Brands Start Planning for Unexpected Criticism by Trump

H&R Block’s new advertising campaign is one of the more ambitious in the company’s 62-year history. It hired the actor Jon Hamm for his first on-camera spokesman role, a significant coup. And the company ditched its “Refund Season” slogan in favor of a more aggressive pitch: “Get your taxes won.”

The ads obviously target Intuit’s do-it-yourself Turbo Tax. More subtle is how much the campaign was really influenced by critical words from one heavy-hitting personality: Donald J. Trump.

It was August 2015, still the early days of the presidential campaign, when Mr. Trump first mentioned that he hoped to “put H&R Block out of business” with his plan for a simplified tax code.

Sixteen months later, the leading tax preparer is still feeling the effects.

“We got kicked around a little bit last year,” Kathy Collins, chief marketing and strategy officer, said. “We realized this was the time to do this.”

As the inauguration nears, Mr. Trump has shown no signs of curbing his willingness to criticize brands that draw his ire, as Boeing, Vanity Fair and Lockheed Martin have realized in recent weeks. The spontaneity of his denunciations — and the speed at which his words travel, particularly on Twitter — has created a sense of unease among marketing executives, who now must be prepared in case Mr. Trump’s insults fly in their direction.

It is prompting some brands to pre-emptively draft informal contingency plans, and others, like H&R Block, to spend money shoring up their reputation. But one thing that industry analysts and crisis management experts seem to agree on: There is nothing in the handbook that instructs executives on how to handle an overnight Twitter controversy created by the president-elect.

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