[by Howard Fencl, Hennes Communications] The University of California, Davis Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi is on administrative leave for spending university cash to push negative news down in search engine results, among other allegations. She authorized spending $175,000 with a search engine suppression (SES) firm in an effort to move five-year-old headlines about campus police […]
[by Howard Fencl, Hennes Communications] It’s that time of year when TV news promotions get louder, more breathless, more salacious and more frequent. It’s the reason every one of your local stations launches competing, exclusive, super-secret investigative reports. It’s a mad rite of spring for TV stations all across the country – it’s the Nielsen […]
[by Howard Fencl, Hennes Communications] I recently returned from a media training assignment in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and had a communications revelation: whatever your corner of the world, whatever your language, to gain the upper hand in a news interview, you must arm yourself with clear, quotable messages, you must believe them, and you must […]
The way an organization reacts in the first hours of a crisis will probably determine whether it succeeds or fails in regaining public trust. The way brand managers at Kellogg Co. recently esponded to the release of a video depicting a disgruntled employee should serve as a model for handling a PR crisis. When crisis […]
A colleague of ours, Don Etling, said it best: You can’t spin your way out of bad behavior. The Penn State situation exemplifies that. Joe Paterno & Co. knew that Jerry Sandusky was abusing children – and they looked the other way. They didn’t have a communications problem – they had a performance problem. Volkswagen is […]
Most crisis communication plans depend at least somewhat on the ability and willingness of employees to come to work – but that assumption may not be valid. According to a Deloitte study, including employees in pre-crisis planning and keeping them updated during an organizational emergency are critical to ensuring their participation and maintaining consistent communications […]
Only four months after terrorist attacks rocked Paris, professionals’ crisis communications were put to the test as terrorists hit Brussels. On Tuesday morning, two explosions went off in the check-in area of Brussels Airport. Shortly after those attacks—at least one of which, Belgium’s federal prosecutor said, was likely caused by a suicide bomber—a third blast […]
For decades, animal-rights activists have gone after SeaWorld and its Orca entertainment and breeding programs. And for years, SeaWorld has fought-off those activists, in the Court of Law, as well as the Court of Public Opinion. Rather than continue to fight in those two courtrooms, SeaWorld did a dramatic turnabout, announcing in full-page print and television […]
[by Howard Fencl, Hennes Communications] On March 22, Bruce Hennes and I were leading a day-long crisis management/media training program in the Netherlands when explosions ripped through Brussels Airport and the Maelbeek metro station. Though the terror struck more than 100 miles south of our training room, everyone’s smart phones immediately began dinging and beeping […]
From Ragan’s PR Daily: When tennis star Maria Sharapova hastily called a press conference, many reporters expected the athlete would be announcing her retirement. Instead, Sharapova dropped a startling admission: She had failed a recent drug test for the Australian Open. Sharapova’s drug test results came back positive for meldonium, a drug used to treat […]