When internet marketing goes wrong, it ends up costing businesses money directly and indirectly. Use the suggestions below to devise a public relations response that is likely to minimize the negative impact of internet marketing gone wrong.
Never engage in business changes to internet marketing that are obviously targeted at generating revenue for you by changing how you relate to customers without using your ability to communicate with your customers and seek their feedback beforehand.
For instance, when Instagram posted its change of terms of service that it planned to implement a policy where conceivably photos posted by users could be used by others to generate revenue, it created a storm of furious response from which it is still recovering, even after doing away with the proposed policy.
Decide whether your response to an internet marketing disaster is best suited to the internet marketing medium on which the disaster occurred or whether other methods of publicizing your response are required, such as addressing customers through video or even making an appearance on news stations.
Don’t wait too long to address a problem with internet marketing that arises. For instance, if your website goes down and you are still able to use your Twitter to alert people to the problem, use Twitter as a public relations tool to inform people of the problem in real-time.
Remember that not every internet marketing criticism or occurrence requires a response. For instance, if your Facebook page comments take an ugly turn in terms of comments that focus on high prices or some other issue that you don’t believe accurately reflects a recurring problem with your business, sometimes the best response is no response. As long as facts are accurately communicated, even if your company receives criticism, you don’t necessarily have to respond.
Don’t scold your general audience for internet marketing because of the behavior of a few. Sometimes businesses attempt to respond to negative feedback or to misuse of their coupons or some other business issue by scolding their general audiences, in effect blaming the many for the behavior of a few. If you decide to change your terms of service or other content based on user misuse of your content, inform your users about the change using positive language.
Keep notes of company responses that you believe are good examples of how to handle specific internet marketing problems as well as those that you believe were handled poorly in order to establish your own company’s approach to specific problems. For instance, if you receive an offer by email that was either not intended for you or contained inaccurate terms such as price, you’ll likely receive a follow-up email that apologizes for the first email and provides you with an offer by way of apology.
Preparing company public relations policies for your company before you experience an internet marketing problem can help provide your company with the opportunity to prevent serious losses of revenue from internet marketing mistakes. Use the suggestions above to begin to consider and formulate a public relations response for your internet marketing mistakes.