Baggage fees are a fact of life when flying these days, and while airlines claim to need the extra money to survive in a struggling economy, the practice is clearly not popular with the public. Travel clothing maker ScotteVest recently tried to run an ad in Delta’s own Sky Magazine that …
Cyber Storm
The federal government is taking advantage of crisis simulations to strengthen cyber security In places like Arlington, Va.; Washington, D.C.; across the U.S. and around the world, a global cybersecurity exercise is underway designed to test the limits not only of the “network of networks,” but the ingenuity of the …
Unpopular Practices
When you are forced to defend an unpopular practice, solid crisis communication is key. Many business have a good chance of finding themselves in the position of defending some sort of unpopular practice. In a recent article from his Monday Morning Media Minute newsletter, PR expert Jerry Brown gave an …
Changing Ways
Until recently, large corporations with a prestige in certain niches used to avoid using the term “PR.” They’d use “corporate communications” or “marcom” to describe the management function of initiating activities directed at building relationships with their different publics. They found PR to be something to avoid, or as something …
Crisis Leadership
An organization’s leadership plays a huge role in crisis management. We saw this first hand with the BP oil spill, a mess that only got worse as CEO Tony Hayward continued to deliver damaging quotes to the press. In an article for our Crisis Manager newsletter, Spanish PR pro Carlos …
New Crisis Manager
Another new Crisis Manager newsletter is up on the BCM website! This week we feature articles from two different PR experts about issues that many crisis management professionals face. First up, a piece by Spanish PR pro Carlos Victor Costa that describes valuable lessons learned from the BP spill regarding …
Social Guidelines
While the steps and theory involved in using social media for crisis management are a frequent topic on this blog, it is just as important to control who is interacting with your stakeholders and in what manner. In a recent article for the Social Media Examiner, Cindy King offered a …
Ready to Engage
As news headlines show us on an almost daily basis, many companies still neglect to prepare detailed and workable crisis plans, hindering their ability to react when disaster rears its ugly head. If your organization believes itself ready to actively engage in crisis management, go through this list of questions …
Social Solutions
In recent years social media has played a huge role in disaster crisis management. From Katrina and Haiti to the BP spill, social media platforms are being put to work facilitating communication and tracking all kinds of information. Why are these platforms so attractive? This quote from a Computer World …
Twitter Delivers the News
The Twitter stream alerted the news media to yesterday’s unfolding crisis at the Discovery building, reports Paul Farhi in today Washington Post. In a piece that notes that “Tweet stream alerts news media to the unfolding crisis,” Farhi reports that “for the raw speed and real-time eyewitness accounts, it’s now …
Preparing for Disaster
Donald Schmidt has 30 years of experience preparing for crises, and with Hurricane Earl still creating storms along the East coast we thought it was good timing to run an article by him regarding disaster preparedness in the latest Crisis Manager newsletter. A sampling: Hazard mitigation can substantially reduce the …
You Need Social Media
Social media has become a “must have” in today’s business world, but fears about opening the floodgates for negative viral buzz still hold some back from participating. In an article for this week’s Crisis Manager newsletter, online marketing and branding expert Cindy Ratzlaff explains why staying out of the conversation …
New Crisis Manager
This week’s Crisis Manager features articles from two authors new to the pages of our newsletter. First up is an article by online branding and marketing expert Cindy Ratzlaff, named one of the top 30 Women Entrepreneurs to Follow on Twitter by Forbes, that explains how to defuse the fear …
Surviving a Recall
“Recalls undermine trust in a specific brand and it can take the company a long time to recover from the damage to its reputation, but it doesn’t have to take a long time if the company uses good crisis management tactics,” Manpreet Hora, an assistant professor in Georgia Tech’s College …
Insurance for Eggs
Egg producers are no strangers to recalls, but following the most recent salmonella outbreak, one of the largest in U.S. history, some are looking towards an emerging service that could lend a hand in recall crisis management. BusinessInsurance.com explains: The recall of half a billion eggs tainted by salmonella linked …