Today is the beginning of summer and the tendency is to want to relax. However, do not forget social media never stop and a hot topic for your brand can arise at any time. Are you ready to react? We can help.
Without knowing at what time something that affects your brand might appear, do not forget that, even in summer, you must be prepared for crisis management. Although the trend in social media management is based on positivism, ã hot topic may appear at any time and you will have to deal with it. The question that arises is: how to give an answer?
Ideally, you should start crisis management before the crisis even starts. If you manage social media, you must maintain a plan that anticipates some of the possible negative events and their responses.
The truth is you must accept a crisis can start at any moment, especially considering how social media can get any problem to take some big portions. That is why it is so important to not see the crisis as a taboo subject and be prepared for anything that might happen.
But when a crisis arises, how must you react? We give you some steps you must follow.
1 – Monitor your brand constantly – with monitoring as one of the bases for good communication, it is not weird that this is a crucial step. Keep up with everything that is said on your social media and on your posts, but, as important as this, monitor some keywords related to your business, so you are able to identify mentions to your brand (positive or negative)
2 – Identify the crisis motive – while monitoring you will find the crisis. After that, you must focus on finding out what is in its origin. We can be talking about a misinterpretation, a rumor, a product, or a service that might not be working as well as it should.
4 – Define the answer and apply it – now that you have identified what is in the origin of the crisis, you must define the answer you will give. We can be talking about finding a situation for a problem or about containing a situation.
From removing posts o rads from social media to writing clarification notes, while also possibly answering some comments (without deleting them), be ready to give some guidelines on what to do. But always keep some flexibility, since during the process something unexpected might happen.
5 – With the crisis solved, identify the impacts it will leave – if you already implemented an answer plan to de crisis and, apparently the problem is already solved, you might understand the harm that might arise from the crisis. You must identify de consequences that the brand will have to deal with: the number of followers changing, comments and likes on your page, mentions to the brand, pages’ evaluation, etc.. When identified, it is necessary to find a way to revert the situation and ensure the situation will not occur again.
6 – Prepare the future – It is now necessary to position your brand and define the way it will answer future questions about the crisis, that, even solved, might continue to bring you negative comments and mentions online.
Crisis might happen at any time, with unpredictability being one of its characteristics. If it occurs on social media, more easily and rapidly it can grow up, the reason why you must be prepared. From constant monitoring to the implementation of flexible answers, while preparing for the future, do not forget: the way you deal with a crisis will have a direct impact on your public’s trust and on your brand’s reputation.
By Sofia Neves, press officer in Media em Movimento
Sources:
https://rockcontent.com/br/blog/crise-em-rede-social/
https://www.knewin.com/blog/gestao-de-crise-em-redes-sociais/
https://portal.clint.digital/exemplos-como-fazer-gestao-crise-midias-sociais/