Nothing makes people take to Twitter to vent their fury quite like transport delays.
So when striking French ferry workers and stowaway migrants combined to close Calais, it was a crisis for the Port of Dover, Eurotunnel and companies like P&O.
For journalists and the media it was the crisis that kept on giving, with ferry crossings and train services hit more than once.
But looking on the bright side, the corporate media and comms teams have really honed their crisis media management.
And there’s a good few pointers you can take from the #Calaisstrike, to help you manage your own crisis – and perhaps even turn it into an opportunity.
1 Get the information to the people
It sounds obvious but don’t wait for people to ask what’s going on. You might need to create a dedicated hashtag or twitter account, like the Port of Dover’s @POD_travelnews.
Whenever there are train delays, what really drives (tweeting) passengers mad is the absence of a shred of information, more than the delays.
@EurostarUK tweets travel information non-stop. People are hungry for that information. @EurostarUK has 130,000 followers. There are even hashtags for individual trains so people can quickly check whether their service is delayed.
2 Get the information to the journalists
The beauty of Twitter is that busy journalists can get a company’s latest line on a crisis quickly, without calling the press office.
But they might have a query. For example, if the Port of Dover is running only one ferry an hour, how many does it usually run? Think ahead about what kind of questions a journalist might have. For example, how much is the strike costing the Port in lost revenue per day? (Answer £250m – a good line for a news headline). Perhaps even create a FAQ factsheet to help you manage these questions faster when in the heat of the moment.
Create an email group and add every journalist that rings to the list – and send them regular updates. If your service has improved during the day, the last thing you want is a journalist running an out of date line. This email list can also be used in the future to drip feed positive stories back out to the media and help re-enhance your brands image.
3 Tell people you CARE
In a crisis, whether you’re writing a 140 character tweet, or putting up your spokesman for a 15 second soundbite for a TV news report, the audience needs to hear what we refer to on our media training courses as the CARE technique:
Compassion – show you care about the people affected – so this might be saying you understand the agony of truck drivers stuck for 10 hours on the M20 in Kent. Especially because those same lorry drivers will undoubtedly feature in the TV report (newspaper article, radio phone-in etc.).
Action – What are you and your team doing to help these customers and resolve the situation?
Reassurance – So the public feels confidence they won’t be affected – or at least that the problem will soon be resolved.
Examples – Proof of the measures you’re taking. For example, are you running two ferries an hour now instead of one?
4 Monitor the crisis from all angles
You might be on top of your message, but are you on top of what the rest of the world is saying?
In most big events, social media users adopt their own hashtag to organise their collective thoughts, photos, videos and jokes. There may be more than one.
You can keep track of things using tools like TweetDeck, which allows you organise searches on different topics, events and hashtags in handy columns on one page. It should mean you don’t miss anything – like parody Twitter feeds. See the parody Southeastern Trains account @SE Tranes:
Don’t ignore them. Journalists won’t. And you could hear your fiercest critic on the Jeremy Vine Show or on ITV News. Get involved. Respond. Answer the criticisms, with CARE.
And finally…
When you’re out of full-on crisis mode – and when it’s appropriate – think about how you can use the high profile your company has ‘enjoyed’ in the heat of the crisis. It’s a good time to deliver your fundamental messages.
An example from the ‘#Calaisstrike crisis. The Port of Dover is now using the hashtag #operationimPORTant to deliver messages about resilience and value to the economy:
In a press release the port’s chief executive admits the #Calaisstrike wouldn’t have been the chosen media strategy for changing perceptions about the Port of Dover. But nothing made the point better than the recent crisis. Every cloud…
Media First are media and communications training specialists with over 30 years of experience. We have a team of trainers, each with decades of experience working as journalists, presenters, communications coaches and media trainers. To find out more about our highly practical Media Skills courses, contact us here.
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