their brand in a crisis, by means of social media activity?

In truth Vidit, it really depends on the particular situation and the brand. However, below are some good key points to remember and focus on when trying to re-build your brand’s good name post-crisis:

• The more honest, transparent and sincere you are with your audience, the more you will appeal to them on a human level and gain their trust and forgiveness.
• Learn your lesson. State what you are doing to make sure that it doesn’t happen again – and then actually make sure that it doesn’t happen again.
• Sincerely apologize when an apology is due.
• When in doubt, always remember to focus on building a relationship with your market. Well-established relationships go a long way in and out of a crisis.
• Be careful about what marketing messages and campaigns you launch during and immediately after the crisis.

Always remember: The best way to recoup your brand after a crisis is to have managed the crisis effectively when it was taking place. This means:

• Not ignoring the crisis in hopes that it will go away
• Responding to the public’s inquiries and demands for updates in real-time, with an understanding and sympathetic tone, while being as open and honest as you possibly can
• Put the victims of the crisis and the public first.
• Be real. Be human. Be sincere. Be honest. Be understanding. Be current. Be reliable. Be apologetic.

Do you have a social media crisis or online reputation management-related question that you’d like me to answer via a thorough blog post? If so, send it over!

I talk a lot about trust on this blog. Building trust with your clients and market, how CEOs should be putting “going social” on their list of to-do’s for 2013, and a whole bunch of other trust-related topics that involve helping you better build and protect your brand’s reputation. Well, I’ve got good news! According to the recently released Edelman Trust Barometer, trust is slowly on the rise – though not by anything that’s worth bragging about.

Apparently Canadian, German, Swedish and Swiss companies are amongst the most trusted companies around the world, and banks and financial institutions are amongst the least trusted industries globally. (Apparently people tend to remember all the scandals of recent years – go figure!)

The Story of Trust 2013

The below video is a short synopsis of the survey, titled “The Story of Trust 2013″, and explains what the Edelman Trust Barometer calls “A crisis of leadership”. You can bet that this is a topic I’ll be touching on and discussing in future posts, but for now, check out the short video below, and if you’re inspired, leave me your comments, thoughts and personal and professional observations below in the comments section.

It’s interesting to watch and see where we, as a whole, place our trust in brands and industries. So take three minutes to watch the video and be sure to pay close attention to what the video refers to as “The new dynamic: the diamond of influence”.

So what does this mean for you in 2013?

What should you and your company or organization be doing with all of the knowledge gained from the online crises of 2012? You should take them as a lesson and learn from them!

To help you better do that, I’ve compiled a list of must-do’s for each and every company and organization, no matter your industry type or company size, in 2013. One of your main focuses this year, sans faute, should be to understand the risks that social media and the Internet present to your brand’s reputation, in order to prevent the preventable and prepare for the unpreventable.

Consider the following as a checklist to get you started in the right direction. I can’t stress enough just how important this is for you to do. In this day and age of many risks and threats, you’d better believe that you have two choices: be safe or be sorry.

Here’s how you can be safe:

• Focus on building credible and real relationships with your clients, prospective clients and fans, online
• Actively monitor your online reputation 24/7/365
• Dedicate some time to conducting a vulnerability audit (or risk assessment), in order to detect crisis-vulnerable-areas within your organization that need strengthening
• Empower your team with the knowledge, tools and motivation to be your brand’s biggest advocates – this can go a very long way!
• Develop policies and procedures for identifying, responding to and resolving all types of social media issues and crises that may arise over the course of the next year
• Focus on your brand and executives’ online reputation. (Here’s a resource to get you started on that)

* For more information on why your CEO and executives should consider being active on social media, click here

In 2013 you have no excuse not to be aware and protected – or at least well-prepared. 2012 was a huge wake-up call to many companies and organizations across the globe, and if you think the risks will decrease in 2013, well, they won’t. So use the above as a guide to identify areas within your company or organization that may need strengthening, and take proactive control of your brand’s online reputation – today!

