An independent charity responsible for leading research into child sexual abuse were looking to strengthen their crisis communications plan. As a small organization based remotely across the UK, they wanted to build a response process which was easy to follow and adaptable depending on resources.

We worked with the Leadership Team to develop their existing plan by adapting their mobilisation and escalation process, giving them clear checklists to follow, and developing useful crisis templates. We then held an interactive workshop to test the plan against several realistic scenarios. 

This workshop was held remotely with the Crisis Management Team using video conferencing, our innovative Crisis 90 platform, and open-source documents. The workshop helped to expose those parts of the plan which needed adapting for real-life situations and where there were potential gaps in the centre’s procedures. 

One of the UK’s largest electricity providers were looking for help mapping their online audiences so they could build a better understanding of their stakeholders and ensure that social media was being integrated into their public engagement work.

Our work focused on identifying relevant stakeholders and helping them to build an understanding of their social media audiences, particularly around key priorities. As part of this work, we used various paid-for and free tools to research their social media channels, analyse how they could develop the breadth of their audience and build a community online. 

The Royal Botanic Gardens in the UK wanted to test their ability to respond to a cyber incident. We facilitated a half-day simulation for their Executive Board, based on a realistic data breach scenario.

The objectives of the session were to :

• Rehearse Kew Gardens’ response to a Business Continuity incident in line with their plan 
• Test the process of mobilising and drawing on support functions identifying gaps in plans and processes
• Work through the escalation process and management of external stakeholders in a contained scenario environment

The scale of infrastructure behind military organisations can be hard to comprehend. So it’s really hard for communicators in defence to explain everything they do on social channels, with sensitivity and relevance. 

People will always like and share images of exciting aircraft, ships and tanks. But how can social be put to work; to recruit suppliers, keep people safe or explain what’s happening behind the security fencing?

Our client is a 30-strong communications team based across the UK. They challenged us to:

• evaluate their existing activity
• identify an audience and purpose for each channel
• run user testing with their existing audience
• benchmark their work against best practice from competing organisations

We had to quickly iterate this project to reflect wider changes to social platforms and changes to internal social media policy. Our evaluation uncovered some hidden gems, including an underutilised blog that does a great job of illustrating their priorities. We compared hard data with user feedback, leading to some challenging conclusions about high performing content. 

(Image provided by www.defenceimagery.mod.uk licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0)

A large UK Government communications office wanted to make their social media channels more effective with targeted audiences and reduce the volume of correspondence/calls to the public enquiry unit. They also needed an in-depth review of their channels which included recommendations going forward. 

Over the course of the project, we provided this in a number of ways:

• An in-depth report where we reviewed the content and analytics from each of their social media channels and provided useful insights into how to increase engagement and avoid reputational damage. 
• 4 pilot projects to test theories borne out of the review which included content training for media officers, workshops with individual social media and data analysis teams and developing new processes to trial.
• Examined the siloed ways of working that were in place and suggested ways to together moving forward, cutting down the amount of data reports being produced and increasing the number of people with skills to produce high-quality social media content. 
• Built confidence in the public enquiry unit to be able to handle enquiries over social media as well as developed new processes to do this effectively.
• A road-mapping workshop with senior staff members to build an achievable plan over 3,6, 12 and 18 months.

Based on the insights in the report, we developed clear recommendations and processes to take forward. These included long-term structural and strategic recommendations as well as quick wins that would make a noticeable difference within weeks. 

Cardiff University wanted to test the abilities of their MA International Public Relations and Global Comms Management students.

We delivered an annual two-hour workshop for their MA students, which tests their knowledge of communications in an unfolding crisis. Working in small teams, students are tasked with running the corporate communications function of a fictional business.

They are responsible for handling:

• questions from media
• fake news
• customer service enquiries
• eyewitness reports
• reputational damage and repair

The training helps students to understand how to communicate to stakeholders in a crisis, how to scenario plan and practise coordinating a response on social media.

The workshop includes best practise and theory on handling a crisis on social media, to help prep students for the next stage in their careers.

Students participate from all over the world using our Crisis90 platform in their browsers.

Digital skills are essential for all communicators. Digital skills enable media and press officers to be more responsive and better support announcements and visits.

The media team of a major UK government department were keen to produce more content themselves, but weren’t confident in their ability to produce high-quality photos and video for social.

They also wanted to know how they should be writing for social.

We developed a half-day training workshop for media officers. Armed with their own phones, some London locations and our guidance they:

• Took photos using their smartphone in different lighting conditions
• Drafted appropriate and engaging social media copy, reducing press releases down to the most important information 
• Shot and edited video quickly, easily and on mobile

We also published a ready reference guide for them to take away.

Some professional skills you learn in training courses or through formal coaching, but most you pick up on-the-job from a colleague at work. In our personal lives, when we want to pick up a practical skill, most of us turn to YouTube for a quick tutorial video. What if learning practical skills at work could be like that?

Our team worked with a group of grass-roots innovators within the Metropolitan Police’s ‘Commissioner’s 100’ programme who had an existing prototype for bite-sized, peer to peer video learning they had created.

