As BP demonstrated to the world earlier this year, even the largest companies with the most resources can get crisis communications spectacularly wrong. Good communications during a disaster, just like other aspects of crisis management, relies upon good planning. What you already have in place before the crisis hits will determine how well your company makes it through – so if you don’t have an up-to-date, detailed crisis communications plan, put it top of your list of New Year’s resolutions!
Here are Preparis’ top five tips to consider when creating a crisis communications plan for your organization.
1. Who does what?
Decide who is going to be your primary company spokesperson (usually the CEO in a major crisis) as well as two backups, and provide them with crisis media training to help them communicate effectively and deal with the kind of challenging questions that they would be asked in a real crisis situation. Clearly define the role of other key executives, such as the president of the company, in both external and internal communications. Identify subject matter experts within your organization that may need to be called upon to provide specialized information relating to a particular topic, and ensure that your legal and PR departments or agencies are on board with your plan and are prepared to support the spokespeople during a crisis situation.
2. Establish processes to enable a quick response
A quick response is one key piece to maintaining your organization’s reputation. If the company isn’t saying anything, someone else will – and it probably won’t be the message that you want to communicate. It’s therefore vital that you establish a system that allows you to issue and distribute an initial public statement within one hour of a recognized crisis event.
3. Be social – monitor and engage
Social media and online news move extremely fast and will be talking about the crisis before traditional channels – often within moments of the event actually happening. Your company needs to have a social media presence now – before a crisis hits – and be monitoring what is being said about the company and engaging with stakeholders and influencers. The benefits of this extends far beyond crisis communications and can have a huge impact on your brand, but bear in mind that it takes a while to engage effectively and once you’ve set up this presence, it needs to be nurtured on an ongoing basis rather than just set up “in case” and then abandoned. Businesses who already have a social media presence will be able to tell you the same thing; it is a work in progress and something that needs to be closely monitored frequently. If you don’t engage with your followers, it will be hard to get new ones, especially if you don’t look into organic growth services like nitreo.com, who can help you to increase your following and build your brand. This could help to take off some of the pressure, especially if you are unable to monitor your profiles as often as you would like.
4. Consider your website
During a crisis, your website has different requirements. It’s less about products and more about people and the company’s response. Create one or more “dark sites” (websites that contain content related to a crisis and are inactive until that crisis hits). A crisis communications plan also needs to take into account how you will cope with increased server capacity (you’re likely to get record levels of web traffic) and how you will quickly activate keyword buys so that your website and your message will show up when people search for key terms related to the crisis. Don’t forget internal communications too – make sure your plan also covers your company’s intranet.
5. Practice
When you have drafted your crisis communications plan, share it with your executives and department heads and get feedback. Practice using tabletops of various crisis scenarios that focus specifically on the communications aspect of the event. What works and what could be done better? Evaluate your response, and rejig elements accordingly.
Do you have any additional tips relating to creating crisis communications plans? Have you ever had to put yours into effect? What were your experiences?