Social media is a powerful tool for businesses old and new. It allows companies to connect with their customers, promote new products and improve customer service, but it can also be a double-edged sword. When things go wrong on social media, the issue needs to be dealt with quickly before it causes bigger damage in the long run. In this article, we will discuss what you should do if your business encounters a crisis on social media.
1. Identify and assess
It’s important to take the time to properly identify the nature of the issue you’re facing. You should ask yourself whether this is an isolated incident, or if it reflects on your business as a whole?
After you’ve got this figured out, it will be easier to examine your next steps. When assessing the situation, be sure to examine the type of social media platform that was involved, how many people were impacted, and what their roles are within your company. From there you will be able to determine if the effects of the crisis are short-term or long-term.
2. Have a crisis guideline in place
If you have a social media presence, you should have a social media crisis policy as well. The documentation should include privacy and privilege guidelines, brand image guidelines, and intricacies of copyright content. When employees engage in social media or react to a situation, adhering to the policy will save you from any unpleasant situations.
3. Use social listening to get to the root
In most cases, it’s possible to detect a crisis before it becomes serious. This is why brands should use social listening techniques to keep a tab on audience engagement, tonal shifts, and content being shared in the network. Be it audience or spammers, you can analyze and identify a potential risk just by staying vigilant.
4. Demonstrate a willingness to change
If you want your company to truly recover from a social media crisis, honesty is always the best policy. Make sure to offer a solution as quickly as possible. This could be anything from offering a refund or replacement or publicly announcing policy changes. Under stress try to keep a logical flow of response and follow the information gathered from previous steps to win back customers.
Crisis management is a complex process that requires thoughtful action. It’s important to be proactive in how you prepare, but it’s also necessary to know what to do when things go awry. We hope this guide has given you some insight into how your social media crisis can be managed and offer our services should you need them. Let us know if we can help.
