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What does trust mean to B2B tech brands? How is it established? How is it fostered? And what challenges are businesses facing? As part of our The Question of Trust research, we spoke to marketing professionals from a range of tech companies to get their insights and experiences.

This is what Helen Aboagye, CMO at Imagen had to say:

Q: In your opinion, what are the components of consumer trust?

For me, it is that you have a quality product. It needs to do what it says on the tin. It needs to be fit for purpose, and it needs to address or does what customers need it to do. It needs to address and fixes their problems and pain points. I think that’s followed by validation preferably from external sources to your company, so customer validation, industry validation, whether that be in the form of case studies, customers allowing you to use their logos, testimonials, placement in the Gartner Magic Quadrant. I think a strong brand is critical to creating consumer trust. For me, that is a brand with a clear sense of purpose and identity. This needs to be brought to life through your marketing, your people and run through the DNA of everything a company does. I’m a big believer in people buying into you as well as buying from you. Finally getting your brand out there through brand awareness activity and PR, so people can get to know your brand and see the customer’s validation for themselves. If people don’t know who you are, they don’t know whether they can trust you.

Q: In the past, how have you typically built trust?

Like many companies, we used many different strategies and tactics. It was very much a multi-pronged approach. Wherever possible we reference our customers from logos on our website to testimonial usage and written and video case studies.

With so many people doing more than half their research online before they even get in touch and want to talk to a salesperson, it is more important than ever that we create the content they need, to arm them with the information they want, so that they want to ‘pick up the phone’. Content in all its forms is important, but creating content that talks to customer pain points, right the way through to independent research and data-driven, anything data-driven I think really helps to validate trusts as well.

And finally, our salespeople and account managers create a lot of trust through the relationships they build and the knowledge they have about our product and industry.

Q: How has that changed in the last 12 months?

We’ve really focused on ramping our digital marketing side of things. We’ve put more into paid search and we have been focused on developing our pages and communities across certain review sites like G2 and Capterra. We have also taken the opportunity to rethink our internal processes. We have focused on what more we can automate when it comes to our of our marketing outreach and communication.

But specifically, we have looked at how we can find the higher intent people that are essentially in the market for a solution. Historically we have put a lot of effort into really compelling pieces of content that many people will find interesting, but they are not in the market for a solution. This helps with brand awareness but doesn’t create leads that convert.

However, what we have been doing a lot more of is utilising new marketing technologies and platforms and sites like G2 and Capterra, as I mentioned, to understand who’s in the market for a solution, and then building much more tailored outreach and personalised account-based outreach.

We have also been doing a lot more videos. Short-form videos, human, a little rough around the edges. With so many people not being able to see or have contact with others during the pandemic, video is the next best thing, and people retain a lot more information from video than they do written content.

Q: Do you think your shift in focus to digital and ABM strategies will stay?

Yes, without a doubt. I still think there is value in the way we’ve done things before, but I think everyone’s moving in this direction, and the pandemic has just accelerated this, and not just in marketing. The pandemic has also helped to blur the lines between online and physical, you just need to look at the event industry as evidence of this. So I think we’ll just see more and more of that without a doubt. Also, we’ve been able to do a lot more with a lot less. Our budgets were cut massively, but our lead numbers are in the realm of what they were when we were spending a lot more money. I think our cost per lead has come down quite dramatically with the efforts that we’ve put into digital.

Q: From a PR and marketing point of view, where do you think the biggest opportunities will lie in building trust with customers and prospects?

I think there’s a real opportunity on the PR side of things. I mentioned the need for being genuine earlier, and I think there’s a real opportunity to hear individual voices on the PR side of things over and above like corporate press releases.

Content is still king, but I think it’s the type of content that people are consuming is changing. For example, there’s a real demand for longer white papers but people are so incredibly time-poor, they just don’t always get around to reading them. I think the more you can translate your efforts of white papers into bite-sized chunks and infographics and videos and podcasts and webinars and things like that, the greater the rewards you will reap.

