A crisis happens when you least expect it and comes in many different forms. And due to this, it’s often a stressful, frightening and overwhelming experience. While there’s no great way of stopping a crisis heading your way, there are ways to be prepared to manage it better. 

Here are a few things to take into consideration while managing a crisis: 

1) Prepare a crisis communication plan: Your plan should outline the goals, members of your crisis management team, key audiences, steps to take when a crisis emerges, how to communicate with the public and how to prevent the issues from happening or at least from hurting your company again.

2) Communicate with the public quickly and accurately: Speed is key, but you can’t sacrifice accuracy. Constantly provide updates to reduce uncertainty, anxiety and rumors, and always remain honest, open and transparent.

3) Use all the communication outlets that you can: Email, texts, calls, website and, possibly most importantly, social media. In this day and age, you can reach a large amount of people in real time by implementing a crisis communication plan via social media.

4) Conduct a follow-up communication and post-crisis evaluation: What strengths did you show during this time? How are you doing post-crisis? What could you have done differently? All of these questions should be taken into consideration while wrapping up your crisis situation. It’s even a good idea to use social media during your “recovery” phase to show that everyone is doing well and that business is in great shape.

Managing a crisis situation can be difficult, and that’s why we are here to help. Give us a call at 386-234-0233 or email Shellie at shellie@macmediaservices.com.