In his Crisis Guru Commentaries, Jim Lukaszewski provides real answers to real questions about your most critical communications problems and issues.

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Question:

Dear Crisis Guru:

I have three questions after participating in today’s IABC Web seminar, “Managing Tomorrow’s Crises With 21st Century Tools: Dark Sites, Social Networking, Blogs, Word of Mouth, and More,” with Idil Cakim:

Thank you.

Web Master

Answer:

Dear Web Master:

The answer to your first question is to put the button someplace where it’s obvious because the moment you try to hide it, people get suspicious and it attracts the attention of people who are suspicious naturally―your detractors and your competitors. So make it obvious, though it doesn’t have to be flashy. It’s just a button like the other buttons on your Web site. When somebody calls, say: “See the button that says ‘S390 Recall’? Just click the button and it will take you where you need to go.” This is a very powerful and positive way to do things. We always worry about being defensive, and this is how we get over being defensive.

If it’s something extremely serious, like all the miners that were killed in Utah or the 12 firemen who died in Charleston, South Carolina, you might consider putting up photos and brief bios of the victims. You will need to get permission from the families first. This act alone can really help the community grieve along with the families and provide the support so necessary for those who have lost loved ones to begin their own recovery.

Give people a commonsense pathway to get to the information, once that passes what I call “the straight-face test.” Avoid titles like “Mining Issues,” to get to the disasters. Be direct. You must put yourself in the victims’ shoes, or the survivors’ shoes, and ask how they would find the information easily and comfortably. Make it easy.

As for your second question, one thing to keep in mind about Web sites and recalls is that recalls are bad news. The media always checks these sites. If you do a good job, it will become a marker site for the media, which means your information will be used and quoted, and will replace other commentators, bloviators, and self-appointed spokespeople. Powerful sites are amazing resources for the media. Take advantage of this.

Honorable companies can and must talk about these things. Honorable people can answer the questions that are out there. Frankly, you have to say to yourself, “Wait a minute. Why would I not want to talk about this?” If someone finds out about a recall in the process of shopping for a new car, but your Web site says nothing about the recall, what would they think of you then?

What we find is that people go to Web sites on purpose. If they go to buy a car and yours is not the model they’re interested in, they’ll push another button. Think about how you use the Web yourself. Generally speaking, it’s very purposeful. One of the things managers worry about is that if they put a recall up on the Web, the whole world is going to care. One crucial Web reality is that nobody cares except the people who are looking for something of specific benefit to them.

Today, recalls are frequent, but even with a good recall site, you’ll still need to use other means to get people to come to your site and respond to your recall. Once you initiate a recall, you have an affirmative obligation to make it effective through all practical means possible. Failure to do this can cause serious penalties and even prosecution. The two most common U.S. government sites for locating information on recalls are www.fda.gov and www.cpsc.gov.

With respect to your third question, when JetBlue suffered thousands of flight disruptions in New York in the winter of 2006, they had more than just a button. The Chairman was all over the media—loading bags and apologizing to customers. There were links to UTube. JetBlue went to great lengths because it wasn’t just a few hundred flights. More than 1,000 flights were cancelled. New York’s Kennedy Airport was a total nightmare. JetBlue, in a sense, sacrificed a lot. As a dedicated JetBlue flyer myself, this is how I expected this company to behave, and they would have to do a lot worse than what they did in their situation for me to not fly on them. Worse would have been the usual behaviors―blaming other people, or not saying or doing anything. Crises like these can put your brand on the line. Better you do that yourself.

All the best,

Jim Lukaszewski