We’ve seen a massive increase in video marketing and people doing lots of video content that is shot from their bedroom. Webinars and online events for thousands of people are being shot from people’s attics and that’s fine. I think people are much more accepting of less professionally shot videos, you don’t need a slick corporate video anymore when you can get your CEO to record something on her or his phone. This makes your brand and company more human and will probably go a longer way to building consumer trust. All of which is great for a company like us that helps people produce and manage and them.

By Susan Richter, Marketing Communications Manager

The pandemic has hastened the adoption of digital marketing. Those who were already firmly rooted in it had a competitive advantage, while slower adopters ramped up budgets and efforts.

In our The Question of Trust research, the increased adoption of digital marketing was a common theme. More content, more social, more webinars. That’s not surprising because we all lived it.

However, now, as we move to some form of equilibrium, the question is: do we keep this intense focus on digital marketing? Is it still the cure-all for brands?

If the answer is yes, then the next question is how do you fight digital fatigue? How do you make sure your brand stands head and shoulders above its competitors? And if the answer is no, is it really a case of getting back to “normal”? What needs to happen next?

Looking at digital fatigue – it’s real, we’ve all experienced it to some degree. How does your brand differentiate itself when everyone is using the same tactics? How do you continue to build customer trust? Much like other marketing and PR efforts it comes down to doing what you do well. That means creating content that is valuable and informative, that can be consumed on different platforms in formats that appeal to your different audiences. Creative needs to be eye-catching, relevant and distinctive — and importantly, integrated into everything you do.

It also means you need to know your audience; who they are, what their challenges are, what they are looking for, and (of course) where they are in the buying journey. That includes your current customers, knowing their objectives and how best you can add value to their business. Inherent in all of that is the implied promise to deliver what you’re offering.

On the other hand, if getting back to normal means a return to events and more face-to-face activities surely digital marketing can work in conjunction with those tactics? The market sentiment is very much a hybrid approach to events at the moment anyway.

But here’s a thought, what if instead of fully embracing getting back to so-called normal, marketers think more retro? Whatever happened to the creative desk drop? Surely something tangible to combat those 1s and 0s would be valuable and well received? Something well thought out, valuable and memorable?

For us, the answer isn’t as easy as a simple yes or no, one or the other. Rather, it’s continuing to meet (exceed) expectations forging a new path using a new strategy based on experience, current demand and future need. Something that can be effectively executed, measured and reported on.

It also doesn’t necessarily need to be all about digital marketing in isolation. Digital marketing is a key component in a wider strategy that can incorporate traditional marketing tactics as well as PR.

So what approach will you take? We think we know the answer!

Remember Facebook circa 2010? Brands took to the platform and it made a significant impact. Like all things digital, Facebook has evolved since then, in fact the whole paid and organic social media landscape has. What this means is with the algorithm changes (for Facebook specifically) reach, impact and engagement isn’t what it once was.

Don’t worry though – paid social media is here to save the day.

Or is it?

Let’s be clear: organic social still has a role to play in your digital marketing strategy. It is the ideal platform to tell your brand story, it’s built around community and it’s not necessarily about target driven results.

Tied into community management, something that’s become more of a focus over the last two or three years, is employee advocacy. Your employees can be your strongest advocates and when they take to social media to convey that, it has a positive impact on your brand in terms of amplification of content, visibility, shareability and share of voice.

Organic is also the ideal testing ground for the paid side of things because you can see what content resonates with which audiences and how they are engaging with your content. Those learnings, building up a clear profile of your audiences over time, can be applied to your paid strategy.

Why should you use paid social then? It’s not just used to boost organic content. It’s a lot more targeted than that. Those strategies are built around campaigns and specific objectives and typically across B2B are designed to generate an action.

So think about targeted content like eBooks, webinars and whitepapers, leveraging your best content. You can use these to fuel your paid campaigns across platforms, such as Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. With LinkedIn specifically, there is the opportunity to be really targeted across things like personas, industry, job title, age, geography, company size… the list goes on. You can use it to find and engage with new audiences.

