{"id":884,"date":"2015-06-02T10:23:26","date_gmt":"2015-06-02T09:23:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/socialsimulator.com\/?p=884"},"modified":"2021-03-19T14:00:16","modified_gmt":"2021-03-19T14:00:16","slug":"smile-youre-on-camera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helpfuldigital.com\/fr\/smile-youre-on-camera\/","title":{"rendered":"Smile, you’re on camera: four new realities of crisis comms in the age of video"},"content":{"rendered":"

“I could kill you,” screams the angry man. “Why don’t you then?” comes the reply. “Because there’s witnesses”.<\/p>\n

This, from the ugly scene at a recent road rage incident between a motorist and a cyclist illustrates a\u00a0phenomenon we’re seeing again and again, both sparking new crises for organisations\u00a0and giving existing ones more media potential: the rise of video.\u00a0Thing is, there’s nearly always witnesses now.<\/p>\n

Here’s that road rage incident, in four minutes of sweary high definition, shot on a helmet mounted camera, uploaded to YouTube where 300,000 people\u00a0have\u00a0seen it. It was enough for social media and a smart local journalist to supposedly track down the\u00a0motorist in question<\/a>, and turn a moment of (pretty strong) incivility into the beginnings of a boycott campaign against a local business frequented by cyclists, who are tribal and well-connected online. Beware, the language is rather fruity.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"wells-rage\"<\/p>\n

UPDATE 31-July-2015: The video has been removed from YouTube, but you can get a flavour of it in this Telegraph piece<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What might have been a shocked customer complaint ten years ago, or a tweet two years ago, is in 2015\u00a0a public\u00a0Facebook video that racks up 2m views<\/a> (note to baristas: you’re being filmed too). Incredibly compact, high capacity storage, better batteries, ubiquitous phones, and in-flight wifi all combine to mean your smoke-filled aircraft cabin will hit the networks<\/a> before your comms team has heard there’s a problem. You can ban film crews from filming embarrassing shots of delays and grumpy passengers in Departures, but journalists carry phones and have been trained how to use them<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The media – and now\u00a0channels like Facebook – favour video over pictures, and pictures over words – because it has a gripping power. And now, with channels like Periscope or Meerkat, there’s scope for anyone to livestream incidents to an audience of thousands<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It’s a struggle to keep up, and we’re increasingly incorporating\u00a0near-live eyewitness reports\u00a0as well as\u00a0prepared video bulletins<\/a> into our crisis simulation exercises. We’re helping teams to adapt to the four truths of crisis communication in a world of broadcasters:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Accept\u00a0the normal broadcast news rules no longer apply<\/strong>: film crews used to look like film crews, and could be allowed into scenes or banned from them. With HD cameraphones and drones, that’s almost impossible to enforce, and a good journalist has more tools at their disposal to get the story.<\/li>\n
  2. Assume everything in smartphone range could be broadcast<\/strong>: get your public-facing staff to default to the idea that bad behaviour will \u00a0be made public, that evidence of problematic\u00a0incidents can’t be suppressed, but that video gives them a chance to come across well too. We won’t all be livestreaming our jobs through body-worn cameras<\/a>, thankfully.<\/li>\n
  3. Update your monitoring<\/strong> (YouTube, Twitter for ‘|LIVE NOW|’ + your brand\u00a0etc) to catch incidents with viral video potential earlier and be resourced\u00a0to review footage as well as scan keywords in text<\/li>\n
  4. Review your ability to respond in kind<\/strong>: how quickly can you publish authentic video, of a senior exec or credible spokesperson dealing with an incident which broke through online\u00a0video? Would you rely on a broadcast interview with a news organisation, or do you have the in-house capacity to shoot, edit and promote a film of your own that\u00a0gives your side of\u00a0story?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Update 3-Jun:<\/strong><\/p>\n

    A helpful reader<\/a> contributes a great example of point 4 above – \u00a0when an employee of supermarket chain Asda was filmed behaving badly in a storeroom<\/a> and became known on YouTube as the ‘chicken licker’, the store’s own staff posted a video response which conveyed their disappointment and pride:<\/p>\n