Talking Point

Crisis Sourcing is the way to channel your inner zombie

By Craig Regan

Crowd Sourcing on the Internet is so hot right now. In simple terms, it means outsourcing a job to a group of people, raising financial backing or tracking an event or cause.

Upheavals in Libya and Egypt are great examples of how to use crowd sourcing to map a crisis. Think of it as social media for activists, where plotting actions on a map mobilises protesters or shows the extent of an issue to raise public support.

We’re going to see a lot more of Crisis Mapping in world hot spots as access to wireless broadband explodes. Wireless broadband is cheaper than cable Internet in much of Africa.

The ubiquitous TV aerial that’s a part of every shack in even the poorest shanty towns in South Africa is fast being replaced by less visible smartphones as a prime communications channel.

It’s probably not far off the mark to say that we’ll soon have billions of digital media users on social media but lack access to fresh running water or a toilet.

One issue that needs to be explored is how reliable as a source of information Crisis Sourcing will be. Crisis Mapping is as easy as signing-up for online software and galvanizing people with the same interest.

Hackers accessing back-end software is a daily event and who’s to say the servers these databases run won’t become the target of operatives spreading disinformation.

In military parlance, this is “black ops”. Where winning hearts and minds used to rely on leaflet drops or foreign language radio broadcasts, the digital world is the new theatre of warfare.

You can read an academic’s view on Crisis Sourcing here.

If it’s all too hard, you can always watch how the world is tracking the zombie apocalypse here. 

Newsjacking and why pimping someone else's ride isn't as easy as it seems

By Craig Regan

“Newsjacking” is a colourful American PR term that means hijacking a breaking news story and inserting your own angle. In the Australian context, many try and few succeed and here are the reasons:

Despite what they might tell you, most Australian PR consultancies aren’t very nimble or responsive. Awakening at dawn and diving into the media to find out what news is breaking isn’t second nature unless you’ve worked as a political press secretary or journalist.

Once a rival story is running in the mass media, it’s almost certainly too late to seize the moment unless you jump ahead of the agenda and define where the issue’s going.

Even at the breaking stage, your story has to be more than good to change the news agenda. It must be newer, more unusual or a bigger game-changer than what’s already out there. That’s a judgement call based on experience and some gut feel.

If a client thinks their angle is the greatest story since 9-11 and it’s not, you need to have an honest relationship that lets you tell them it’s not. The same applies if buying into an issue isn’t a good idea.

Your PR company needs to know its way around the media. It’s no good firing out an email to an over-crowded or unattended in-box. Talking to someone senior on the newsdesk is imperative.

Newsrooms are chaotic places. A phone will ring out or be answered by a reporter’s neighbour who has no idea where their colleague is. That’s no time to be passive – it’s time to go up the line or find a roundsperson on their mobile.

Social media can be a useful tool here but it's no good tweeting if no-one's following. 

Lastly, the client needs to be prepared. Can they talk to the angle if journalists pick up on the angle and come calling? If they’re part of a large local company or multinational do they have authority to act without sign-off from someone else? Pre-agreed messages make all the difference.

It’s not as easy as inventing a colourful term.

Picture credit: Beyond PR blog

Brisbane floods teach a PR lesson

So the final report of the Queensland Floods Commission is out and recommends that three engineers working in the city's dam system be referred to the state’s Crime and Misconduct Commission. The story’s likely to dominate Queensland news for the next week, especially since there’s a State election in eight days time.

Putting the politics to one side and not inferring blame, there’s a lesson here for PR professionals – especially those working in crisis management. It runs along the lines of: No matter how prepared an organisation is for a crisis, a plan is only as good as the people charged with implementing it.

Most large organisations have crisis plans. Few bother to regularly test them. Many have a plan only because it required by their parent company or taxpayers.

The Lighthouse Communications crew has collectively worked on hundreds of those documents. We all agree that it’s one thing to have a plan but it’s another to invest in training the people who have to use it.

Working for one of our clients, I visited the Brisbane flood scene shortly after the waters subsided. The sight of people picking through stinking messes that were once backyards or scraping mud from the floors and inside walls of homes was devastating. It reinforced that the victims of a crisis - and those charged with managing it – are people and a natural disaster can take a heavy toll.

I recall working with another external PR consultant on a plan for a health technology company. Most of the plan was “his” intellectual property. It was actually off-the-shelf and wasn’t anything new. The colour-coded flow charts were very pretty, though, and the document looked great when it was printed and bound.

Crisis plans are not “size fits all”. They’re a prescriptive guide to what you might do when something hits the fan and people need to know how to use them.