The key thing about these types of targeted campaigns is that they can be measured and you can determine your ROI. While paid gets the quick-fire results based on specific campaigns, having organic running concurrently building your brand story and presence provides longevity.

Using both paid and organic social media together makes sense. And when you’re using social as part of a larger PR and marketing strategy, they pack a powerful punch for reaching those objectives – be it lead generation, brand awareness or expansion.

If you’d like to chat about the opportunity that paid and social media can deliver to your business, please get in touch.

As part of our The Question of Trust research, we spoke to marketing leaders from a host of B2B tech businesses. We got their insights on trust building, how to do it, how to overcome any challenges and how the process of maintaining trust and customer loyalty were affected by the pandemic.

This is what Martijn Groot, VP Marketing & Strategy at Alveo Technology had to say:

“I think what we saw during the pandemic was that it is very easy to engage on a superficial level in the sense of filling up webinar rooms, at least initially.

I think during the year, there was a certain fatigue of webinars and online events.

At the same time, I think there’s this digital bombardment of mailings, and everyone is taking pot-shots at buyers or influencers in companies.

But, in that war for attention using creative subject lines as well as tactics, there have been big developments in marketing automation, in the personalisation of websites or portals that people go through.

It’s easy to send content and get reactions and get downloads and get webinar attendance. Getting one-to-one meetings, that has been hard because things were postponed during the year and there wasn’t a reason for the buyer to engage.”

Q: What are the best ways to build trust?
The brand is important. Comms are important, so try to come up with relevant content, certainly be consistent in your messaging.

The best content in my view, and I’ve also been a buyer on the other side, is case studies, testimonials, or insightful commentary on challenges that I would face as a buyer. Anything from relevant peers which is the most credible content. Together with that kind of content, it’s anything from trusted third parties.

Part of our outreach has also been to the rest of the ecosystem, so people that we have a shared interest with, for example, selection consultants, or services companies that complement what we do in adjacent fields, both from the perspective of using them to help us in direct influencing, but also to team up to offer a more comprehensive solution to target accounts. Our outreach is not only to prospects, but also to influencers in the ecosystem.

In terms of building trust, I think it’s targeted comms on what you do, what’s coming down the pipe to your clients, report on service levels. We share roadmap information, so try to be transparent and consistent. Also, of course, you have to do what you say that you will do to your clients.

To prospects, it is as I mentioned, about, if possible, show them something that one of their peers has solved using our solutions, that will work best.

Q: Did that kind of approach change at all over the pandemic?
I think it changed in the sense that, on the marketing side, which is my department, we’ve certainly done more to get more out of our marketing automation toolset. Like HubSpot and making sure we’re using the content properly.

We’ve also accelerated micro-targeting that I mentioned, using our partner network, and still trying to make it all more personable, even though it’s digital.

We also have the comms come from the salesperson and offer something like brief consulting sessions with an SME, 30-minute or an hour call, where you’re not trying to sell them something.

Overall, we tried to be relevant. Have relevant content and then build on that.

Q: What are the biggest barriers to building trust with customers and prospective customers?
It’s been harder to get meetings, again, probably because early on pre-pandemic, it was easier to just have a coffee with somebody, sit down and interact more, let’s say, informally.

On the bright side, maybe the pandemic has, I guess, changed the etiquette of business meetings a little bit, that it’s now a custom to have video chat immediately. Maybe two years ago, we would have had this conversation over the phone or in person. There was this, I would say, an intermediary step that you can look each other in the eye, but it’s still digital.

On the digital side, the biggest challenge has been gauging the intent of people. I think marketing and market automation can play a bigger role.

Q: Where do you see the biggest opportunities for PR and marketing in building trust?
For the customers, it’s clear concise communication and regular updates. Don’t bombard them. Be selective in what you send to people and be relevant. Transparency is helpful.

