Page 60 - Crisis Communication Practical PR Strategies

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Proactive Crisis Communication Planning 41
Again, it is a ‘vacuum game’: if you do not provide an image, they may
search for one, and it might not be the one you would have chosen.
High-resolution images of your company, your spokespeople and, if
possible, lifestyle images (people interacting with your products)
should all be on file and ready to use. When dealing with TV, you’ll
want to have b-roll ready, too.
Remember, you’re going to be short of time during a crisis, so you
might like to consider having high-resolution images and b-roll
uploaded to an FTP server or some other equivalent. That way you
only need to point your press contacts to the right place and material
will be streaming into their news reports.

Message

By developing your company media relations messaging document
and having standard company information available (see Appendices
1 and 2) you can forecast possible crisis scenarios and what a response
might be. While this process is based on the media relations of a
company, the advantage is that you may identify potential crises that
are preventable and thus modify existing methods of operation.
This is the most proactive part of the proactive crisis communica-
tions plan. Anticipating crises allows you to produce game plans and
suggested communication messages before the event. Appendix 3
shows how you might be able to anticipate crises (see page 213).
One-off communication will not solve a crisis. For a large-scale crisis
you need to develop your message over a number of different commu-
nication pieces and try to steer the following path: concern, relief and
reassurance.
First of all, you need to show concern and consideration for what
happened. You have to be honest and open that a crisis has occurred
and that as an organization you are doing everything in your power to
find out exactly what happened and how it happened.
Next, you need to subtly express relief. This is where you will prob-
ably demonstrate some internal company safeguards, showing that
your company actually had the crisis under control well before it got
out of hand.
Third, you need to show reassurance that all possible steps are being
taken to right the wrong and to make adjustments to keep the event
from happening again. You have to show that you are learning from
your mistakes.
How to deal with reporters is further discussed in the media
training chapter – Chapter 10 – but for the process of developing your
message you will find the pointers in Appendix 4 to be most useful (see