If you need any help or guidance with the above mentioned checklist, don’t hesitate to contact Melissa Agnes Crisis Management. You can learn more about us and the services we offer, here.

photo by: Nationaal Archief

As it promises on the cover, The Media Training Bible is complete with “101 Things You Absolutely, Positively Need to Know Before Your Next Interview”, including sections and lessons on everything from: developing your brand’s key message points and message supports, what to wear, where to look, how to answer the tough questions, what your body language tells your audience, the different types of media formats and how to prepare and handle each one, and – you guessed it – a complete and thorough section on handling the different types of media in a crisis.

A compelling read that makes you feel as though you have your own, personal media trainer in your pocket – or on your shelf. This book teaches you everything you need to know about handling the media and shining your brand in the most positive of lights, in and out of a crisis, when you’re ‘on the record’ – and off, as Brad forewarns!

Who should read The Media Training Bible?

This is a book that you’ll want your spokespersons to have on-hand before each interview, just as you’ll want every one of your front-line employees and executives to read. As Brad points out in lesson #84: everybody should be trained to handle the media in a crisis, from your receptionist to your security guard to the spouses of your executives.

My advice is to read Brad’s book and then to keep it handy and ready to go. The next time a reporter or blogger calls you for an interview, you’ll want to skim through the lessons within The Media Training Bible for a refresher on everything from preparing for the interview to delivering your memorable message points on target, and more.

Bottom line: Put The Media Training Bible on your list of “must reads” for 2013!

In the very early stages of a crisis, it is imperative that you evaluate and assess all pre-scheduled marketing messages, stopping and/or pausing as many (or all) as necessary.

When Ibrahim Langoo, a 19 year old UK-based scholar, recently found brain-like substance in his KFC chicken, the image he took and posted online soon went viral, leaving KFC in a social media storm. However, as Karen Freberg points out in her blog post, “Kentucky Fried “Liver”?: Photo sparks viral social media crisis for fast food brand“, the fast food chain did little to respond to the online crisis, leaving their brand to be potentially damaged for the long-haul.

Adding insult to injury, while the world was disgusted with the realization of this global fast food chain’s lack of compassion, extremely low-food-quality and lack of regard towards food safety, KFC continued to publish their regular stream of marketing messages to their social media accounts, as if nothing had happened.

The big mistake you can’t afford to make

As part of your social media crisis management plan, somebody needs to be responsible for evaluating and stopping or pausing all pre-scheduled marketing campaigns in a crisis. This includes tweets, Facebook posts and any other form of self-promotional campaigns that were scheduled to be released on the days during and proceeding a crisis. Failing to do so will only make your company or organization look insensitive, uncaring and very disorganized.

As we see often, this crucial step in your crisis management plan is easily forgotten. A social media crisis is a hectic time and things easily get overlooked. That’s why having a crisis management plan created – and having your teams established and trained prior to experiencing a crisis – is so very, very important.

Your own crisis is not the only time to stop marketing messages

As Brad Phillips of Mr. Media Training recently pointed out, evaluating your pre-scheduled online messages should not only be done when you’re facing your own crisis, but also when there’s a global, regional or societal crisis occurring that affects your nation, the world or your fellow-citizens. When a tragedy strikes your nation, for example, it’s very important to reflect upon what marketing messages, tweets, etc., were pre-scheduled for that day and the immediate days proceeding the crisis. If it’s time to grieve with your peers and fellow-citizens, then it’s most certainly NOT the time to be promoting your services.

Times of a crisis are not times for marketing messages, and it’s very important that this step within your crisis management plan not be overlooked. For more information on social media crisis management and communications, click here.

