The Financial Times Guide to Social Media Strategy

CHAPTER 10

AVOIDING PROBLEMS AND HANDLING CRISES

Why this matters

All organisations are vulnerable to the reputational damage that can be caused when things go wrong in social media. These problems are exacerbated by a lack of planning, poor training and inadequate processes and policies. Conversely, the majority of problems can be avoided, anticipated or dealt with, so long as you have the right people (with the right senior management support), robust processes and the organisational agility to respond quickly to a particular situation.

Often what are termed ‘social media crises’ are, in fact, operational crises that simply are amplified through social media. In a world of almost ubiquitous camera-phone ownership and instant news, any poor ...