Rights? What Rights?

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Response, reputation management

We haven’t quite made it a week since the last crisis management disaster involving a major US company and here’s The Consumerist at it again, this time with a doozy of a story involving sporting goods giant REI and Loomis security. While Shane was standing in the customer service line …

Don’t Be A Boob!

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Response

British retailer Marks & Spencer passed a public Crisis Management 101 pop-quiz with flying colors when, facing a campaign protesting its charging extra for bra sizes above DD, it decided to reverse the policy and issue a public mea culpa via full-page newspaper ad. Toting the bold headline, “We boobed.”, …

Kentucky Fried Crisis

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

Kentucky Fried Chicken is the latest big name to find themselves in need of some heavy-duty crisis management. Their super promo, a partnership with Oprah designed to introduce America to their new grilled chicken, seemed destined for success. A story from The Consumerist details what went wrong. What’s happening is …

CDC Crisis Management

Jonathan Bernstein crisis communications, crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

Successful crisis managers learn the most from studying real-world situations. This recent article from AdAge.com dissects the crisis management strategies used by the CDC when reacting to the recent “swine flu” outbreaks. Although the story is directed towards marketers, I believe the tips within apply to any organization’s crisis prevention …

Flow of Information

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

For effective crisis management, information needs to flow quickly to your target audiences. This past week communicators have done, by and large, a good job of using the various media channels available, especially social media. Relying on crisis communication protocols, the Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, …

Communicating about Swine Flu

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Response

I’d like to let all of my readers know that I’ll one of the speakers at a Ragan Communications webinar entitled, “Communicating the Swine Flu Crisis to Employees and Stakeholders.” The primary goal will be to educate communicators who are charged with handling this crisis. All aspects of crisis management …

Swine Flu Resource

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

Worldwide health care provider International SOS has created a web site solely to communicate important info about recent the swine flu outbreaks. The site should be of great use to anyone involved in creating crisis management plans as it has all the current news and recommendations regarding the new outbreak. …

Get Networked

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Response

Before the digital age, the previous day’s happenings were often erased by today’s news. Now, the opposite is actually true. With so many people getting their news via the Internet, stories actually gather steam, being passed virally with opinions (both informed and otherwise) being tagged on willy-nilly. A recent article …

New Crisis Manager

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

The latest edition of Crisis Manager went out yesterday and is now posted to our site as well. I’ve still got Twitter on the brain and this issue features an article detailing my conversion from Twit-a-phobe to vocal supporter. We’ve also got a guest piece by Tony Lentini , President …

Preparation is Key

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

It can’t be said enough, thorough preparation is the key to successful crisis response. A reporter from Pacific Business News recently spoke to members of several crisis communications firms to prove this point using real world examples, including navigating clients through last year’s terrorist attack in Mumbai. From the article: …

That’s Not Sanitary

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Response, reputation management

Domino’s Pizza’s crisis management team definitely earned their paychecks this week. Last Monday, two employees posted a YouTube video which showed one of them doing various disgusting things to a Domino’s sub sandwich, including sticking cheese up his nose and, ahem, “passing gas”, on the salami. With the video garnering …