How to manage a reputation crisis with market research

Do you have an emergency system to secure your reputation?

Yesterday I went to the first aid course, the one that is mandatory for companies. I imagine you also had to attend it, or at any rate someone on your team or in your company.

It’s quite a nuisance, isn’t it? In my case, I have to spend at least three lost days listening to health regulations and rescue principles while market research lags behind!

Why am I telling you about this? Because the course made me think about how prepared companies are for certain emergencies…. And how totally helpless we are in the face of equally serious emergencies, such as reputational emergencies!

Why? Because of all the risks, reputational risks seem most distant and least serious.

We are attentive to security risks, health, financial, legal… And we forget about the ones that affect the main value of our company, which is our reputation.

Today more than 90 percent of your company’s value comes from the trust your customers and the market have in you. Your reputation is the idea that precedes you and that people have in their minds when they think of your company.

It is the spring that makes consumers trust you and choose your products instead of those of your competitors. It is what makes them rest assured that you will not cheat them and betray their trust, because it has never happened before and it will not happen now.

This trust you have sweated for year after year… But if for any reason you betray it (or if clients think you have betrayed them) winning it back let me tell you: it’s a mess.

Of course, a reputation crisis does not endanger people’s lives as much as a security risk (thankfully). But it can shake the solidity of your company, putting its very existence at risk!

A scandal has an even greater scope than a fire or an explosion. Why? Because thanks to the Web, today a scandal can reach all over the world, spreading like wildfire.It can involve huge numbers of consumers and discredit a company before public opinion halfway around the world.

You’ve probably never thought about it, but what would happen if your company was involved in a scandal?

Well, first of all you should spend time and money to cope with the crisis by ditching all other activities altogether. I don’t need to tell you how much it costs to leave behind already planned activities in order to devote yourself to an emergency, because I imagine you know that very well.

If customers then began to boycott you, sales might drop, while expenses to manage the crisis would go up… And inevitably some jobs would begin to be in jeopardy.

These risks and problems are just as serious as a safety issue; they are simply seen as unlikely and far from the norm.

But they are not at all: a scandal does not have to be a sensational thing that happens to one in a million companies.

Today all it takes is for there to be a problem with one of your products or services, or for an employee to make any kind of mistake, or for your testimonial to be targeted for some reason.In short, for the normal things to happen that happen to everyone, sooner or later, through no one’s fault (more or less).

Today the most insignificant cause can become the fuse that sets off a real bomb, as I told you in my article a few weeks ago.  ( If you missed it, I suggest you go read it here because these are things you MUST know! )

The Web is now uncontrollable. Ruthless, looking no one in the face. The only law is that of sharing at all costs.Any news, whether true or false, today can become a scandal in no time.

The people of the Web are just waiting for a reason to turn on someone: any pretext is good to start boycotting a company, saying they are in favor of this or that cause!

Yet, for this kind of risk we are totally unprepared.

Almost all companies do not have an emergency plan, nor an alarm system, nor an emergency response team.

The law does not mention it, there are no courses on the subject, and almost all companies, at least in Italy, ignore this risk.

If you also ignored it until now, let me tell you: it was not your fault. 

Very little is said about it, in fact almost not at all! We only talk about the cases that have already happened, the big scandals in all the newspapers … but no one is concerned about how to prevent them.

One way to make yourself safe, however, exists, as I have already anticipated.

As with corporate security, there are anti-crisis and anti-bomb systems for reputation crises.

And you can put one up today, too. Don’t worry, I will now explain what it is and how you can do it. First, however, a clarification: avoiding a crisis altogether may not be possible.

Even in the first aid course, we were told a thousand times that despite all precautions, a safety emergency can happen anyway!

So what do we do, retreat into hermitages or hide under the bed to avoid any risk?

Of course not: we pre-equip ourselves with alarm systems, such as emergency buttons and smoke detectors,and prepare emergency procedures to intervene in case of problems.

The idea is also the same in the case of reputation. We first monitor the situation with an alarm system–and then if the alarm goes off, we take action to react and keep track of what is happening.

Our crisis alert system is to constantly LISTEN to what is going on around us, the signals coming to us from the world of the web.

Yes, because when interest in a certain topic increases (and thus a scandal is precisely brewing), the number of conversations on that topic also increases. Like wasps gone mad, web users start sharing, posting, commenting.

And if we are listening, we can pick up on these warnings!Listening to the network means precisely knowing in real time what is going on, intercepting online conversations on social networks, media, review sites and so on.

(If you want to learn more about what network listening is, you can read about it in this article by clicking here).

