Communication Plan for PR Crisis - Coursework Example

Communication Plan for PR crisis s Submitted by s: The main aim of this paper is to seek to understand themanner in which the MH370 incident that involved a Malaysian Airline can be able to rise above the public relations crisis that is associated with it after the tragedy that was associated with it recently. In a situation that is characterized by a catastrophe of this magnitude, it is always important to be prepared to deal with the issues that arise in terms of public relations. There should be two people who will act as the spokesperson and the backup who should be on call the entire time and be informed enough to deal with the effects that will arise from disaster. Coordination as well as partnership with other public relations organizations or a single public relations practitioner who can be able to step up and deal with the clients is also important when a disaster happens. There should be a detailed disaster preparation and recovery plan that should be developed and distributed to all the employees so that they can be able to be up to speed with what is going on. The employees should be in a position to make contact with the officials of the company in the case that they are out of the office and alternative means of communication should be provided in the case the normally used ones are not working. This paper aims at will come up with a series of repair steps that will target the brand image of the Malaysian Airlines while developing a marketing communication plan that will be aimed at bringing back the reputation of the company. All this will take place after there has been a brief description of the events that took place and lead to the disaster that is in question. Background The Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 was an international passenger flight that was scheduled to fly from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing but in the process lost contact with the air traffic control on 8 March 2014 at around 1320 hours Malaysian time which was less than sixty minutes after it had taken off. Malaysian Airlines made the report that the flight was missing at 0724 hours. The flight had been a Boeing 777-200ER, which had on board twelve Malaysian crewmembers, as well as 227 passengers that came from fourteen different nations. There have not been any form of flight debris that were discovered and also there is no crash site that has be seen anywhere in the path that the plane was to follow or other places. The crew that was in the flight had been expected to make contact with the air traffic control in Ho Chi Minh City when the Aircraft reached the Vietnamese airspace, which is a short distance in the Northern direction of the area where the last contact with the flight occurred. There was an attempt to establish contact with the crew of the flight 370 by the captain of a different flight a short time after 1330 hours by utilizing the internal distress frequency and relaying the request that had been made by the Vietnamese air traffic control. The captain that had tried to establish contact with the flight reported that he was successful in his attempt but all he could be able to hear was mumbling and static. A search and rescue effort that was comprised by experts from various nations that was stated to be the largest that has ever been constituted in history started their activity in the Gulf of Thailand as well as the South China Sea and in a span of a few days, the search had to be extended. The scope of the search was extended to reach the Strait of Malacca and the Andaman Sea and on 15 March, the investors made the conclusion that the flight had taken a west direction across the Malay Peninsula according to the military radar data that had been availed to them. After taking the westerly direction, the flight had further taken a northern or southern direction for about seven hours and this lead to the abandonment of the search that was taking place in the South China Sea. Exactly three days after this revelation, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority started searching the southern part of the Indian Ocean for the plane that was still missing. March 24 saw the confirmation by the Malaysian Government that there were two analyses that were independently made by the British Air Accidents Investigations Branch as well as Inmarsat that lead to the arrival at the conclusion that the aircraft had gone down in the southern part of the Indian Ocean and there were no survivors. The search activities were stopped in the places where they were initially concentrated then the efforts, which are still being conducted today, shifted their attention to the area that was lead by the Australian team. Bad public relations The news that was delivered that the officials have been able to determine that the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has reached a tragic ending in the Southern Indian Ocean was a piece of information that was disturbing to many people that were keenly following the events that followed the disappearance of the flight. Unfortunately, some of the family members of the people that were in the flight and were grieving since they did not know about the whereabouts of their relatives received the news via text messages. It is also clear that the airlines contacted the families through phone calls as well as in person and the texts were supposed to make sure that all the family members received the news from the airlines’ officials and not from the news media. Consequently, this occurrence shows the increasing role that is played by text messaging as far as serious communication is concerned even though experts agree unanimously that bad news should be delivered in person. A brand image can be considered to be the total personality that is associated with a brand and is also the accumulation of all the experiences that the customer goes through in relation to the brand or the product where the company strives to make sure that the image that is portrayed is always positive. A brand image that is positive is something that is developed over a period of time by ensuring that the delivery on a brand promise is constant (Chritton, 2012, p. 29). PR is a function that is associated with the management and addresses open issues and an important component associated with OR is publicity which is mainly concerned with dealing with news events that are linked to the products and services that are created by companies and it can be able to create both challenges and opportunities. In the case that there is negative publicity, there is a challenge that is developed while the discovery on new products creates opportunities for the companies (U Bhojanna, 2007, p. 272). The management of crisis as well as disaster recovery is very important for majority of the organizations (Watters, 2014, p 25) especially those that deal with a huge number of customers and any negative publicity that may come from a crisis can have the potential to generate more devastation than a natural disaster such as a hurricane. The disruption of the operations that normally take place as well as the paralysis of employees and the company’s customers can reduce productivity when the disaster is taking place and it has the potential to destroy