We helped expand and develop this over 18 months into Metflix: a robust, flexible platform to help colleagues follow the right procedures, and share their own expertise, and for central teams in the organisation to push out learning on key skills in video format.

Metflix is available to Met Police officers on their phones or larger devices. It’s designed to be ‘public proof’ – i.e. no sensitive content that couldn’t be made public. But these are niche videos that benefit from a more custom environment than YouTube itself.

Not every video is perfect, but the idea is to encourage sharing of practical expertise whatever equipment you have to hand. Metflix lowers the barriers to producing and sharing practical training material with colleagues, so that any officer can make a video of up to 3 minutes’ length, with nothing more than their phone.

We’ve introduced concepts like ratings, video feedback, approved videos (reviewed by subject matter experts), and channels to showcase guidance from different Met teams.

The Lambeth Redress Scheme is the first of its kind in the UK to offer compensation to people who suffered abuse in the past at a children’s home.

Lambeth Council, who runs the scheme, had already published information online about the scheme. Its website content catered for many different audiences:

• abuse survivors
• people helping survivors with their application (like solicitors, family and friends)
• others (like journalists) looking for background about the scheme

And while more than 1,000 people had applied to the scheme so far, feedback from survivors was that the information was hard to understand and could be made clearer.

To encourage as many eligible people as possible to apply, Lambeth asked Helpful to review and then improve the website content.

User-centred approach

We began with identifying high-level user needs, writing these in the ‘user story’ format (“As a… I want to… so I can”). We recommended that Lambeth focus on survivors as the primary audience, and move the less critical ‘background’ information to the main Lambeth website.

We analysed the existing content and broke it down into smaller ‘content items’. We then re-ordered it in a more logical, step-by-step approach to meet users’ needs. For each content item, we listed the ‘user acceptance criteria’: the essential pieces of information that the user would need at each step of the application process.

We then validated our content plan. In an ideal world, this would have been with actual or potential applicants. As this wasn’t possible, we checked our content plan with 2 survivor advocates and the client in a card-sorting exercise.

With our iterated and agreed content plan in place, we then re-wrote the content using writing-for-web best principles:

• plain English
• no jargon
• short sentences and paragraphs
• scannable content (using headings and lists)
• inverted pyramid structure (most important information at the top of a page)

Feedback and sign-off

Both the survivor advocates and the Redress team commented on the draft using Google Docs. All the stakeholders could also follow and comment on progress using Trello.

At the end of the production process, the agreed text was sent to the Redress Scheme steering group for final sign-off. Thanks to the early and regular involvement of the client, the group approved the content with only minor changes.

The result is clearer copy that will hopefully encourage more people to apply.

Charity NSPCC wanted to train their national and regional communications teams on how to manage and respond to a crisis.

We delivered a series of simulations in which local and national teams managed and responded to an escalating scenario. The scenario was designed to be realistic, test the teams’ processes and ability to respond as a team.

The training helped teams to work through their crisis response plan, practice coordinating a response on social media and identify any gaps in existing processes. During the simulation, the teams stayed calm, listened to each other, and effectively managed a variety of stakeholders and channels.

Rolls-Royce approached us to test its global corporate affairs teams as part of a wider exercise testing its global crisis management structure and processes in response to a serious product issue.

Given the real-time nature of the modern media landscape, integrating social media into the wider communications response enables companies to:

• Receive early warning of any issues impacting their products via proactive monitoring
• Issue instant posts and updates to reassure investors and staff
• Provide executives with flexibility in terms of how they communicate with key stakeholders

We used our Simulator platform to challenge teams across three different markets by delivering real-time Twitter and Facebook-style feeds including witness imagery and accounts, as well as live on-scene reporting by journalists and media outlets. We also tested how responders managed misinformation emerging on social media channels.

Authentic news-style videos were used to bring the exercise to life and maximise impact. Our on-site interview team conducted media training with company executives during the exercise using a mixture of different styles and formats.

Our showreel gives an idea of the kind of news videos we produce for these kinds of exercises:

Key findings highlighted during the exercise informed updates to its global crisis management structure and processes.

YVR approached us to provide a genuine stress test for digital responders belonging to its own team and those of key airport stakeholders as part of a biennial exercise to test the response to a serious aircraft incident.

Given the array of audiences present in any airport, effective digital triage and engagement has a critical role to play in:

• Enabling airlines and airport agencies to share real-time updates with passengers and staff in terminals
• Allowing emergency responders to establish situational awareness in relation to the situation (e.g. location of casualties, nature and scale of incident)
• Providing ‘line of sight’ with the communications output of other agencies for a coordinated response

Using our Simulator platform we engaged and challenged different airport agencies by delivering real-time Twitter and Facebook-style feeds including passenger queries, witness imagery and accounts, as well as live on-scene reporting by journalists and media outlets. We also tested how responders managed misinformation emerging on social media channels.

Our live writer developed real-time media articles to bring the scenario to life and a team of telephone role-players put airport media handlers through their paces.

Findings highlighted during the training have led to updates being made to YVR’s incident communications protocol.