Monthly Archives: August 2012

Yeah We Lost Your Kid, So What?

Published on 29th August 2012 by . Leave a Comment

Appallingly poor online crisis management from United Airlines

United Airlines was riding a wave of social media success following the Olympics. With Facebook contests and Twitter stunts accompanying pictures of returning athletes embracing United staff, the campaign was a mounting success.

Suddenly, the Monday after closing ceremonies, a new and very different story came to light. Here’s the rundown, from a Slate.com article by Will Oremus:

Bob Sutton, a Stanford professor who writes about management and organizations, related on his blog on Monday a tale of appalling customer service. Friends of his had sent their 10-year-old daughter unaccompanied on United to summer camp, assured by the airline that it would take good care of her. Instead, the girl missed her connection in Chicago—apparently because the airline employees who were supposed to help her failed to show up.

When the girl asked for help from other employees, they allegedly told her several times that they were too busy. And the parents only found out about it hours later, when the summer camp called to say their daughter had never arrived. When they called United, they were put on hold for 40 minutes, then told that the whole situation was no big deal. The girl eventually turned up, but it was only after the parents contacted a local TV station that United got serious about apologizing and addressing their concerns, according to Sutton.

This story obvious hit home with many readers, and went viral with ferocity. Suddenly, the thousands of new “fans” United had gained weren’t playing Facebook games, but voicing their rage at the company’s terrible treatment of a young girl and her concerned parents, as well as sharing their own horror stories from flying the airline.

United, which had all appearances of being social media savvy before the crisis dropped, resorted to mass deletion of negative comments from its Facebook wall, which only prompted angry stakeholders to redouble their efforts.

It took a bit over 24 hours – eons in ‘net time – for someone at United to realize their actions were hurting their reputation management efforts and finally issue a public statement:

We appreciate and understand everyone’s concerns over this situation, please know we have reached out directly to the Klebahn family to apologize and are conducting an ongoing investigation. The service they describe is not the service we aim to deliver. We are doing a thorough investigation into what happened and into our procedures to see how we many continually improve.

Although the tone of the post falls somewhere short of heartfelt, it was the right thing to do, and over the next few days the heat surrounding the situation gradually dissipated until United’s social media operations could resume business as usual.

If anything, this incident exposes the fact that social media marketing and social media crisis management are two different creatures, both requiring a different mindset and specific training to be effective.

The BCM Blogging Team
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/

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The Crisis Show Ep. 10 – Akin, West Nile, Sports Crises, and that’s not all!

Published on 24th August 2012 by . Leave a Comment

In the latest episode of The Crisis Show, hosts Jonathan Bernstein, Rich Klein, and Melissa Agnes welcomed guest Karen Freberg, assistant professor in Strategic Communications at the University of Louisville and adjunct faculty member for West Virginia University.

The crisis management mishaps continue to roll in, and we covered the biggest, including Todd Akin’s massive #crisisfail, the return of West Nile, Progressive’s careless crisis communication, food recalls, a pair of sports crises, and more!

You can catch The Crisis Show live every Wednesday at 4 PST/7 EST, or if you can’t make it live, you can always check out past episodes on our YouTube channel.

The BCM Blogging Team
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/

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Crisis Management for the Long Haul

Published on 21st August 2012 by . Leave a Comment

Think beyond the short term when it’s crisis management time

It’s a very common crisis management mistake – you see an issue, think of a quick solution, and POOF, it’s fixed in the fastest way possible. Problem is, a “quick fix” has a strong chance of becoming a damper on the long haul.

In a recent Fast Company article, Mark Mcneilly had this to say about the dangers of short-term thinking:

Don’t allow short-term thinking to destroy the long-term value of the brand and the business

In the midst of the emotion and confusion of a crisis it is often easy to take steps one will regret later. Therefore, it’s essential, before any major decisions are made or statements released, to think about the long-term impact on your brand and your organization. Think not only about the organization but, more importantly, about your customers, your stakeholders (employees, investors, suppliers) and society in general. How does what has happened and what the organization plans to do or say affect them? How will they react? If you think beyond just your own firm it will lead to a better outcome than thinking solely about the company.

Let’s look at an example of a typical small business. Say you’re part owner and operator of a neighborhood convenience store that’s had troublemakers showing up after dark to shoplift or bother customers. The knee-jerk reaction might be to close earlier, but what about your customers that work late and rely on you for check cashing and household essentials? Can you afford the lost revenue? Will your partner(s) agree with the decision? We could go on, but the point is clear. Before you make a rash crisis management decision, think about its impact not only immediately, but also as you move into the future, and your organization will be stronger for it.