Image courtesy of Mashable and Ibrahim Langoo, Facebook

Last year I wrote about an issue that bothers me: when companies and organizations strong-arm their employees to give up access to their personal social media accounts. You can read more about my thoughts and advice on this issue here. Well, finally the law is taking notice and it appears that several states across the U.S. have recently passed laws stating that brands and schools are no longer permitted to do so! To quote Judith directly, she says:

“The states of California, Michigan, Maryland, and Illinois as of this date January 8, 2013 have passed laws that make it illegal for companies to request social networking passwords or nonpublic online account information from behind the “social media wall” (as Nora Campos author of the California law calls it) from their employees or job applicants. If you are a student living in California, Delaware, Michigan or New Jersey they now have the same or similar laws that apply to academic institutions.”

Judith also reminds her readers on a very good point: Employers, prospective employers, colleagues, clients and academic institutions can still Google and view your public social media accounts at their will – and trust me when I say that if they’re looking into you, you’d better believe that they will! So make sure that your privacy settings are set to your preferences and that your profile and cover photos are not of you doing something that you will later be judged on and regret. Having a responsible online presence should be a no-brainer. Whether you’re working for yourself or for others, your personal brand-image follows you online. So, no matter what, it’s always important to be socially responsible.

photo by: JD | Photography

Your online reputation is your brand’s reputation.

Today, word of mouth exists primarily online. Reviews, searching, trends… they all exist online. So when someone says something about your brand, or wants to know something about your brand, guess where they go. You got it! They go online. From our smartphones to our tablets and computers, to interacting with family, friends, colleagues and customers, our lives – and thus our reputations – exist online.

With the changing of Google’s algorithms and with the unlimited amount of tweets, blog posts, videos, comments, discussions and others that get published to the world wide web on a daily – make it hourly – basis, if you aren’t focusing on managing your online reputation in 2013, well, I hate to say it but you may very well be screwed.

Here’s the bottom line:

> If you don’t have an online presence, you’re at risk.
> If you don’t monitor your online presence, you’re at risk.
> If you don’t manage and maintain your online presence, you’re at risk.

Managing your online reputation in 2013

If you thought things went social in 2012, just wait ’til you see what happens in 2013! People and businesses really started to get comfortable with social media in 2012, but we also saw the high-risk factor that social media and the web present to our reputations as both personal and corporate brands. 2013 is only going to be a continuation of this social world, and for that, each and every company, organization, scholar and personal brand needs to be prepared.

The following are some highly important strategies your company or organization needs to put in place, early on in 2013:

Set up your monitoring posts
It’s important that you actually pay attention to what others are saying about you, your brand, your product, services and your industry, online. Your social media monitoring should be a 24/7 activity, though it does not need to take 24/7 of anybody’s actual time. No matter what monitoring needs or budget your company has, there are tools out there that will help you know what is being said about your company or organization, 24/7/365. This, ladies and gentlemen, is NOT an option!

Create an online presence for your company or organization – and maintain that presence
Although having a website and some very high-ranking social profiles (Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook, Quora, About.me, etc) is a must, it’s also just the first step. The second step – another must – is to be active on these platforms. Having nothing but a stagnant website won’t do much for you when you find yourself in some hot social media water. Google loves relevancy, consistency and activity. So it’s very important that you maintain your online presence, if you want your presence to hold its own in a crisis.

Build a strong reputation and good-will online
Unfortunately, there’s no quick way to do this. Fortunately, your brand advocates and online friends count for a lot in an online crisis. Trust me when I say that building a credible reputation online and forming real and lasting relationships with people, pays off in substantial ways when you find yourself the center of negative online attention.

