 To
set the stage for understanding the crucial role web sitse
play in crisis, it is important to understand at least a few
key elements of what makes a crisis. In his IABC book, “Crisis
Management and Communication: How to Gain and Maintain Control,
Second Edition,” Dan Pyle Millar, APR, Ph.D., identifies
the features of a crisis:
- It appears suddenly or is a surprise
- It escalates in intensity
- It stimulates extensive media coverage and public scrutiny
- It disrupts the organization’s routine and performance
and exceeds the organization’s capacity to respond.
This latter element is most affected by technology. Experience
has shown that technology can increase an organization’s
capacity to respond to crisis, or improve its ability to extend
itself beyond normal capacity. The organization’s web
site is the predominant technological tool in this process.
In 2004, the use of the web for announcements in response
to significant issues has become more commonplace. Throughout
the series of hurricanes in South Florida this past summer,
the VisitFlorida
web site kept visitors up to date about the storms’
progress. In late September, when Merck announced the recall
of its arthritis drug, Vioxx, their web site was used for
the announcement and for follow-up. Throughout the lengthy
trial and even after sentencing, celebrity Martha Stewart
used a microsite
to to share her perspective on the controversy. As more and
more companies in the U.S. and abroad have begun to use online
communication as a significant tool, the understanding of
its use in crisis response has escalated.
The Institute for Crisis Management in Louisville, Kentucky,
has been studying business crises for more than a decade,
and has documented a rise in the number and types of crises
encountered by businesses, with more than 90,000 negative
business stories in its database. Since 2000, web communication
has continued to play a more crucial role in responding to
these crises. The top five industries affected by crises in
the 1990’s included
- Telecommunications
- Pharmaceuticals
- Technology & Software
- Banking and Securities
- Insurance.
In his seminal book, “Public Relations on the Net,
Second Edition,” Shel Holtz, ABC, notes that organizations
using the web for crisis communication began with dark sites:
web sites that could be hidden until needed in a crisis. These
sub-sites could then be expanded into crisis-specific microsites
dedicated to specific disasters or crises. Finally, he notes,
as a crisis wears on, a company can add the sites of supporters,
advocates and allies. Today, the immediacy of web sites has
created a case for the dark site to come into the light and
be a permanent part of an organization’s web site.
 At
St. Francis Hospital & Health Centers in Indianapolis,
Indiana, this information is housed on the crisis information
sub-site as a set of pages in the media center of the hospital’s
main site. When things happen that require more direct access,
a special box or link from the hospital’s home page
is added. The media center is located at a third-level domain:
http://media.stfrancishospitals.org,
and ongoing media relations support this direct link.
At many hospitals such as Duke in South Carolina, there are
guidelines for the media, definitions of patient conditions,
contact information, and HIPAA release of information rules.
Many for-profit companies have similar links in their newsrooms,
focusing on stock issues, etc. The location on the media center
or newsroom also makes access to backgrounds, biographies
and other media information more readily available and doesn’t
have to be separately linked during a crisis. In times of
crisis, cold sections of the site are modified or made live.
These include things such as a crisis section page that indicates
that something is happening, a photo page if there are photographs,
and a crisis log or statement page.
A log, rather than a news release or statement, is often
used during the initial four to six hours of a building crisis.
The log system allows people to see everything that has gone
on as information is gathered and released. It reinforces
a sense of openness and allows for rumors, mistakes or incorrect
information to be addressed in an ongoing manner. The first
statement is already written before any crisis occurs.
As the crisis unfolds, information is gathered, a short statement
is written, and the statement is then approved for release
and quickly uploaded to the web site. Using the Internet in
this way reduces the volume of media calls and frees the communicator
to gather information and deal with the crisis. This frequent,
open release of information on the web site allows for anyone
to monitor the unfolding drama and provides breathing room
while the crisis escalates and eventually stabilizes.
More comprehensive sites can be developed internally or adopted
from organizations providing specialized crisis communication
web sites that can be linked to your site. One such company
is Audience
Central, which uses the PIER (Public Information and Emergency
Response) system and has numerous large clients with significant
vulnerabilities to crisis, such as the U.S. Coast Guard and
utility companies. PIER, an Internet-based system, allows
the communication and response team to quickly launch an incident-specific
web site, develops full and accurate information and distributes
it instantly via the web site and through e-mail and fax.
Whatever system you use, crisis communication should become
a key component of any expansion or rebuilding of an organization’s
web site.
Fred Bagg has more than 30 years of experience in Public
Relations and Marketing. For the past 25 years, he has been
the Director of Community Relations and Marketing at St. Francis
Hospital and Health Centers of Indianapolis.
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