Keeping client brands out of the headlines is often as profitable as PR campaigns to secure positive press coverage.

With that in mind, this story on the BBC website about the murder of Joanna Yeates made me wonder if the Asda crisis PR team will be jumping into action.

Why is this an Asda crisis PR story?

The fact that the murderer was visiting an Asda supermarket is by and large irrelevant detail. It could have been a Sainsbury’s, Tesco or a Waitrose. Asda doesn’t need to be mentioned in the headline, or, one could argue, in the story at all. The story should be changed and Asda’s name removed.

What could Asda do?

My advice would be to liaise with the journalists to request for Asda to be removed from the story, or its prominence to be lowered, perhaps by moving this detail to one of the end paragraphs.

You might think that the horse has bolted on this story, and that changing this doesn’t really matter, but corporate brands are one of the biggest assets of any organisation. These details do matter.

Remember: ‘Google never forgets’ – it is never too late to clean up a story.

I did a quick (and admittedly rough and ready) Google search and there are currently 488 articles on Google News for the search term “murder Asda Joanna Yeates.”

This story (see screen shot) also appeared on the BBC News website at 4pm on the 10 October. It will be interesting to see if this headline gets edited to replace ‘Asda’ with ‘supermarket.’

If this detail gets changed then the Asda crisis PR team deserve a pat on the back. In fact they probably deserve one anyway as all sorts of crises and issues crop up for most high profile retailers like Asda. The likelihood is that they have killed off a fair few stories before your eyes got to see them.

The other consideration is that brands need to know which fights to fight. It is not always possible to put press office resource on issues such as this. However, if brands spend so much time chasing often spurious mentions in lowly media titles, then why not spend a little more time cleaning up the mess created by others too?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxvrRggOQjo

(gratuitous opportunity to show Moscow penalty miss)

The John Terry super injunction story is more proof that celebrities or organisations should turn to PR professionals and not lawyers when dealing with a media crisis. Only public relations professionals have the tools to ensure that a story such as this one can be kept under control.

A super injunction can work, sure. However there is no plan B.

Once the injunction is made public, what was a negative story is amplified tenfold. The whole affair seems more sordid. He is now on the front of five national newspapers. This is a massive fail, nearly on the same proportions of his penalty miss in Moscow (Viva John Terry – bit of Man Utd gloating there…).

Of course PR isn’t 100 per cent fool proof, far from it, but media relations would have been a better strategy, rather than litigation. John’s PR consultant could have negotiated and traded other content, tried to kill the story and prove it to be incorrect, or managed the story, so the coverage was minimised.

Most people wouldn’t be that surprised about John Terry behaving this way, so really taken on its own the story of a footballer trying to impregnate someone is fish and chip paper. We’ve already seen him urinating in bars, fighting and taking cash in hand payments from journalists for tours of the Chelsea training ground. So really this story is not that newsworthy. John has made it newsworthy, thanks to his legal advice.

PR crisis communications is never dull. It is the part of the job that most public relations consultants love, because handling an issue can become a roller coaster ride and practitioners never know what type of crisis they might be presented with. Over the years I’ve worked on my fair share of crises – from date rape to ‘poo’ in swimming pools – and this video illustrates the variety of problems that can come your way.

This video is an interesting case study. The question is whether this video is a media relations opportunity or a threat.

On the face of it this video is obviously of a negative tone and therefore a threat. However when dealing with any crisis one must recognise that coverage of this nature is part of a wider narrative, and like any story there will be twists and turns along the way, and what was an isolated issue can be turned into something positive, or it can morph into something, much, much worse.

The test will be how Hewlett Packard handles and responds to the video. I am sure there is a very simple explanation, such as the fault being a one off technical error. Whatever happens, I am sure their handling of the issue will win them friends in the long run as HP are a good, solid company with an excellent track records.

I’ll be keeping an eye out for their response. Good luck to them! The first response I can find is here on Wired.com . Maybe that will be the end of the matter?

(hat tip to http://twitter.com/PRtweets/ )

The Football Association needs a PR campaign to show that hooliganism is no longer a big problem in England.

