Crisis Communications: It’s Online

Tomeka Rawlings, president, IABC-DC, and me

I had a terrific time last evening speaking before members of IABC’s Washington, DC, chapter to share some idea about crisis communications in the Internet era. The whole landscape has changed for how to handle a crisis.

 First, though, I want to say how nice it was to see IABC-DC’s President Tomeka Rawlings back and looking good after a recent illness.

My challenge was how to present a few ideas about crisis communications within a 30 minute speech. It comes down to this:

• Take your story online. Develop a blog-based online newsroom to tell all the stories and deliver all the messages in your universe. Write in an accessible online news style with stories no longer than 500 words. Use many appealing photos.
• Build relationships in advance of any crisis. Get to know the bloggers and the few remaining legitimate mainstream reporters who cover your space.
• Create a network of third-party thought-leaders – well in advance of any potential crisis – who speak out regularly on your behalf and post what they are saying on your interactive online newsroom.
• Be the voice and face of your industry or area of expertise through timely, relevant and meaningful information, reflected through an online newsroom.
• Don’t let the media push you around. With a couple of exceptions, much of the media is as silly as the “Gong Show.”
• PR agencies, especially the big ones, are far behind the learning curve about Web 2.0, online crisis communications and social media. Many have an obsolete business model, they just don’t know it yet.

Click here to download my presentation as a PDF (about 900k)

Special thanks DC-based photographer Marvin T. Jones – www.marvintjones.com.

Category: Crisis Communications, Featured