In the wake of the pride month backlash, it’s become pretty clear that no company is immune to a PR crisis. But when it does come up, there are some best practices in dealing with the fallout. Scott Powell, president of Skyline Corporate Communications Group joined TheStreet to discuss what companies should and shouldn’t be doing in the face of bad press.
Full Video Transcript Below:
J.D. DURKIN: Anheuser-Busch is one of the companies that has been in the headlines quite a bit this year. A Bud Light related controversy, as you certainly well know. I don't to what degree you're comfortable talking about specific companies, but but let's talk about an issue like that. If you were tasked with and your team at Skyline with sort of handling some of the PR fallout for a name like Anheuser-Busch, what would that conversation have looked like?
SCOTT POWELL: Sure it's not always easy to handle a crisis. Right and this applies to a variety of different companies and crises. What we advise clients is don't remain silent. You have to say something. You know, it may be just that we're still investigating. For instance, if you remember years ago when the Tylenol capsules were somehow laced with cyanide and several deaths occurred, you know, it's OK to say we're still investigating, but to remain silent is very detrimental because as investors, the public are wondering what's happening. Silence may mean culpability, may mean that they're guilty of this or that. So really making a statement and either saying, you know, we're investigating, we're aware of the situation, we're investigating it, or if they realize and understand the situation, fully taking responsibility for it, you know, saying this is what happened, maybe we made a mistake. Here's it wasn't intentional, but here are the steps that led to this particular mistake or this accident or something like that and explaining it.
J.D. DURKIN: Another company that's been very much in the headlines this year has been Target (TGT) -). We talk about the backlash to so-called rainbow capitalism or Pride Month backlash. How can companies, do you think, overall better handle boycotts or protests, especially in the face of unfavorable headlines when obviously this is very much the reputation of the brand itself could suddenly be at stake in the minds of many of their long time consumers?
SCOTT POWELL: Yeah, that's a good question. You know, public relations is challenging, right? And when a company's image gets tarnished, the, you know, the effects can be far reaching. And, you know, companies like Anheuser-Busch and Target, you know, need to you know, I think they're trying to be, you know, inclusive and friendly to, you know, a number of different, you know, groups and constituents out there. You know, and inclusion is obviously very important. But, you know, in a situation where, you know, a situation where there's a risk for a public image damage, it's, you know, really goes back to what I said before, you know, acknowledging the issue, acknowledging maybe there was a mistake, maybe we didn't do this correctly. Here's what we're doing to fix it and here's what we'll do next time so that the same mistake isn't repeated.
And that's how companies can establish trust again and how they can engender confidence from investors and from the general public by getting, you know, control of the situation, by acknowledging maybe there was a mistake. But here was the intent of this particular program with Busch or with Target is what we intended to do. We intended to do good things. Right we really did. Here's what went wrong and here's what we've learned from this. And that generally will help, as I said, engender confidence and trust in the brand. And it won't be as much of a public relations issue or disaster.