The reason for my post is that this story of the Italian FA telling Capello that “Hooligan is an English word” annoyed me today.

England has an issue with its reputation abroad, one that is no longer based on fact, but rather folklore.

With such strong, negative and ingrained perceptions of British fans there is a clear task for the Public Relations Industry. This is because unbalanced reporting leads to disproportionate levels of coverage, that then informs international football fans and organisations worldwide. It becomes a vicious circle.

The facts need communicating:

- England is the safest place to watch football (there is lots of evidence to back this claim up)
- France, Italy and Spain is a far more dangerous place to watch football
- France has ancient stadia with hooligans aplenty, as does Italy
- Spain has the added joy of racism to throw into the mix, click here

OK, here is my caveat, this season there has been more trouble than usual in the UK, e.g. Man Utd v Barnsley, West Ham vs Millwall, and England can’t take its eye off the ball, but look at this more severe example which happened this week in France at a match between Marseille and Paris SG. In my view it was under-reported, see here:

Events such as what happened in Marseille are a regular occurrence in France, but just aren’t reported worldwide, compared to when we Brits get involved. This lack of balance needs addressing. I just want to see us all up to necks in the same problem without other countries missing out on the criticism.

35 Italians died in a horrific incident involving Liverpool FC hooligans, yet during the war millions of human beings died. However we can forgive the nations involved in those war-crimes, so why not the same with sport?

Could the Football Association create a crisis management strategy which kicks into action every time there is trouble in the UK or the rest of Europe? Maybe it already has a crisis PR team but clearly more needs investing in improving our reputation. When trouble is severe then the FA will rightfully hold its hands up! However robust efforts must be made to put hooliganism into perspective when compared to what happens in mainland Europe. OK, we need to stamp the problem out here, but reporting of events in Spain, England, and Italy must be proportional on a global level.

I’ve been following the Ralph Lauren advertisement scandal (see previous post: http://jameswdcrawford.wordpress.com/2009/10/07/ralph-laurens-pr-argument-is-a-little-thin/) and today on Boing Boing the following statement appeared:

On Thursday, Polo Ralph Lauren released the following statement about the retouched ad: “For over 42 years we have built a brand based on quality and integrity. After further investigation, we have learned that we are responsible for the poor imaging and retouching that resulted in a very distorted image of a woman’s body. We have addressed the problem and going forward will take every precaution to ensure that the caliber of our artwork represents our brand appropriately.”

Has Ralph’s PR department done enough?

Ralph Lauren and blog BoingBoing.net are today at each other’s throats over images used by the fashion brand showing a rather skinny looking model.

The image, Boing Boing claims, has been touched up in photoshop and today on the blog another picture was published showing how a graphic designer had “unworked” the advert to show a healthy looking woman.

Read about it here:

http://craphound.com/10-2-09LettertoPriorityColoinrePRLInfringement.pdf

So assuming Ralph Lauren is in the wrong, what can it do to halt the damage to its reputation? (note I say assuming, but it looks pretty certain that this woman is not this shape through exercise alone!)

1.  Speed is of the essence.  Deal with the problem and deal with it quickly before it gets worse.  Ralph Lauren can’t stop the story getting out but it can halt interest in it.
2. Get to the bottom of what really happened.
3. Provide a statement accepting that Ralph Lauren made a mistake.  (We all make errors!)
4. Show some humanity.  Perhaps try ‘empathy’…  Show that Ralph Lauren understands the damage anorexia and bulimia causes.
5. Demonstrate that this is a one off incident.  (make sure it is first)
6. Demonstrate commitment to an anorexia charity and / or create company guidelines on the manipulation of digital imagery.  This can’t be tokenistic, so be generous.
7. Follow up the crisis a month later with media relations to show that Ralph Lauren “meant business” when the fashion brand said this wouldn’t happen again
8. Continue to be proactive on the topic of eating disorders, photoshop distortions, and skinny models

(I’ve assumed that Ralph Lauren have got all the basics in place. E.g. a crisis trained spokesperson, a crisis manual has been prepared prior to this event, media monitoring is in place and an international network of PR agencies is ready to support the brand)