Issues and Crisis Management

Managing Your Reputation

As an example of a common public relations issue, hostile rumours and accusations can spring fully formed from internet news groups and social networking sites and quickly establish themselves in urban mythology.

The internet offers extraordinary new resources for issues and crisis management. These can be quicker, more targeted, more interactive and responsive than anything possible with conventional media. At the same time, the internet has created a host of new threats and dangers. Rogue sites can savage corporate reputations; chat room and newsgroup gossip can generate almost unstoppable rumour. The digital grapevine can bury, or make, reputations with startling speed.

The internet has also enabled individuals and small groups to wreak havoc on corporate reputations on a scale out of all proportion with their numbers or resources. Chelgate has long been renowned for its crisis and issues management skills. In recent times Chelgate has worked for clients facing some of the most savage and extensive Iiternet campaigns the UK has ever seen. We have developed a range of internet crisis strategies which work, and which have been proven to work.

The internet now offers a powerful crisis communications resource. Within half an hour of a Chelgate client reaching the studio, we can have a video and sound clip of the chief executive or company spokesman making a statement. Broadcasters will be able to download and use the sound clip at broadcast quality. And for the general public there is the opportunity to see and hear from the source, without depending on media reports. The broadcast clips can be linked to constantly updated text, as well as downloadable photos, charts and background material.

For more information on how Chelgate can help your organisation with a digital crisis management strategy, please do not hesitate to contact our chairman and chief-executive Terence Fane-Saunders directly here.