The BCM Blogging Team
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/

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How to Trash a Political Career in 15 Seconds or Less

Published on 20th August 2012 by . Leave a Comment

Rep. Akins reputation is beyond crisis management

“Legitimate rape.”

If you don’t know what I’m referring to, prepare to be shocked. This weekend, Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) was the guest on a St. Louis TV news program. A vocal opponent of abortion, Akin should be used to answering questions related to the subject, but when a reporter asked him about abortion specifically in instances of rape, the Congressman dropped this bomb:

“It seems to me, from what I understand from doctors, that’s really rare. If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. But let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work or something: I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be of the rapist, and not attacking the child.”

Oh, did I mention that Rep. Akins, who appears to have no grasp at all on human physiology, is also a member of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology? Go ahead, I’ll give you a minute to pick your jaws up off the floor.

Rep. Akins’ opponent in the Missouri race, Claire McCaskill, who happens to be both a woman and former criminal prosecutor, was quick to pounce on the sheer outrageous untruth of his comments, blasting the Congressman via Twitter and sharing a link to the clip of his self-destruction. Her outrage was shared by, well, everyone, and Akin’s stock fell faster than you could ask, “How’d that shoe taste?”

Fellow Republicans rushed to distance themselves as well, with some calling for Akin’s resignation, while others, like Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, a former ally, made public appearances assuring the public that they were not in agreement with his statements.

Akins did release a reply, but coming from a man who just last year co-sponsored a bill (with the aforementioned Ryan, no less) distinguishing between “rape” and “forcible rape,” the public took it as the blatant load of hot air that it is.

“In reviewing my off-the-cuff remarks, it’s clear that I misspoke in this interview and it does not reflect the deep empathy I hold for the thousands of women who are raped and abused every year”

When it comes to crisis management, Rep. Akins appears to be hopeless. Even while attempting damage control, he won’t admit that he made a HUGE mistake. Without that admission, and a proper mea culpa to go with it, there is no amount of crisis management that could save his future as a politician.

Frankly, if you want our opinion, with the amount of bleeding that Akin’s reputation has done already, along with the fact that the entire Republican party has essentially disowned the man, a defibrillator couldn’t bring this one back.

The BCM Blogging Team
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/

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Progressive’s #Crisisfail

Published on 15th August 2012 by . Leave a Comment

Don’t let lawyers control your crisis management

Progressive has made a fortune branding itself as the “everyman” of the insurance world with its kitschy commercials, but a major crisis management failure has caused the brand harm it could have avoided. At the heart of the controversy is a Tumblr created by Matt Fisher, whose sister Katie was killed in an auto accident. On the Tumblr, he shares the story of how his family was (allegedly) given the run around when attempting to collect on Katie’s Progressive policy and eventually settled on suing the driver of the car that struck Katie, which would allow the family to collect on the policy. According to Matt, Progressive then actually provided a lawyer for the defense in an attempt to avoid paying out for Katie.

While sites like The Consumerist have postulated that there are legitimate legal reasons Progressive would have taken over the defense, the knee-jerk reaction of most people hearing a heart wrenching story like this one is to get angry, and that’s exactly what happened. The absolute torrent of enraged posters descending on Progressive’s social media pages, along with the countless shares and re-posts of Matt’s story across the ‘net clearly called for a response.

What did Progressive, the “everyman” do? Exactly what it shouldn’t – resort to legalese and corporate speak. Below are a couple of early responses from the company:

The first statement, from Chris Wolf, general manager at Progressive, posted in response to a blogger:

“To be very clear, Progressive did not serve as the attorney for the defendant in this case. He was defended by his insurance company, Nationwide.”

Another drew yet more fire from critics, the full statement was quickly wiped from the ‘net by what appears to be a ban of Progressive’s TwitLonger account.

“This is a tragic case, and our sympathies go out to Mr. Fisher and his family for the pain they’ve had to endure. We fully investigated this claim … and feel we properly handled the claim within our contractual obligations.”

Interviewed for a Ragan article by Matt Wilson, BCM President Jonathan Bernstein had this to say about Progressive’s response:

Jonathan Bernstein of Bernstein Crisis Management says the inclusion of the phrase “contractual obligations” couldn’t be much worse.

“That might be the legal truth, but repeating it in the court of public opinion was a #crisisfail,” he says.

By allowing lawyers to take over its messaging, Progressive essentially announced that its carefully-constructed image of a caring, compassionate provider was nothing more than a facade for the type of money hungry corporate machine the public loves to hate. Deviating so far from its publicly presented ideals was a major crisis management mistake that will cost the company in both reputation and lost business.

The BCM Blogging Team
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/

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