For the prospects, it’s pretty much the same. It’s wherever possible, of course, and this is, to me, the most valuable content. You have to make sure that you give them what they need to go to the next step or make them think, which is more the thought leadership, and make sure the lightbulb goes off and they have this aha moment and they will look at you. Maybe otherwise they would not have ever considered it.

By Mark Wilson, Creative Director

We all love a good podcast – from true crime and football fantasy, to epic cookery and comedy. There is a podcast on every topic.

But it’s not just entertainment. And content isn’t just directed at consumers. I’ll say it again… there is a podcast on every topic. Business, tech, creative, advertising, tech PR, HR… the list goes on. As a business owner or marketing professional you’ve most likely already asked the question: how can podcasts help my business?

The answer is simple.

The right podcast, with engaging and informative content, can be used in much the same way as any other PR and marketing asset. It is a great vehicle to support your objectives, and can be used to fuel awareness of your brand, generate leads and demonstrate thought leadership.

The best thing about podcasts is that they are so versatile — giving you almost carte blanche when it comes to format. Q&A, monologue, conversational, panel… the choice is yours. Depending on your objective and your content, of course.

And again, just like with other marketing and PR assets, the podcast is best used as part of a balanced campaign mix, covering off a range of different assets for every touchpoint; social, video, eBooks and the likes. Not everyone consumes content in the same way so it’s important to give your audience options and make it easy for them to engage with your brand.

The podcast is also the perfect tool to humanise your business and give your customers and potential customers insights into the people behind the brand. You can talk about your values, highlight your staff or simply give them valuable content in a personalised way, whether that’s coming from a subject matter expert or your CEO.

Another key element that podcasts can help with is credibility. We all know that having your existing clients talk about their successes and positive experiences with your business is a valuable sales tool. Also think about employee advocacy; having your team talk about their experiences, career growth and why they enjoy their jobs can help boost that assurance for prospective clients but also help attract the right candidates for new roles.

Okay, so maybe that wasn’t a simple answer. But the facts are clear around the value that a professionally executed and promoted podcast can deliver to your business. Whether that’s providing a window into your brand and your team, reinforcing what you stand for or demonstrating your expertise and thought leadership to the market, podcasts are definitely worth considering for your brand.

By Ella Thompson, Senior Account Director

The value of crisis comms has really come to the forefront in recent years for obvious reasons. But having a crisis comms strategy in place encompasses so much more. Most experienced marketers will have dealt with some form of crisis in the past, however large or small, but it’s worth repeating that a crisis, according to the Institute for Crisis Management is a “Significant business disruption which stimulates extensive media (and social media) coverage. The resulting public scrutiny will affect the organisation’s normal operations and also could have a political, legal, financial and governmental impact on the business.”

Undoubtedly there have been many lessons learned from the pandemic, but moving forward, how do those lessons apply to your overall strategy? Taking a step back, there is a multitude of different disruptions that can happen to a business from cybersecurity hacks to natural disasters, and a good crisis comms plan will have a plan of action in place for as many eventualities as possible. In the event of a crisis, the media want the exclusive and this can have an impact on the accuracy of initial reports. This becomes even more difficult for companies because in the social media world, unsubstantiated rumours can be reported as fact and spread quickly, audiences may believe a company is hiding something if it does not respond immediately to a request for information.

There are many pitfalls in dealing with the media in a crisis and plenty of real-life examples from some of the biggest companies in the world on how not to handle a crisis. First off, you need to reach your target audiences quickly and minimise the spread of misinformation. Regardless of how much you know at the time, it’s important to take action quickly, stick to the facts, don’t speculate on what could have caused the crisis or the extent of it because that is when misinformation can spread. Your spokespeople need to be responsive and offer straightforward and accurate information.

While external communications with the media are important, internal communications should play a big part in your plan as well. Your employees need to know what is happening. By doing this you avoid your employees speculating about what is happening and therefore reduce the spread of misinformation. It can also be very important for morale. If your employees feel that they are being kept in the dark then this will not endear them to the company and you could see people’s loyalty waiver. Therefore, it is important to have a dedicated resource or channel to communicate with employees and respond to their desire for information.

