“Marketers no longer have control.” Have you heard this
before? Maybe you’ve lived it firsthand?
Social media has enabled people to rapidly swarm—creating
monsoons that can cause serious damage to your business OR create serious
opportunities if you’re ready.
The upside to real time goes way beyond crisis management.
Real-time firestorms can create once-in-a-lifetime opportunities for businesses
that are prepared and can quickly respond.
In this article, I’ll review what you can do right now to
prepare for your next real-time situation.
What Guitars Can Teach You About Real-Time Marketing Communication
Have you heard of Dave Carroll? If you haven’t, watch this
video called “United Breaks Guitars.”
United Airlines refused to treat Dave fairly. So he created
the above video out of frustration. Now more than 9 million people know how
poorly United Airlines treated Dave.
If you Google “United Airlines,” you’ll see Dave’s video
comes up on page 2. Translation: This one act is now etched into the annals of
time and won’t go away anytime soon.
Simply said, it was a PR nightmare for United Airlines. Take
a look at this article to see how poorly United responded.
What does any of this
have to do with you?
How would you have responded
if you were United? Are you really ready to respond to a real-time crisis, the
moment it arises?
Fortunately David wrote a book on this topic. And the story
only starts with Dave Carroll.
A few smart companies, including Taylor Guitars, took quick
advantage of the growing firestorm. Check out the video response of Bob Taylor,
founder of Taylor Guitars (posted 4 days later, and viewed 500,000 times).
How to Prepare for Real-Time Opportunities and Threats?
There a lot of simple steps you can take to be ready when a
real-time situation arises. Perhaps the easiest first step is to get your hands
on David Meerman Scott’s new book Real-Time Marketing & PR.
The following real-time marketing tips come straight from
David’s book:
Engage in the midst
of the crisis: Real time does not operate on a 9-to-5 schedule. Your
organization needs to be monitoring and ready to respond around the clock, as
the crisis is occurring.
Use Twitter as your
real-time communications tool: The media will be monitoring what people are
saying on Twitter. This gives you an opportunity to join in on the discussion
in real time, providing an insider’s perspective.
Establish
relationships with journalists BEFORE a crisis happens: Reach out to
influential journalists in your industry. Follow and respond to them on
Twitter, comment on their articles and send email introductions. Hopefully
they’ll follow you back on Twitter so you can send them direct messages if a
crisis occurs.
Don’t just sit back
and think, “This will never happen to me or my company.” If you have that
mentality, you’ll be ill-prepared when (not if) your marketing monsoon occurs.
Do you have firsthand experience dealing with a real-time
crisis (or a real-time opportunity)? What did you do? What tips would you add?
Please leave your comments!!!!!
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