De andere kant van de Kryptonite case

Iedereen kent inmiddels het verhaal van Kryptonite. Sterker, zelfs Microsoft wijdt er in hun brochure ‘How to Blog for Business’ twee complete pagina’s aan. Het gaat waarschijnlijk de analen in als de officiele case hoe het niet moet. Het lastige met dit soort voorbeelden is dat het makkelijk is om een bedrijf belachelijk te maken, zonder dat je weet wat daarbij de overwegingen waren van het bedrijf zelf. Ik kon nergens een reactie vinden tot ik op de posting stuitte van Dave Taylor die een interview heeft gehouden met Donna Tocci, de PR chef van Kryptonite. Het interview geeft een meer gebalanceerd beeld van het bedrijf. Het laat zien dat ze wel degelijk op de hoogte waren van online consternatie, maar dat het veel tijd kost om een crisisplan voor het terughalen van producten nou eenmaal wat tijd kost.

Why didn’t Kryptonite announce its Lock Exchange Program faster, to help alleviate the damage?

Well, the Internet moves at real time but companies sometimes can’t - not ‘won’t’, but can’t. If we’d announced what we wanted to do before we had the back end in place and couldn’t back it up, that would have been the bigger PR nightmare, right?

So, we had to check with factories, find and work with a fulfillment house, find and work with a shipping company, research customs (this was a worldwide plan), talk with our distributors and get their input and concerns, create a space on our website for registrations and make sure the site could handle the traffic and then worry about whether or not all of the respective softwares could talk to each other (website, fulfillment house, shipper). There’s a lot of stuff that needs to be done before announcing a plan like this with so many
facets.

Interessant is de vraag hoe ze tegen de invloed van de blogosfeer aankijkt en wat ze de volgende keer anders zou doen:

Companies absolutely need to keep track of the blogosphere. I agree with that. However, I think it is only a segment of what companies should look at for their marketing and publicity plans. There are millions of blogs, but what are the audiences of these blogs? We know that lots of teens and college students have blogs and, mainly use them to communicate with friends and family. These are our customers, but are they going to corporate blogs? Not so sure about that.

We also know that the technology sector is blogging and paying attention to who and what is out there in the blogosphere. Great. We also know that marketers are out there. Great, too. All of these people can be our customers.

However, is the blogosphere the best ‘bang’ for our ‘buck’. And by ‘buck’I don’t mean money. I mean time. I’m not so sure about that. Each company needs to make that decision for themselves. They need to do the research and spend the time to figure out where their customers are, if that’s the blogosphere then they need a blog. If not, they don’t. They do need a good crisis management plan no matter who they are or how they choose to implement it
Now, I’ve spent the time to research what is going on online and have created relationships with some of the more influential bloggers. I’ve treated this like I would do with any traditional media representative. I’m confident that, should something else come up like it did in September ‘04, I would be able to converse with a few of these folks and, should they choose, they could write about what is going on with us. That may include that Donna has left the building… kidding… but, you see my point.

There is no way for a company to answer all of the individual blog posts or forum posts during a crisis. No way. There isn’t enough time in a day. Having your own blog or even a website that is easy to change information on, like we do, is a way to get out some information, but just like the traditional media, everyone wants their own quote that is unique to their blog or news coverage. Just like you! :) That is also why companies need to do the research I mentioned above now, before a crisis. Know who the influential bloggers are in your space and start a conversation. Create a relationship or two or ten.

Het is nuttig het verhaal te lezen, ook de comments die eronder staan zijn de moeite waard.