One of the major changes to crisis comms over time is the speed in which you are expected to respond to crises – over 20 years ago information didn’t spread nearly as quickly, so companies would have far more time to gather the information on what has happened and then make a statement. Nowadays in the age of social media and rapid news cycles, companies have to react quickly to these problems. They need to act quickly and state what they know then gather as much information as possible to stay on top on the spread of misinformation. Social media has now become the main source of communicating with their stakeholders, allowing the company to quickly reach a large proportion of their audience.

Although the channels and speed at which you need to communicate your message during a crisis have changed quite drastically – the core principles of crisis communication will stay the same over time:

– Plan for tomorrow
– Respond rapidly
– Work with local authorities
– Position your management front and centre
– What you say must reflect what you do
– Be open and honest
– Demonstrate concern and convey integrity
– Speak with one voice
– Talk to stakeholders directly

If the future of crisis communications follows in the same path that it has taken so far then it is imperative for companies to have a comprehensive plan that allows them to adapt, change and communicate effectively in the event of any crisis. Companies are being held to account of their actions now more than ever and they are given less time to explain themselves – but if you stick to the core principles then it could be the difference between success and failure.

A crisis doesn’t mean the end for a company, it is how they deal with that crisis that determines their outcome.

By Hannah Buckley, Head of Content

A popular topic of discussion in the world of PR and marketing is the role of content and the question ‘is content still king?’ is one that comes up from time to time. For us at Whiteoaks, there is no doubt that content is still king. After all, what else could you rely on to do everything from building trust with your audience and guiding customers through the sales funnel, to demonstrating your expertise and boosting brand awareness?

Content is multifaceted and, with a solid content strategy directing your efforts, every single piece can open you up to a world of opportunity.

No matter your business objectives, whether it’s increasing brand awareness, community engagement, lead generation, or anything else, a well-executed content strategy will set the stage for success and help you achieve your goals.

When it comes to content marketing, for example, those who have a strategy in place are much more likely to be in the category of successful companies, according to a recent Statista report.

So how does that play out in the real world? With 70% of B2B decision-makers saying that content marketing has helped them achieve their lead generation goals, let’s see how you can align your content strategy with this goal…

#1 Define your target audience
If you’re aiming to generate leads, the starting point is ensuring you can reach your intended audience. This means developing personas which encapsulate who those audiences are so that their needs and wants are front of mind when it comes to what you create and how you share it. This will help to ensure your content not only reaches them but also resonates.

By segmenting your audience based on these personas, you can tailor your content more precisely to meet their different needs. As experts in your industry, you understand the challenges your customers are facing, therefore, you can align certain pain points to different segments and create content with the intention of helping them to overcome those issues.

Taking this approach will also help to cement your identity as an authority within your industry.

#2 Nurture the relationship
A vital part of content marketing is understanding that different content is needed for each of the different stages of the buyers’ journey. After all, the requirements and intentions of someone at the awareness stage are likely to be very different to those of someone who is almost at the point of making a decision about whether to buy from you. As such, this should be a key consideration of your content strategy to ensure you influence leads and nurture the relationship.

Mapping out the different stages of the journey and determining what types of content are right for each stage, whether that’s evergreen content you’ve produced previously or new content you need to create, will help you with this and will be crucial to achieve your ultimate goal of turning a lead into a customer.

#3 There’s more than one channel
From print media, such as trade publications, and third-party websites, to social networking sites and your own blog, there are a great many channels on which you can now share content in its many guises.

By understanding how your target audience interacts with each channel, the types of content that perform well on each and what they want from content, you can share content to greater effect.

Some channels may be more effective at generating leads at different points in your campaign. By monitoring this, you can ensure your efforts are optimised and each channel is used as effectively as possible.

