MH370 Case Study:

Lessons in social media and crisis communications

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What did they do right on social media?

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1. Lit up dark site as main source for updates, activated hotline numbers,

used hashtag, shortlink

Hashtag:

#MASalert

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Shortlinkbit.ly/MH370updates

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2. Symbolic graying out of social media channels, removal of all promos deemed

insensitive

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3. Responded and corrected misinformation, speculation, rumours fairly quickly

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4. Made clarifications when necessary

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5. Ignored things that needed to be ignored

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6. Showed empathy for victims’ families, relatives, friends

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7. Finally appointed a single source of credible info; a spokesperson who took ownership, showed leadership, empathy BONUS: Had an active online presence

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Meeting families of victims of MH370. Pic on Fb.com/HishammuddinH2O, March 29, 2014

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8. Tried to draw empathy for their affected staff, raise morale by engaging with followers

and fans

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What they didn’t do right(some nitpicking)

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1. Slow to update social media channels

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1st post on FB at 8.12am, March 8, 2014

2nd statement on FB, timestamped 9.05am, posted on FB 9.36am, March 8, 2014

1st release timestamped 7.24am. But posted at 8.13am, March 8, 2014 (49 mins to post 140 characters, > 6 hours after incident)

Update fastUse

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Example of speed: Southwest Air Flight 345 lands nose-down at LaGuardia, July 22, 2013

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Crash at 5.40pm, 1st alert tweet at 6.17pm

Use unique hashtag

Alert followers Follow up

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Good news get it out fast, bad news get it out faster (Caveat: verify, clarify, confirm)

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Power of social media:Passenger David Eun tweeted shortly after crash of Asiana Airlines Flight 214 at SFO on July 6, 2013. Over 30,000 re-tweets.

Post early, get ahead of crisis. If in doubt, leave

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Jan 15, 2009: US Airways Flight 1549, landed in Hudson river after bird strike

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From Twitter to Front page

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2. Information on passenger manifest kept changing, no alert on edits, some info still wrong

Update, report

changes

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3. No updates : Number of tweets at http://www.twitter.com/mas

went down to zero some days

trinetizen.comSource: TwitterCounter

Keep updating

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Even though, MAS Twitter followers rose > 48% from March 7 to Apr 14

trinetizen.comSource: TwitterCounter

Leverage reach

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Dramatic rise in FB engagement

Source: Birdsong, Kevin May, http://www.tnooz.com/article/mh-370-malaysia-airlines-social-media/

Keep engaging

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4. Not leveraging “frienemy” sitesto spread message

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FB page on Missing Plane had garnered > 400,000 Likes since March 8 – April 14

@AirAsia: 982K followers

@tonyfernandes: 963K followers

5. No unique URL or link for each update, not shareable, dead links, no index, no search

Navigation/UI : Any update from yesterday all the way back to March 8 has no direct link at dark site, have to go to bottom of page and

click tiny numbers

•http://bit.ly/MH370updates -> Resolves to http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/my/en/site/dark-site.html•Alt: http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/my/en/site/mh370.html

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6. Informed victims’ families of loss via SMS when no wreckage or evidence of plane found

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A text message was sent out March 24 to families of victims stating “none of those on board survived”

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7. No FAQ or Dedicated Media Room

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• No online FAQ to provide facts on company history, plane, manifest, secondary events, SOP, pilot profiles, blackbox technical details

• Not using real-time channel to refute claims, douse speculation, correct misinformation, get ahead of rumour-mongering

• No audio recording, transcripts of press conferences

Italian footballer Balotelli used as example to suggest how Iranians with stolen passports looked like

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8. Poor visuals, no videos• Photos• Timeline• Graphics • Maps • Raw video of

press conferences

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Dedicated digital media

team26

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Crisis communications reactions

POORDefensive – take it

personally

Decline to comment

Deny or lie

Deflect – taichi, play blame game

Downplay

BETTERAccept – that it has

happenedAcknowledge – to those

affected, media, publicAssure – show you care,

calm fearsApologize (if you have to)

and be specific, express regret, suggest remedy

ACT – assess your allies, plan your action, act out your plan

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LessonsPre-crisis:

– Form dedicated social media team– Ensure social media is part of crisis communications plan– Prepare FAQs– Train spokespersons, staff– Prepare key messages for various crisis scenarios– Practice conveying key messages in any crisis– Test ability to activate dark site

Crisis– Appoint single spokesperson, take ownership– Use unique hashtag, shortlink– Use linkable, shareable page for each update– Show empathy for those affected– Be transparent with remedial action – Think visually– Record raw audio, video – post online– Reduce speculation with fast-turnaround, online updates

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