Focus on your search engine optimization (SEO)
SEO is not something that is built overnight. It takes time, consistency and a strategy. But when we’re talking about managing your online reputation, having a solid online presence with good, consistent rankings in the search engines will help you significantly. The time to start thinking about your online rankings and optimization is NOT when your world gets turned upside down, and you find yourself in a viral attack with negativity flooding the search engines. Focusing on your SEO for crisis management is a long-term strategy that needs to be undertaken before you find yourself faced with a crisis. Doing so will give you a significant and strategic edge in a crisis, to:

• Communicate your key messages to your audience, making sure that searchers find YOUR version of the story when they search
• Help you keep your name above the negativity flooding the search engine results pages (SERP)

When dealing with Internet defamation, learn your rights and act fast!
Internet defamation is beginning to be more and more of an issue for brands – both corporate and personal. What many don’t realize is that, when it comes to online defamation, the law tends to be on the side of the victim. However, many make the mistake of avoiding the issue, thinking it will pass and not have any serious repercussions on their business’s reputation or bottom-line. Unfortunately, these companies find out the hard way just how wrong they were. When it comes to Internet defamation, you have rights and you need to act fast. Learn more about the options that lie before you when dealing with Internet defamation, by clicking here.

In conclusion

Your online reputation can literally make or break your company. It’s not something to be taken lightly, or to be tossed to the side-lines for a rainy day. Maintaining a strong, positive online reputation takes strategy and time. But the good news is that the more you work at it, the stronger it gets, making it harder for others to bring you down. So, what should be at the top of your to-do list this year? Your online reputation management, that’s what!

Find out how Melissa Agnes Crisis Management can help you build, strengthen and maintain a positive and influential online reputation.

photo by: crsan – christianholmer.com

In fact, trust should not be built in a crisis, but rather strengthened. Trust is something that should be built way before a crisis, and in truth, should be part of every business and organization’s pre-crisis planning and strategy.

Dr. Leslie Gaines-Ross, Chief Reputation Strategist for Weber Shandwick, recently wrote in an article titled “Reputation Trends for 2013 — Now and Ahead“:

“2013 will bring a greater focus on social reputations, be it for companies or CEOs. Companies that are truly social and engage their employees and customers in genuine conversation will be recognized as the new corporate leaders. CEOs who are social will be the next new thing. In a 2012 IBM study among CEOs from 64 countries and across 18 industries, only 16 percent participated in social media. Yet, that figure is expected to rise to 57 percent within the next five years. New research from Weber Shandwick to be released at the start of the New Year confirms that CEOs are increasingly mustering up the courage to go social and show their human side. As tasti-D-lite’s chairman and CEO James Amos said in his new book on how his company went social, “the future is human.””

Although many will argue that it depends on the company or organization at hand, the truth is that crises don’t discriminate against industry type or company size. And when a crisis strikes, you’d better believe that it will find itself being circulated and talked about online. For this reason, being active on social media and building a trusting relationship with your market online is a strategy that every single brand should be focusing on in 2013. As for the CEO’s and whether or not they should be connecting with their market and audience on social media, well, considering that the trust of their audience comes in great hand in a crisis, it most certainly wouldn’t hurt!

A 2012 CEO, Social Media and Leadership Survey, by BrandFog.com, showed us that:

“When asked about the connection between executives on social media and trust in a brand: 82% of respondents were more likely or much more likely to trust a company whose CEO and leadership team engage with social media.”

and,

“93% of respondents believe that CEO engagement in social media helps communicate company values, shape a company’s reputation, and grow and evolve corporate leadership in times of crisis.”

We’re living and working in a social age, where what we do and say, and with whom we interact online has a major impact on our business’s reputation and bottom-line. The front-line employees who connect with and build relationships with their audience on social media are both liked and trusted by their customers and market. Why should CEOs and executives not be taking the same approach? Especially when you consider the benefits of such a strategy:

• Building and strengthening the trust you share with your customers and market
• Developing relationships with industry bloggers, the media and others – which have substantial value in a crisis
• Trust isn’t just good for crisis communications – it’s great for sales and reputation management as well!

So should your CEO be actively building a positive and trusting personal brand online? As Dr. Gaines-Ross said “CEOs who are social will be the next new thing” – and I completely and whole-heartedly agree.

photo by: Michigan Municipal League (MML)