Firefly public relations blog –
opinions on PR online.

Twitter: Power of the People. Firefly reflects on lessons learnt for public relations people and agencies

27 January 2012
by Fiona Hughes
Tags: crisis communications, digital PR, public relations, reputation management, Twitter

This week has seen some big PR campaigns kick off; marking the real start of 2012, in terms of planned PR activity. Perhaps most noticeably, Tropicana’s “Brighter Mornings” campaign, that saw a good tranche of print coverage (plus over 600,000 video views to-date and Twitter and Facebook debate a-plenty). There’s also been evidence of garnering social media in a planned fashion throughout the week, for power-brands Snickers and Lynx, amongst others.

But sometimes the most powerful PR stories are the ones that, to some extent, are unfortunately out of the PR person or team’s control.  The Twitter storm that erupted on Tuesday afternoon over LA Fitness was a perfect example of a story that seemed to suddenly become the responsibility of the public relations or social media team.

Starting off as a reader letter in The Guardian, the Twitterati picked up on the story when a member of the public contacted the LA Fitness UK Twitter feed, asking for them to comment on the case.

For anyone who missed the Twitter storm around this case, at the centre of it was a married couple from Billericay who were trying to cancel their LA Fitness contract after six years of membership. Their case was compelling for a combination of reasons: the need for cancellation was due to pregnancy, redundancy and a home move 12 miles away; and yet they were being held to a two-year notice period.  The Guardian took over negotiation on the couple’s behalf, but even after thorough investigation of rights, was only able to negotiate the required notice period down to six months (incidentally, the length of many board director notice periods, to put this in context).

A Guardian reader tweeted @LAFitnessTips on Tuesday afternoon, asking for them to comment on the story. In my view, it seemed to be the coldly corporate @LAFitnessTips tweet, which was – to paraphrase – “we do not comment on individual cases”, that started the thunderstorm.  (Incidentally, this seemed entirely incongruous in light of the “We’ll get there together – in the gym, in life and online” that is LAFitness’ 140-character Twitter biog.  What a lovely brand personality… that was not in this case, practiced).  Incidentally, the offending tweet has since been removed, in a careful erase of social media history, to be replaced with a series of well-messaged, carefully-worded tweets.

The power of the Twitterari, which in this case included Caitlin Moran and her 180,000+ followers, soon turned the case around.  The same day, LA Fitness withdrew all charges and all contractual obligations on the couple.  This is the power of social media in practice.  But sadly, the way in which this was done left the brand rather more workout-weary than post-exercise exhilarated.

Looking forward, my advice to LA Fitness is that to succeed in the social space, the customer services team must be properly integrated with other core channels, and the front line (and boy, must it have felt that way on Tuesday!) must have the correct support and training for successful issues management.

So, McDonalds, LA Fitness, even Tom Watson’s intern have all been the source of Twitter backlash this week. What’s next and what will we continue to learn along the way?

Digital PR tips: Taking the good with the bad

26 January 2012
by Charlotte Stoel
Tags: Age UK, British Gas, digital PR, Facebook, Ogilvy, online PR, PR Moment, PRs using Facebook, reputation management, social media strategy

Yesterday, PR Moment and Ogilvy hosted a session on ‘How brands use Facebook’, inviting Age UK and British Gas to talk about their Facebook presence. I went along expecting to hear how great these brands are on Facebook and why it was going so well for them, but that’s not what I got. Rob from Age UK and Laura from British Gas gave an honest and humble presentation on how they use Facebook and a key theme that everyone agreed on was the importance of taking the good with the bad.

Any brand who hasn’t set up a Facebook page but is thinking of doing so, needs to be ok and prepared with the fact that you will get negative comments as well as good ones. Rob’s (from Age UK) key piece of advice is to keep it real and experiment. Using Facebook as a source of instant feedback, Rob questions his Facebook community as opposed to forcing messages at them. My only niggle with instant feedback in an open forum is that there is risk of backlash – this may be my overly-cautious side talking here!

Laura from British Gas has taken a different approach, to, in her words, “manage the moaning”. She has disabled comments on the wall and uses an app called ‘Talk to Us’, to give the company a much more controlled approach to complaints.

