Overview
For many businesses, social media a great way to engage and interact with clients. Many companies owe their marketing success and increases in customers to social media. However, there are times when unfortunate events happen when using social media. For example, a business may send out an ill timed tweet, or their social media accounts may be hacked and let out bad information. At the end of the day, if a business has various social media accounts long enough there is probably going to be a crisis of some kind that must be responded to. How a business responds to a social media crisis can mean the difference in an event that blows over quickly versus one that stains the company for years to come. Here are several steps on how to handle a social media crisis.
Admit the Mistake
The first and most important thing that any business can do during a social media crisis is to admit the mistake of the business. Even if it was not anyone in the companies’ fault, it is still important that customers hear an apology from the business of some kind. Generally, people that use social media are forgiving of people and companies that admit their mistakes quickly and work to repair the damage. By admitting the mistake that took place, a company is showing that they want to invest their time or money in to fixing the problem rather than trying to hide it.
Repair the Damage
There are several different types of social media events that can happen that will require work to fix. First of all, if a business sends out something with incorrect information on a product or service it can have a big effect on customers. For example, if a business accidentally sends out something showing a price of $10 instead of $100, customers may go to purchase the product and end up having to pay more than they originally thought. Although it is up to the business at the end of the day, a good policy to adopt is to honor any pricing that customers legitimately see. If there are other types of social media issues, like a hacker or rogue employee sending out vulgar content, the business should immediately apologize and take care of the person that was responsible for the bad content by firing them.
Increase Awareness
Finally, any time there is a social media crisis for a business there is going to be increased attention on the company. Instead of shying away from the attention, a business should use this time to market themselves to potential customers and work to keep the ones they have. There are times when a crisis can turn in to something that has long term benefits, and a social media crisis handled the correct way can do just that. In fact, many companies report they have increased followers on social media sites after a crisis. It is important for any business to not only apologize and fix the problem, but also position themselves in the best way possible to get any benefit possible out of the situation.