June 3, 2010

BP’s Next Challenge

The slow motion disaster that is unfortunately continuing to take shape in the Gulf of Mexico will undoubtedly become a significant case history in the fields of public relations, corporate social responsibility (CSR) and crisis management.

While British Petroleum has certainly been the victim of a worst-case scenario, they have also been woefully unprepared for a disaster that is obviously within the realm of possibility.  Good crisis planning could have probably predicted the current event and hopefully prodded some preparation to deal with it.

But from a PR perspective, BP has done a good job of accepting responsibility, admitting mistakes, being transparent about what is going on and I suppose when this is over, doing what is necessary to make sure it never happens again.  What is yet to be determined is how much BP is willing or able to make the innocent victims of the disaster whole.

The Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska showed the massive resources, both financial and in human capital, that are required to right a wrong of this magnitude.  And as the oil slick in the Gulf continues to grow and more communities are affected, the job just becomes bigger.  While the fragile eco-system of Prince William Sound is still recovering from the effects of its disaster, it is relatively sparsely populated compared to the communities of the Gulf of Mexico.  Cleaning up the oil and working to restore both the environment and the confidence of an angry public will be a massive undertaking.

Once the flow of oil is stopped, the real work will begin.  Let’s hope that BP is prepared.

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February 24, 2010

Lessons from Toyota

Today’s congressional hearings on T0yota’s safety problems and a recent mini-crisis at work have prompted me to focus on the long held rules of crisis communications.  If you read today’s coverage of the congressional hearings and what Toyota is doing about its unintended acceleration problem, you can see how these rules come into play.

Rule One: Show you care.  Demonstrating that you are concerned about the issue shows that you are a responsible corporate citizen.  Saying that you are concerned is great, but showing you are concerned is better.

Rule Two: Take action.  The best way to show you are concerned is to take action to address the problem.  This should be done as quickly as possible.

Rule Three:  Admit mistakes and apologize for them.  Toyota has done this today and it is an extremely effective tactic.  Everyone knows that we all make mistakes and we are very forgiving if we believe the errors were unintentional.  Americans love anyone who is willing to fall on their sword.

Rule Four:  Take steps to make sure this horrible thing never happens again.  Now this is easier said than done, but if you do steps one through three correctly, most folks will take you at your word for step four.  Now just make sure it never does happen again or you’ll really be in trouble.

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December 9, 2009

Living Stories To the Rescue?

I guess that Google feels bad about the way that it has helped to injure, maim and in some cases, kill newspapers.  Why else would it spend its time and energy to roll out a new product that it hopes will revive them?

I’m talking about Living Stories, a Google experiment to help newspapers present all of their content on a specific topic on a single web page.  Right now, you have to hope that the keywords entered into the papers’ search engine turn up all of the articles in your selected topic, but frequently some are missed.  Living Stories is a partnership between Google, the New York Times and the Washington Post.

As is often the case in technology experiments, the devil is in the details.  If a subject page becomes a defacto authority on a certain topic, I can see it getting a lot of page views.  But newspapers tend to be slow and deliberate when it comes to publishing articles on weighty topics, so the time between a post and a new article in a single newspaper may be too long for today’s Google-addicted immediate satisfaction-seekers.

As with all efforts to resuscitate newspapers, I’m all for it.  I just think this one may not have the horsepower to drag the publishers out of the abyss.

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November 16, 2009

MASSIVEGOOD is massively good

 

joinmassivegood_bgMASSIVEGOOD is an innovative fundraising movement that combines micro-philanthropy with social media. MASSIVEGOOD will let travelers make a small donation ($2/€2/£2) through a simple click each time they buy a ticket, whether online or through a travel agent. MASSIVEGOOD relies on the network effect of its members to spread the word about the solution. The more MASSIVE the movement, the more MASSIVE the GOOD.

MASSIVEGOOD is in testing phase and will be launched early 2010.

Mission:  MASSIVEGOOD was developed by the Millennium Foundation for Innovative Finance for Health. Funds raised by MASSIVEGOOD are distributed to UNITAID, hosted by the World Health Organization , to fight HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.

MASSIVEGOOD:  It’s massively good!

 

 

 

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August 31, 2009

Twitter for Travel

Twitter_256x256[1]I’ve recently begun tweeting for my employer, which is a supplier in the vast global travel industry.

