Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but one day, chances are good your company might have to cope with a social media crisis. With the ongoing and growing popularity of social media as a communication channel for brands, there are more opportunities for the good and the bad. To weather the storm when bad things do happen, consider these guidelines for tackling a social networking crisis:
Table of Contents
Evaluate
There is a large difference between an issue and a catastrophe. Prior to taking any action, determine if the events taking place are minor issue or a significant matter. This could avoid wasting time and resources to get something which takes a simple solution.
For instance, a minor client complaint may be dealt with via a direct and personalized response. Germin8’s Social Media as a service can be used for the same. Nevertheless, an offensive article or a situation between your businesses which arises outside of social websites should demand elevating the problem to the status of catastrophe.
Have a plan
Do not wait until disaster strikes to plan how you’ll respond to it. Germin8 can help you with planning and even responding to such crisis. You can also take your time now to prepare yourself a social networking catastrophe plan, if you do not have one already. To ensure the thoroughness of your emergency plan, brainstorm with some other members of your team to flesh out a wide range of potential emergency scenarios that could affect your company.
Make sure to account for both offline and online risks, then map out a plan of how each should be responded to both internally and externally and who’s accountable for executing each part of the plan. Also produce an emergency plan for any problems that might arise which do not fits into the scenarios you identify so you’re prepared for the unknown just as much as the known.
Respond quickly
Social media moves in real time, which may be both beneficial and damaging. Speed is the essence that can go against the company if you are not prepared to respond quickly.
According to Edelman, while 28 percent of crises spread internationally within one hour, it takes an average of 21 hours for companies to issue meaningful external responses. The initial step in quick response is realizing it’ll call for a tiered approach.
First, aim to simply acknowledge the problem and commit to supplying information as soon as you’ve them. This might help buy your organization time to collect more info regarding the situation so as to craft more in depth bills.
Don’t argue or hide comments
When a sea of pessimism is staring you in your face, it may be tempting to delete articles. Resist that temptation because trying to silence those voices will bring frustration and rage your way. Additionally, while it’s good to respond to comments or questions from a fashion, don’t allow the interaction dissolve in an argument. Avoid taking comments personally or falling into the trap of going back and forth with the trolls. Instead, find a way to take the conversation off social by offering an email address, phone number or other offline avenue for persistent individuals to contact.
Educate employees
Thanks to social media, it is easier than ever before to discover employees of a given organization. Bear this in mind as you prepare for or work through a social media crisis. While you might have a specific person or several people designated to respond to questions and provide responses, there’s nothing stopping anyone from reaching out to your employees. Make sure that they know exactly what to do and that to path individuals to when this happens.
In addition, ensure that transparency succeeds on your employee communications – tell them what the planned settlement will be and what is happening, session with the main actors involved once it ought to be resolved. You need employees to feel confident at the resolution of any emergency and that they are not kept in the dark.
Document lessons learned
Take time to debrief as once the social media crisis has passed by with the key players involved. Maintain a session with the key players.
- What action items worked and what didn’t?
- What would you do differently in the next time?
- Were there people involved were they were not supposed to be, or vice versa?
- What Channels would you use the next time same or different?
Also make a note of a key point to hold the session soon after the crisis has passed so that the lessons learned are still fresh on everyone’s minds.
You can also avoid any Social Media Crisis by deploying Social Media Listening as a Service by Germin8 at your end. To know more you can contact our team CLICK HERE