#4 Don’t stop once you convert…
A vital point to remember about using content for lead generation is that engagement shouldn’t stop purely because you’ve managed to convert. Rather, content is key to retention.

Your customers are also an excellent source of content as once you’ve built that relationship you can approach them for testimonials which you can then feed into your content strategy and use for future lead generation. With research finding that testimonials can help businesses generate 62% more revenue from every customer, it’s certainly a valuable type of content to have at your disposal!

As you can see, when it comes to content, the possibilities are endless and armed with an expertly crafted and well-executed content strategy you can make the most of every opportunity it presents.

By Sophie Sadler, Senior Account Director

One of the longest running discussions we have with clients is about the face off between trade and national coverage. Which is better? Which most benefits the business? Which delivers the most value?

In the B2B tech space, you’re often spoilt for choice with specific titles that potentially better serve your brand’s audiences, despite smaller overall readerships. But you also have the bright, shiny lights of national or broadcast coverage, with the attraction of higher audience figures and the prestige that comes with being featured in such widely known names.

In my opinion, the question shouldn’t be which is better, trade or national media, but rather, which will serve your purposes better. For example, if you are positioning your brand for an M&A or investment, then national coverage makes more sense. However if the goal is launching a new solution aimed at a specific set of customers, then trade media will yield the most value.

National coverage is the idea vehicle to generate top of the funnel awareness and address higher level and c-level issues. It also helps with the searchability of your brand online and SEO because national publications lend significant authority to search. There’s also no question that it’s unbeatable in terms of reach and it does deliver your message to a much wider audience.

But in the example above, wider audience isn’t necessarily always a good thing. Trade media has the benefit of having niche titles that are targeted at your target market. More than that, with trade publications, there is the opportunity to build relationships with the journalists, and a better chance to tell your story more in-depth; whether that’s related to pain points, profiling or thought leadership. The opportunities are also more frequent, guaranteeing more consistent coverage over a longer period of time. And that’s not to discount the impact that trade coverage can have on SEO, with more chance of making use of backlinks in articles, something that is near impossible with the nationals.

After weighing it up, it’s clear that shouldn’t come down to a face off between trade and national coverage. Depending on your objectives, the two should (and can) complement one another to support you reaching your communication goals. It’s not about choosing the best option, but creating the best mix of coverage that is going to benefit your business.

If you’re looking for your own answer to the question, keep three things in mind: What are you trying to achieve? What are your timescales? And which mix will deliver the greatest value?

Feel free to get in touch to discuss.

By Mark Wilson, Creative Director

Brand development can sometimes be a daunting task. The thought of overhauling your brand, changing everything and moving away from what you know is a big undertaking. But brand development may not be as daunting and fear-inducing as you first think. In this article, I’ll talk about why brand development doesn’t necessarily mean a complete rebrand by answering three simple questions.

What is brand development?

Firstly, branding is very much the face of your company; it’s how people perceive you and governs their instant reactions when they hear your name or see your product. Brand development is how that brand evolves and develops to ensure that they are staying current. Development can take different forms, such as imagery, tone of voice, messaging, typography, colour, communication channels.

This leads me to my next point, about how brand development isn’t all about changing everything. There are many different intensities to brand development. It could be small tweaks to your imagery and icons or it could be a complete rebranding with a name change and new messaging that is aimed at a new target audience.

A good example of tweaking your brand to constantly evolve is Google – they are always updating logos and icons that generally goes under the radar but ensures their look is current.

Why is it important?

The importance of brand development is easy to understate and sometimes companies don’t realise the importance of it. It’s the face of your company – it’s the first thing people see and think of when your name is mentioned. I always compare it to a news feed; when you look at a news feed that is out of date your perception of it changes and you are unlikely to spend much more time looking through that feed. Whereas, if it’s current, you’re likely to revisit.

Brands are very much the same – you need to stay current to make sure that people trust you are up to the task, especially in comparison to your competitors. It’s no use if you’re a cutting-edge tech company that sells state of the art software but your branding is dated. Your brand needs to reflect the product or service that you are selling.