A refreshing point to hear is that both Age UK and British Gas understand that people need to vent. Their stance is that at least people are telling them what’s wrong, giving them an opportunity to learn or address the issue.

So what’s the best approach here? Plan, plan and plan some more. James Whatley at Ogilvy said that you must plan for the worst before thinking of setting up a page. For a brand’s reputation, the emphasis needs to be on how you manage issues as opposed to the issues you face.

The world in a #: the age of nano-public relations

24 January 2012
by Ana Mangahas
Tags: crisis communications, public relations, Social Media, Twitter

We live in an age of nano-PR, when a mere symbol (#) followed by a few words smashed together (justlikethis) can spell glory or doom for your PR campaign. Here is a recent example of the latter, which was brought to my attention in this post by Gordon Macmillan. In a nutshell, a McDonald’s campaign to highlight its (presumably positive) relationship with food growers was hijacked when the company started using the #McDStories hashtag, versus the more deliberate #MeetTheFarmers. Then came a torrent of unflattering tweets about customers’ McDonald’s experiences – ranging from a chipped tooth, to upset tummies resulting from innocent consumption of Micky D’s fare.

Cautionary tale or plain bad luck? I think the author’s comment about McDonald’s being a brand that polarises people is clearly a valid one. Invitations to engage via social media carry risk; and in this case, when is it ever NOT open season for mega-brand, fast food bashing? Or was it merely a case of – to cite another post from the Wall – a hashtagfail?

Contrast this with the Twitter campaign against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), which used the hashtag, #factswithoutwikipedia, referring to the Wikipedia blackout. The tweets ranged from the absurd (“Charlie Sheen is a model citizen”) to the all-out silly (“The Great Wall of China was built to keep the rabbits out”).  But the owners of the hashtag got their point across. True, they were riding the already huge crest of anti-SOPA sentiment.  But the hashtag was well-crafted: it got people to think, get creative, then comment, versus issuing a more deliberate call to action (e.g., #signthepetition). You could say the McDStories hashtag achieved all of this; but in doing so, it exposed a certain lack of self-awareness about the full range of customer sentiment that would be on offer.

What’s been your favourite, PR campaign-generated hashtag? And do you think the direct (#dothisrightnow) or subtle (#youknowyouwantto) approach works better?

Crisis communications: when it isn’t plain sailing, information is vital

18 January 2012
by Sharmee Mavadia
Tags: crisis communications, PR, PR consultants, public relations, reputation management

The capsizing of the cruise ship Costa Concordia on Friday night off the coast of Italy is a human tragedy and a public relations crisis writ large. So far, we have seen the death toll rise to eleven passengers, with many more injured and the threat of an ecological disaster. The reaction by the cruise liner in its communications has caused a stir due to its (very quick) decision to release unsubstantiated information.

Crises, by their nature, are very unpredictable. There’s no knowing when they will strike, and no amount of preparation is a guarantee against further surprises. Based on our own experiences of helping clients through crises, they can be a daunting challenge for even the coolest head and the steadiest hand.

Having read through the reports of what happened, the most surprising part of the communications is how quick Costa was to point the finger. In a statement issued on its website, the company said, “While the investigation is on-going, preliminary indications are that there may have been significant human error on the part of the ship’s Master, Captain Francesco Schettino, which resulted in these grave consequences.”  Not giving a statement is a disaster in itself, but jumping the gun could prove to be much worse.

The public spat between the captain and the cruise line operator will be seen as insensitive and ill-timed, having occurred before any official investigation was carried out to determine what actually happened. This does nothing for the survivors, the families of those still missing, not to mention Costa’s overall reputation.

Hindsight is 20/20 and it’s easy, from a comfortable distance, to critique how a company handled a PR crisis. But some things on the Costa Corcondia update page, reading in chronological order, may have resulted in more questions than answers. For example, there was a four-hour gap between their first official statement and the acknowledgment of a tragedy. That said, “victims” are referred to in the second statement without any prior mention of fatalities. In addition, the emergency contact details for families were not issued until (an agonising) eleven hours after the accident. There was also no human face stepping forward early on, to express the compassion and grief that was only referenced in their press statements.

