A Bad Idea

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response, media training, reputation management

Microsoft recently unveiled a brand-new ad for their business productivity software. While the U.S. version was fine, someone at the software behemoth’s Polish subsidiary decided to make a change that spawned a storm of negative criticism throughout the Web and on Twitter. Here’s a description of the switch that angered …

More about Whole Food’s John Mackey on the Hot Seat

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response, media training

Whole Foods Market’s CEO John Mackey is well known for landing his company in the hot seat. The outspoken Mackey first caught the public’s attention after being outed for using a pseudonym to both promote Whole Foods and blast their competition on the Yahoo! Finance bulletin boards, an incident which …

Corporate Malware

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

mal·ware (māl’wâr’)n. Malicious computer software that interferes with normal computer functions or sends personal data about the user to unauthorized parties over the Internet. Although the news media usually focuses on more widespread attacks like the recent Conficker worm, there is a new generation of malware aimed solely at gathering …

Continental Drops the Ball

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Response, media training

A half-hearted attempt by Continental Airlines to compensate passengers held for nearly six hours on a Minnesota airport tarmac has resulted in a serious wave of negative publicity. With reports surfacing about poor conditions on the plane, and the fact that multiple passengers asked to be let off and were …

Vick Gets it Right

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response, media training

Disgraced quarterback Michael Vick, recently released from an 18-month stint in prison, granted one of his first interviews to CBS’ 60 Minutes. The interviewer pulled no punches and, unlike nearly every disgraced sports figure in recent memory, Vick made no attempts to deflect them. A recent Yahoo! Sports article has …

Twitter Turbulence

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, crisis public relations, Crisis Response

An interesting, and silly, lawsuit has been filed against Twitter by Texas-based emergency alert provider TechRadium. Their complaint? They say the widespread use of the service by governments and organizations as an emergency notification system violates their patents. The worst part? It appears that none of their patents have even …

Crisis Protection

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response, public relations

Effective crisis management starts long before an incident ever occurs. The world is an unpredictable place, and the best way to mount a rapid, convincing response is to be prepared beforehand. In his piece, published in the most recent Crisis Manager newsletter, PR vet George Hayward gives some important steps …

The Dark Side of Social Media

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, crisis manager, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response, reputation management

Social media has exploded onto the scene, bringing promises of more interaction with, and among, customers. This platform, which appears to be a marketers dream, has also shown itself to be dangerous, most recently causing trouble for corporate giants Johnson & Johnson and Pepsi. In her guest article from the …

Recall Recovery

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

As I’ve stated in previous articles, product recalls have the potential for crises for which many companies remain unprepared. They are nearly guaranteed to produce an initial barrage of criticism that, if not properly handled, can snowball into something much worse. A recent interview from ReliablePlant.com has more on this …

Preventing Identity Theft – Tips from the IRS

Jonathan Bernstein crisis management, Crisis Prevention, Crisis Response

In an identity theft scam, a fraudster, often posing as a trusted government, financial or business institution or official, tries to trick a victim into revealing personal and financial information, such as credit card numbers and passwords, bank account numbers and passwords, Social Security numbers and more. Generally, identity thieves …