[By Thom Fladung, Hennes Communications] How fast is social media at reporting on events – including events that your organization might consider a crisis? Faster than you. Consider a situation involving a school in Westfield, N.Y., that we stumbled upon. Here’s the first paragraph of a story from the Westfield Republican: “Parents need to realize that […]
The biggest bully-pulpit in the land is located inside the Oval Office. In the past, the occupants of that office have carefully chosen words and phrases, knowing they can move markets, armies and trends with minimal effort. Today, we are on the brink of uncharted waters as the next president of the United States appears to […]
Molly Strong writes: While fake content has circulated in tabloids and on the internet for years, the 2016 election has given us a reason to take it seriously. Stories about the Clintons selling weapons to ISIS and Trump winning the popular vote (he didn’t) spread like wildfire, and in some cases outperformed real news. The […]
Zach Schonbrun writes: 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 […]
Michiko Kakutani reviews ‘How Propaganda Works’: n “Mein Kampf,” Hitler argued that effective propaganda appeals “to the feelings of the public rather than to their reasoning ability”; relies on “stereotyped formulas,” repeated over and over again, to drum ideas into the minds of the masses; and uses simple “love or hate, right or wrong” formulations […]
From The National Association of Corporate Directors and The Wall Street Journal: As a host of threats continue to mount against organizations, more boards are weighing a broader, more proactive approach to crisis management. This is a positive development: in doing so, these boards are opening the door to adding significant value and stability to the organizations they oversee. Boards are uniquely […]
From Forbes.com: Depending on who you believe, Donald Trump won the election because of Russian hackers, last-minute FBI announcements, fake news, or because Hillary Clinton was a bad candidate. A new study from the Harvard Kennedy School pins the blame on the news media—specifically the “overwhelmingly negative” tone of news coverage and the “extremely light” coverage […]
From The Atlantic CityLab: In October, the ACLU released emails showing that a social media monitoring company called Geofeedia had tracked the accounts of Black Lives Matter protesters for law enforcement clients. The revelations of social media spying made headlines and led Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram to cut off Geofeedia’s access to bulk user data (which in […]
[By Bruce Hennes, Managing Partner, Hennes Communications, and Keynote Speaker, American Public Power Association Legal & Regulatory Conference, 2016] It’s not just terrorist attacks, explosions, active shooters, and environmental disasters. More often than not, it’s going to be sexual misconduct, data theft, unfair labor practices, OSHA complaints, mergers & acquisitions, layoffs, accusations, or employee fraud […]
[by Scott Juba and Howard Fencl] First, it was simply called “lying.” Then, it evolved into “propaganda.” Then “disinformation.” For whatever reason, the term has been further sanitized as “fake news.” Whatever you call it, it’s all bad news for organizations whose reputation is under attack. Right now, Facebook is at the vertiginous epicenter of […]