Despite the fact that the travel industry is struggling along with the rest of the worldwide economy, there is no shortage of twitter fans among travel suppliers.  I feel safe saying there are thousands of airlines, cruise lines, hotel chains, resorts, tour companies, travel agents, destinations, experts, bloggers, journalists and pundits of every stripe tweeting on every aspect of the travel industry.

While my tweets are generally informative and my efforts still exploratory, I have found there are some lessons to be learned and opportunities to be exploited in the world of business tweeting.  Here’s what I’ve found:

Twitter is a great sales tool.  If you have prospects, see if they are on twitter.  You can follow their tweets, learn a lot about them and even create a relationship with them.

Listening is as important as tweeting.  I’ve learned a lot about my industry from reading the tweets of the many people I’m following.  Listening to tweets is just as valuable as sending them out.

Own a niche.  Tweeters who own some niche in the industry are seen as a valuable resource and have no trouble getting followers or having their tweets re-tweeted.

Twitter is a conversation.  Some people think Twitter is a publishing tool.  It’s actually a tool to hold conversations and build relationships.  Use it that way. 

Put some personality into your tweets.  I think there’s nothing worse than the corporate tweeter who just posts the occasional sterile information and offers no personality, no humor, no sign of being a human.  Don’t be that guy/gal.

Hashtags work.  Hashtags are search tools that help others find your tweets.  My favorites are #traveltuesday and #followfriday.  These hashtags are day specific and you can find people to follow and generate followers for yourself.  Most industries have a standard hashtag, ours is #travel.

Thanks for reading and happy Tweeting.

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August 6, 2009

Vacation Deficit Hurts America

on_vacation[1]Access America has released its first ever Vacation Confidence Index (shameless plug: my idea) and has found that a significant number of Americans are suffering from a Vacation Deficit.  The “deficit” is caused by those Americans who strongly value a vacation, but for economic reasons have not taken a vacation this year.

 

The Vacation Deficit is very real.  Of those who feel that a vacation is important or very important, nearly one-quarter (23%) do not plan to take a vacation this year.  That’s a lot of missed vacations.

This fact made me think about the effect all of those missed vacations have on our country, our economy and our productivity.  It’s no secret that the travel industry has been having a tough year because travel is down across the board, including in leisure travel.  The travel industry contributes a lot of money and jobs to our economy.  The U.S. Travel Association predicts 450,000 U.S. travel jobs will be lost between 2008 and 2009.

But beside the pure economic impact, what is the impact on workers who don’t take time to get away because they don’t take their vacation?  No vacation means the batteries aren’t recharged and workers aren’t “tan, rested and ready.” One study found worker productivity up by 82% after a vacation.

Bottomline:  Take a vacation.  It’s good for you, it’s good for all of us.

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July 28, 2009

Embrace Rejection

 

John Paul DeJoria

John Paul DeJoria

I just started reading Entrepreneur Magazine again after a long hiatus.

 

Three articles in the July 2009 issue caught my eye.

The first article talks about learning how to alter customers buying habits in order to get your sales going again.  In this economy, customers must be jolted into buying again, not unlike the jolt one receives from a defibrillator in order to get the heart started again.  Customers have hunkered down and have learned a new pattern of buying behavior:  they aren’t buying.  This is causing a downward spiral that by now we know only too well.  To get them to buy, you have to do something drastic like offering them something that’s almost free, just to get them to learn how to say “yes” again.

Another article lists 5 ways to ramp up marketing in a downturn:

  1. If your product is a great value, scream it from the rafters.
  2. Use social media like your life depends on it.
  3. Cause marketing can bring in new customers.
  4. Take the fear away from buying by giving an iron-clad guarantee.
  5. Give stuff away to generate some good PR

The last article tells the story of John Paul DeJoria, the entrepreneur who turned a $700 startup into Paul Mitchell Systems, a $900 million hair care empire.  Not yet done, he co-founded Patrón Tequila, accidentally creating the ultra premium tequila market and becoming rich in the process.  He’s worth an estimated $2.5 billion, making him one of the richest men in the U.S.

John hails from an immigrant heavy part of Los Angeles that I’m very familiar with. On his way to making his fortune, he sold Christmas cards when he was 9, delivered newspapers at 4am and sold encyclopedias.  John was homeless twice; he was sleeping in his car while getting Paul Mitchell off the ground.

John’s story is an amazing rags to riches story of determination.  He says the biggest hurdle in business is rejection.  The difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is the ability to handle rejection and soldier on. Pretty good advice.

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