I’ll let you in on a secret: crises never erupt suddenly.In fact, there is always some time between when they start and when they explode, and the key is precisely in intercepting that moment when a news story is starting to grow in importance but has not yet exploded.

How, however, to intercept that moment?

It’s not like you can spend all your time looking for information on the web! Even if you had the chance to do that (leaving aside everything else you do), you would not have the confidence that you were looking at the right thing at the right time.

Fortunately, there are tools that allow you to do this in a much more convenient way.

The Web has become so susceptible that the risk of crisis has grown to stellar levels. And so in recent years advanced deisoftware has sprung up that can intercept conversations for you.

Today there is software to listen to the network that thinks they will intercept the crisis for you.

Even while you sleep, they scan the Web and social networks and take care to find out anything you might need.They are like fire or gas alarms, constantly measuring air quality and alerting you as soon as something is not in the norm.

However, the software alone is not enough, just as the alarm system is not enough to prevent the emergency.

To set up an effective crisis contingency system you need two basic things:

1. software of adequate quality
2. And the skills to set it up correctly.

Point 1 remains fundamental. Today you can no longer do without a network listening tool. And it must be of high quality, because when it is your safety that is at riskI imagine you want only the best.

If your company was going to be on fire and you were asked whether you wanted the basic or the advanced firefighting system, I think you would have no doubt!

For that you don’t just need a free network listening service or a simple Google Alert search.

Free services offer very basic listening that gives you an idea of what people are talking about. They can be useful for spot research, but certainly not for letting you sleep soundly.

Same thing Google Alerts and similar press review services. They are like medical bulletins, alerting you when an article has come out in the news papers about a very specific topic.

I think you’ve already figured out the problem yourself: if a news story is already IN THE DAILY, everyone knows about it by now, and the emergency has well and truly broken out!

However, the software alone is useless.

Think of the system that detects a gas leak or fire start. If it is not set up properly, it may go off when not needed, or it may not be sensitive enough to pick up the beginning of a problem.

Or, think of the case when the alarm started going off like crazy–but there was no one around to intervene! Or conversely if someone came running but didn’t know what to do, the situation would still precipitate, don’t you think?

It’s clear: during an emergency, you need the right people who can handle it.

If you have to put out a fire, you’re not going to call an ambulance are you? It simply would not make sense!

The same goes for listening to the network. Do you want your system to be truly crisis-proof? Then it needs to be set up by experts who know the tricks and know what risks need to be kept under control.

The risks of a crisis can come from many different directions: from within, because of your own mistake; from one of your competitors dragging the whole industry into the spotlight; from one of your spokespeople caught in the wrong–and so on.

A network listening expert has seen it all. It has already followed changes of opinion, scandals and all sorts of problems.

He knows what your risks are, or at any rate he knows what questions to ask you to figure out what they might be!

Most importantly, he knows all the tricks to make sure your software monitors these risks and alerts you at the crucial moment.

It is like the ambulance team, rushing in and knowing what to do. Your marketing agency, on the other hand, is like someone who took the 12-hour first aid course I took: they have a vague idea of what to do, but better if backup comes (I promise! I couldn’t even save the CPR test dummy).

I can tell you from experience: I work with several marketing agencies, and when it comes to these things they prefer to ask us.

Just think that an agency we were working with managed to saturate an entire month’s license of the software in a matter of minutes,due to making a mistake in setting a single parameter.It collected a million completely useless conversations and saturated the software!

By this I do not mean that agencies are not good; on the contrary. The corporate first aid team is critical and can save lives! However, when the problem becomes more difficult, in fact what do you do? Call 118!

Well, are you ready to set up your emergency reputation crisis system?

If until today you had never heard of these things, it was not your fault. Probably your agency had never told you about it, or you had not yet realized how dangerous and unpredictable the Web is.

However, if you found out today that your company had some serious security risks (and even risked penalties), I imagine you’d run for cover right away!

So my advice is this: don’t wait any longer. Don’t let it be too late, and don’t make the mistake that almost all companies make of taking risks to your reputation lightly.

The costs and losses would be so great that you would regret not taking action sooner.

You would be forced to drop everything and handle the emergency hastily and rashly. You wouldn’t even fully understand the situation and would spend time and money left and right trying to fix it!

Today you can make a healthy choice and put the safety of your reputation (and your entire company, and even your workplace) on the line.

You don’t have to do anything yourself-I’m here for you.  Contact me by clicking on the link below and we’ll talk calmly about what is the best solution for your company to listen to the network.

Activate your anti-crisis system!