relationships that were built over a long period of time (Pride and Ferrell, 2006, p. 525). Managing communication in the event that a crisis occurs is very different from that actual handling of the crisis since the crisis communication is aimed at averting the conflict, which may occur between the organization’s internal as well as external stakeholders. This communication helps to reconcile the relationship that might have existed previously between the stakeholders and the organization through creating a single voice that will achieve credibility as well as reaction that will be on time (Ray, 1999, p. 48). Steps to be taken in the repair of the company’s image The most important step as far as the repair of reputation of a company that has been faced with a crisis is concerned is taking responsibility for the situation and avoid as much as possible acts that will imply that the company is shifting the blame (Goodall, Goodall and Schiefelbein, 2010, p.263). The company should take responsibility for the actions that lead to the damaging of the brand and this will normally be received well by the audience since there is a good chance that they will understand that mistakes happen. The second step will involve responding as quickly as possible so that the audience can realize that the company has acknowledged that there are things that are amiss and are being corrected. Honesty and clarity are also vital issues that should be adhered to (Beal and Strauss, 2008, p 17) and using vocabulary that is technical in trying to explain to the customers and those who are concerned does not resonate well. In the times of crisis, honesty is should be paramount and the information that is given out should always be true and the explanations that are associated with this information should also be in a simple language that will not bring about confusion. The manner in which the information is delivered as important as the information itself and composure in the process of the delivery should never be underestimated. This goes a long way in avoiding lawsuits and other issues that may arise after the information has been delivered since it will be clear and easy to understand while eliminating confusion. The company should then take elaborate steps towards planning an investigation that will address the crisis and the investigations should be as through as possible to make sure that the root cause of the crisis is established so that adjustments can be made to avoid repeat cases(Devlin, 2010, p. 964). The stakeholders should always be kept informed during the investigation to avoid uncertainty that may make the public come up with information that is not accurate and cause further panic to the people who are affected. Once the investigations have been done in a thorough manner and have been completed, the findings that result should be used to come up with adjustments that will aim at making sure that a calamity of the same manner does not happen again and in the case that it is unavoidable, the best way to deal with the issue. Creative advertising campaign The advertising campaign will be used to make sure that the correct company position on the crisis that took place is communicated to the customers and also let them know that there are measures that are being taken to make sure that it never happens again. The target population will be the regular clients who always travel using the Airline as well as the potential clients who might have been repelled by the news of the crisis. The cost of the campaign will be determined by the rates that the television stations, which will carry it will quote but the Airline will make sure that it remains reasonable while the advertisement reaches the desired population. The message that will be carried by the advert will show that the Airline can be reliable and that the targeted customers as well as other customers should have nothing to fear. Facebook will also be used to support the campaign through a page that will be created which will be associated with the Airline since Facebook has very many users and the page that will be created will be very easily shared between the users including those that may not have subscribed to it. Stage 1: Situation Malaysian Airlines has a route network that crosses the whole world with numerous daily departures to airports all over the world making it one of the major Airlines in the world. The growth of this airline has been progressive and measured and it has emerged to be a reliable and convenient Airline with the latest fleet of airplanes that makes sure the customers are comfortable. Stage 2: Objectives To make sure that the crisis that occurred involving the disappearance of flight 370 is explained and does not affect the affect the normal operations of the Airline To develop an awareness in the target group of the Airline that the crisis that happened will not occur again Stage 3: Strategy To make sure that the customers remain loyal, a variety of communication tools were utilized so that thought of the Malaysian Airlines could be put into the minds of the targets at every opportunity. This entailed thinking of the ways in which the customers spend their day. Therefore, the Airline should make sure that all the information received by the customers would make them consider the Airline. Stage 4: Tactics The Airline will develop an advertisement that will run of televisions in most of the countries that the Airline travels to and with priority being given to the most frequently flown routes. The advertisement will be as comprehensive as possible in making the customers understand the campaign that Airline will have to wards retaining the customers. Stage 5: Action The management of such a program will need efficient coordination and all the available communication channels will be used in the development of ideas, which are creative so that can always be consistency in the messages that are released. Stage 6: Control The advertising will go on for a year and they will be more frequent in the times when the Airline will have something new to announce to the customers. The advertisements will run at different times of the day to make sure that it captures all the people that are part of the targeted population. Conclusion The crisis that happened in Malaysia should have been handled in a better way by the public relations team that was involved and information should have been delivered in a timely manner to ensure that the relatives of the people who were in the flight do not become distraught (Wilson, 2014). The Airline took five hours before it announced that the flight had gone missing and the relatives to the people that were in the flight were put in a room where they were supposed to wait for information which was delivered by low level employees at the airline in an unprofessional manner (Alexander, 2014). Even though the root cause of the disappearance had not been established, there were better ways that the Airline could have dealt with the crisis in terms of public relations so that they could make sure that the relatives of the passengers and not further distraught. 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Wilson, J. 2014, Flight MH370: Malaysian officials criticised for poor PR, but how do you prepare for the unprecedented?. Viewed 4 may, 2014 . Read More