Our best advice for companies in this situation is to be in possession of the full facts. For any company who unfortunately finds itself in the midst of a crisis, it’s about knowing exactly what has happened. Ensure the chief executive is available (a spokesperson of this level of seniority is the most appropriate in such cases) and provides regular updates. Make sure that only information that is factual and accurate is relayed. The company should do all it can to help the people affected, putting lives first over commercial interests.

The blame game is a dangerous route to take. It creates the impression that a company will jump to conclusions before all the facts are known. In Costa’s case, the cruise ship’s black box has still not been released and investigators haven’t reached a definitive conclusion. In addition, what if investigations conclude that the captain was not to blame and lack of training or an engine failure was the reason?

Crisis comms is often judged on the quality of the information, timeliness of response, the channels of communications used, and the (promised) actions taken. Only time will tell whether Costa got the first part right.

On matters of Wikipedia…can PRs really be Switzerland?

11 January 2012
by Ana Mangahas
Tags: brand exposure, corporate communication, PR, reputation management, wikipedia

There have been some great posts recently about how to make the Wikipedia and PR “dance” more like a waltz and less like head-banging; Stuart Bruce’s and Phil Gomes’s being two that convey solid arguments in favour of open and responsible Wikipedia editing by PRs and corporate communicators.

To rewind: agencies – most notably, Bell Pottinger – have come under fire for heavy-handed editing of Wikipedia profiles on behalf of clients. The latest furore comes to us via Stella Artois and the attempted removal of “wife beater” from their entry. The brewer, InBev, said it disapproved of the reference to domestic violence; others yet said Stella “shouldn’t look to change details that are factually correct”.

Wikipedia belongs to everyone and no one. But people do feel proprietorial about its contents. It’s not just the image police who try to re-write history: disgruntled employees or anyone with an axe to grind can also have a go. (Firefly itself was the target of some unkind editing whereby, buried in the lower levels of text and not immediately obvious unless reading the whole script, were unflattering and factually inaccurate comments about the company). Ultimately, the ‘disgruntled’ are unlikely to be successful, given Wikipedia’s official rules of engagement; but that’s where its metadata is fascinating, because it can sometimes reveal the motive behind these edits.

On matters of editing, it’s easy to say, “stick to the facts”. But in these naked days of PR, one should do exactly that. Goodness knows there are enough policies and guidelines to make that line in the sand between fact and fabrication very painstakingly clear. And if you still had doubts, more guidelines look to be on their way from the various industry bodies.

So why do PRs still get it wrong? Is it because real brand-neutrality (for a client or one’s employer) can be difficult to achieve? Personally, I don’t think this tells the whole story.  Contrary to some people’s beliefs, PR is not an industry where you’re brow-beaten into submission, even when your moral compass is pointed in the right direction.

I think the Wikipedia crisis has revealed a crisis in writing. We need a re-training of the mind to write in a way that is simple, factual and is there primarily to inform –not necessarily influence. There are plenty of other vehicles for that.

Wikipedia’s importance – to companies, PRs, the media and the public at large – is not in question. But I have no doubt the quality of many entries can actually be improved with PR intervention. Of course, I would say that: but I would also put my money where my mouth is and participate in industry dialogue or training on this topic, to make sure I was doing a heck of a good job (acknowledging that “good” in this context can be subjective; in time, I hope it won’t be).

Firefly’s top six Wikipedia editing tips:

• Write for facts, not feeling, even if the text looks and sounds slightly dispassionate at first
• When in doubt, think back to section 2.2 of the PRCA guidelines: “Have a positive duty at all times to respect the truth and shall not disseminate false or misleading information knowingly or recklessly, and to use proper care to avoid doing so inadvertently.”
• Work with an editor when updating Wikipedia entries and have hard proof or evidence to substantiate your claims
• Sit down with a colleague who’s more removed from the task and ask him/her to critique your work
• Be prepared to have (potentially difficult) conversations with your stakeholders about what Wikipedia is and isn’t, including its mission, purpose and limitations

And last but not least, in true Wikipedia fashion, engage; engage in the dialogue, as there is certainly more to come in this hotly-contested space.