Where do you start?

This one is a hard one because different factors determine how you develop and what you develop. I look at it in two ways – do you have an old brand, where your brand is established and been around for a long time but needs to be updated? Or are you a new brand that has finished the brand launch and are unsure where to go from there?

Looking at it from the old brand point of view – you may have a good offering and a healthy client base but need to re-energise the brand. My first recommendation would be to look at the core messaging to make sure that it is still relevant and resonating with the audience. From that you can evolve your visual identity, by creating a new website, introducing more colours and imagery to give your brand a modern look and feel that can give you a competitive edge.

Now to look at the other position of the new brand, where it hasn’t been long since you introduced the new brand. Should you develop the brand any further? If the brand is very new, then you need a ‘settling-in’ period to make sure that you get some time to increase brand awareness. If you start changing bits about your brand straight away it’s an uphill battle to create some awareness with your target audience. Then I’d recommend starting slowly – don’t jump straight into changing the logo or colours, it can be as simple as changing a few images on your website to keep it modern and up to date. Once you have some brand awareness then you can start to look at refining and moving into new areas, such as channels.

It’s easy to want to constantly update and develop your brand but before you do make sure to look at whether your brand is still resonating with the audience. If it is then there is little reason to make drastic changes. But if you feel that your brand isn’t working with your current audience or are aiming at a new audience then it might be time for a refresh; feel free to get in touch with me to discuss how we could help develop your brand.

By James Kelliher, CEO

If there’s one thing that last year has highlighted to business, it’s the value of crisis communications and the importance of having the right strategy in place to deal with said crisis.

But before we start using words like “unprecedented” and “new normal”, it may help to take a step back and ask ourselves what a crisis is — the first step in dealing with one. Simply stated, a crisis is a significant event that results in high levels of scrutiny which has the potential to affect an organisation’s normal operations.

Looking at 2020, the defining feature when it comes to the crisis is that the pandemic has affected all organisations; it’s a global challenge. Yes, it has impacted businesses differently in terms of customer service, logistics, supply chain, etc., but overall, everyone has been affected.

That said, the basic principles of crisis comms still apply and haven’t changed. What may change, and certainly should change, is the way we approach planning given the benefit of hindsight and experience from last year.

A case in point is scenario planning; a successful crisis comms plan includes preparing for a host of potential crises e.g. an executive scandal, data breach or natural disaster. Now, however, and moving forward, we’ll be including managing the impact of a global pandemic.

Because one key piece of advice we offer our clients is that you shouldn’t do crisis comms planning during a crisis. It can lead to hasty (and poor) decision making and a less than favourable outcome for the business and its stakeholders.

Our current situation might be an anomaly, but it has demonstrated how important the core principles are:

– Plan for tomorrow
– Respond rapidly
– Work with local authorities
– Position your management front and centre
– Be open and honest
– Demonstrate concern and convey integrity
– Speak with one voice

It has also highlighted the importance of accuracy. During a crisis, it is crucial for businesses to only communicate what they know to be true. Speculation is never advised. Earlier on in the pandemic this came into sharp focus with many brands falling short after making bold statements about impact, job losses, etc. when they simply didn’t have the information available to back that up.

Brands that fared well include those that admitted what they didn’t know but balanced that with making it clear what their plans were to deal with the crisis.

Looking ahead, it’s natural that the crisis comms landscape will continue to evolve, shaped by external factors — much like it’s changed from the 1990s (when it was primarily media relations focused) to now where multiple audiences are important and the use of social media makes it simultaneously more challenging yet easier to monitor what is being communicated.

While COVID has certainly taught us a lot, it’s the adherence to the basic principles and being prepared that will help organisations through. It’s about being proactive, understanding the situation and having the tools at your disposal (like the right message communicated to the right audiences) to ensure you’re addressing the crisis and demonstrating that you have a handle on things, even when there is information that you don’t yet know.