New Must Do: Tracking Social Media in a Crisis

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By: Doug Bedell

Just as the TV networks were monitoring the topics drawing comment on social networks while President Obama was giving his State of the Union address, crisis communicators need to be prepared to track their own web presence should a crisis strike. While the President's address wasn't a crisis, online feedback, clearly, is a new dimension of crisis PR.

The European Commission’s Community Research and Development Information Service demonstrated the crisis tracking aspect of social media in an exercise, reported on here, of a simulated accident at a Paris train station. Take the report to heart, hope you don’t have a crisis, but be ready if you do — for social media input along with news media presence.

The French authorities found the social media input helpful, not harassing.

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About the Author

Doug Bedell has a background in journalism and PR and is the owner of Resource Relations LLC in Central PA, focusing on organizational and crisis communication. He’s the community manager of SimplyFair.net, a social network on fairness. On the Web, Doug’s at www.ResourceRelations.com. On Twitter, he’s @DougBeetle.

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