What Mediums Should Companies Be Using

So my last six 5 blogs were all about different companies that faced a crisis and the way that they handled it.  In this blog I want to look more at the different avenues in which companies need to be active and explain their significance.  The internet is a wide world, where most people use to turn to the television or the radio, in this day in age people are now turning to it to find out what is going on.  Mediums such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and a company webpage are all very important tools in not only public relations, but especially crisis communications.

Twitter is a social networking and microblogging website that allows its users to send and receive tweets.  As of 2010 there were over 200 million users on Twitter.  Companies have used Twitter to communicate with their customers, promote their brand, and understand their customers in general.  Companies that monitor Twitter closely respond to tweets about their company, good and bad.  This is creating a new kind of relationship between consumer and producer that has never been there before. 

Facebook is a social networking service that allows users to create a profile, add other users as friends, and exchange message, both directly and through wall posts.  Companies can create a company page where users can “Like” them to get updates every time the company posts something.  Facebook has over 500 million users worldwide. For companies Facebook is much like Twitter, except the posts on Facebook are not limited to 140 characters.  Facebook can be used to promote a brand as well as defend it.  Many apologies made by companies using the internet for public relations are through Facebook because the post can be as long as one wants it to be.

YouTube is a video-sharing website which allows users to upload, share, and watch videos.  YouTube has over 400 million users worldwide.  Companies can create a company channel on YouTube through which they can upload videos and receive comments to their videos.  One of the best reasons to use YouTube as a medium for crisis communications is the fact that a video apology is much more effective and personal than using other mediums to convey a message.

The good old company website is still a stronghold in the area of corporate crisis communications.  With a company website the company can link to their Facebook and Twitter accounts, link to videos uploaded to their YouTube channel, as well as post press releases and convey important information.  The company website is a company’s main medium they should use when in a crisis.  The first thing that many people will do when a crisis occurs is to visit the company’s website to find out what is going on and what will be done.  The use of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and any other medium the company uses can all be gathered here on the company website. 

United Airlines Breaks Guitar

Back in 2008, Dave Carroll, was a passenger on a United Airlines flight.  Carroll, a musician, witnessed baggage handlers throwing his $3,500 guitar.  When he got his guitar backs and inspected it, his fears were met with a broken guitar.  Carroll filed a complaint a week later on his trip back.  After a year of trying to get compensation for the broken guitar to no avail, Carroll posted a video on YouTube calling out the company and company personnel by name.  The video tracked over two thousand views overnight and threatened to be the first of three videos. The next day it was picked up by Consumerist.com and the LA Times Daily Travel & Deal blog.  By the following Tuesday the video generated over 24,000 views. His first video garnered nearly 8 million views and media coverage that made his career explodes.  The second video did a million views.  The third video should do at least half a million as well. 

Views of YouTube channel generated tons of negative comments from users with no response from United. Thousands of tweets were made about Dave Carroll with no response from United for a while.

United Airlines finally responded by speaking with reporters and posting on their Twitter account that they donated $3000 to Dave Carroll’s selected charity.

Wow there were so many missed opportunities here weren’t there.  The first thing that United Airlines should have done to alleviate this situation was to post an apology on YouTube the medium which Dave Carroll used to post his video.  This would have made customers believe that they were listening and a personal message would have prevented too much backlash.  The second thing that United Airlines should have done here is they should have paid more attention to their Twitter account.  With thousands of tweets being made about Dave Carroll, United could have used them as an opportunity to explain any extenuating circumstances.  Alas, United did none of this, instead they allowed Dave Carroll’s videos to go viral and did not respond.  When United finally responded they could have responded with an apology, but they did not, just a post about a donation to charity.  Some could have just considered this as hush money, because United never cared enough to defend themselves in the situation.

Kenneth Cole's Twitter Gaff

Back in February, Kenneth Cole, an American clothing designer in poor taste tweeted this, “Millions are in uproar in #Cairo. Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is available online at http://bit.ly. KCAIRO   -KC”, on their Twitter account. There was immediately backlash on Twitter and on blogs because of what was going on in Cairo at the time.

Kenneth Cole responded to the backlash quickly taking down the tweet and posting this tweet to their Twitter and Facebook account, “Re Egypt tweet: we weren’t intending to make light of a serious situation. We understand the sensitivity of this historic moment.”  Kenneth Cole also posted an full out apology on their Facebook account and linked to it through their Twitter account.

Though Kenneth Cole responded quick to the trouble, the damage was already done.  People on Facebook and Twitter were calling for a boycott or refusing to ever buy the brand again.  One person on Facebook responded to the apology saying; “The satire is no less tasteless. Two wrongs don’t make a right.”

One problem with Kenneth Cole’s response to the situation is that they had a general response to everything that was being said, please view our apology here.  Users didn’t like this either and felt that it was very generic.

Overnight in San Francisco, a consumer activist (or possibly a group) pranked the Kenneth Cole store front by installing a vinyl decal of the original tweet on the stores front window.

So what is my opinion of the response?  Well Kenneth Cole made a huge mistake in the fact that they were not really listening to anything anyone was saying.  It is one thing to make a serious mistake but to post a generic reply to any one that has a problem with it that is not acceptable.  Kenneth Cole should have been more sensitive all around on this one.   Regardless of their insensitivity with the original tweet, if they were to actually address the problems that people were posting and the reasons they were upset, they may have had a better turn out for people saying that everyone makes mistakes.  Unfortunately, that was not the case of all the posts on their Facebook page only two were saying this everyone else at the beginning posted about the huge mistake that was made.  After the apology was posted, people were upset about the generic reply. 

Kenneth Cole if I were grading your performance in this crisis that you created for yourself, I would give you a D and that is only because you made a minimal effort.  But the minimum is never good enough, as a popular clothing company this is something you should know.

Domino's Crisis Communications

In April 2009, Domino’s Pizza faced a huge problem, two employees at the companies Conover, NC store posted videos of themselves doing grotesque things to the food and other things in the restaurant to the popular video-sharing website YouTube.  The video received over a million views before being taken down.

Within 48 hours the company responded to the situation by utilizing bloggers and communicating with YouTube to track the two offenders down, where upon they were arrested.  Subsequently, the restaurant was shut down and sanitized.

Domino’s response to the situation was seen through an apology posted on their website (seen here). 

The company also asked its employees with Twitter accounts to tweet the link to the apology. The company also took to its own Twitter page (seen here) with their first post being a tweet the link to the apology.   After the original post, the company, which is Australia based, responded to tweets made by those concerned about the incident.  The responses were quick, however anyone in the United States that viewed the tweets may have felt a bit put down by the company’s tweets.  The company kept returning to saying that the incident happened in the United States and Australia had strict health codes, kind of insinuating that health in the U.S. was subpar.

The company’s U.S. president, Patrick Doyle, went further to issue an apology using YouTube (seen here). 

The public responded well to the video, but the response could have been quicker.  With the way the company decided to respond on Twitter, it is lucky that no one read too much into it, because it could have started another PR problem.  Overall, though the timing for the response was a little delayed (48 hours could feel like weeks in the world of public relations), Domino’s response to the situation was very well handled.  The company used two major outlets to convey its apology to its publics and was well received.