Crisis Communications is never far from our minds as we navigate the constantly evolving media landscape. Whether your organization must deal with bad weather, a product recall, countering a bad media development, whatever your PR dilemma, your message and how it’s presented online is critical to your success! I’ve witnessed some masterful crisis communications management from our clients with their online newsrooms over the years, so I thought a couple quick reminders of what is absolutely necessary to conduct successful online crisis communications might be helpful.
-
First and foremost, do you have a Crisis Communications Page on your Online Newsroom and Website? If not, you better get one fast! The online newsroom is the first place the media go when they want to find out more about your organization’s pending issue, and having a Crisis Communications page you can turn on quickly means YOU control the message and what information your audiences receive - and that can be videos, press releases, press kits, etc.
-
Email, Texts & Social - We all know that the vast majority of people - media and consumers alike - are tied to their mobile devices, so they see everything with one simple click. The same content you post to your site must be distributed to them in real time. Whether you’re blasting an email or text, or posting your news to your organization’s social channels, placing a simple link and title, driving the recipient back to the Crisis Communications page, is a must. Again, you act as the primary source of the message and control who sees it.
-
Time is Not on Your Side - The advantage of having a crisis communications page up and ready to go is that there isn’t a delay figuring out where your message needs to be delivered. Having the site ready and the distribution lists already configured means you’ve minimized the amount of time to respond and hopefully got in front of the story.
Don’t let the media and your audience drive your response when events might turn sour, be prepared with the right online tools and tactics. If you need to talk through your online crisis communication strategies, please let iPR Software know and we’ll be glad to help!
