-1.svg "Close Icon (3)-1")
.svg "Close Icon (3)")
- Share
-
Summary
- Inaccurate or damaging claims are often assumed true unless corrected
- For this reason we counsel clients to swiftly contest damaging claims about their brand or people, and to ensure the permanent record (Google and media coverage) is correct
- How and when you contest incorrect claims can matter more than what you say
How to use contestability as a PR strategy...
- Create a fact base - that's yours, true and supported by third parties or other evidence
- Get it on the record - to create a reference point for all reporting & stakeholder interactions
- Dispute, contend or rebut any untrue, biased and damaging claims - if you lack credibility, seek third party defence or endorsement (noting timing and conviction is key here - too late in the cycle or too weak and it's not effective)
There's a reason Facebook is advertising that 'fake news is not our friend'. It's because there's a damaging perception afoot: that the social media giant provided a platform for fake news which in turn determined the outcome of the US election.
The concept of contesting damaging information is a core issues and crisis management principle, whether through PR or advertising.
This is because inaccurate or damaging claims are often assumed true unless corrected.
For this reason we counsel clients to swiftly contest damaging claims about their brand or people, and to ensure the permanent record (Google search outcomes + news) is correct.
How and when you contest incorrect claims can matter more than what you say.
What is "contestability"?
In simple terms, it means disputing claims or allegations. These might be factual errors, the implications of material and damaging omissions, bias in reporting or other issues that leave a poor impression - and are untrue or a misreading of the facts.
Where does it work well?
The ideal execution of this concept is to halt a story or negative report before it happens. A few examples illustrate this:
- When a journalist has knowledge of a corporate issue but incorrect information, and wants to run a half-truth kind of story - it's easy to be clear, specific and firm in denials
- When a circling rumour is hard to pin down, but can be addressed by the company in a series of proactive profile interviews, CEO speeches or team briefings
If a negative view has a full head of steam - for example it's part of a mainstream media story - the response has to escalate accordingly to arrest existing reporting.
Timing matters: effective responses contest the negative or inaccurate claims before the story dies, entering the story or reporting arc before the story starts to lose momentum. Once it has, there's a far more limited platform on which to respond. If attention has moved on, the rebuttal becomes kind of pointless because no one's paying attention.
How does it work?
There are, in our observation, at least seven steps to consider in effectively contesting an issue.
- Identify the specific claims (or potential claims) which are wrong and why they're wrong
- Establish a fact base internally - the objective and verifiable truth. Similar to a statement of facts presented to a Court in legal processes, this becomes the foundation for contesting the issue. Simply having one in a suitably edited (public) form inspires confidence among audiences that you're right, and in control of the issue
- Aim to establish, as far as possible, the root cause of the issues so you have a high conviction in the fact base - the more you understand how you got where you are, the greater the confidence you'll have to respond. This is the "how" of the issue
- Analyse the active channels and audiences, to better inform responses
- Draft and sense-check (through the eyes of diverse stakeholders) messages and materials, before...
- Deployment, often through multiple channels
- And open a Q&A channel - if you're confident that you and your organisation are in the clear, or if you're owning up to something you got wrong or dealing with innuendo, there's immense power in following a denial or correction with full access to senior executives to talk through the detail and answer questions. Nothing to hide = nothing to lose. As long as your spokesperson is up to the job. And you're right about the issue.
What's needed to make it work?
There are at least three critical success factors, in our experience, to include:
- Speed. Add to that, good timing: usually earlier is better.
- Conviction. Audiences judge spokespeople and executives by the strength of their defence. Theatrics aside, that does in part determine how believable a defence is. It might be evidenced through strength of language, how widespread the denial is and what lengths you go to to ensure your version of the facts is heard.
- A fact base. Truth and proof: you need to be telling the truth, and, ideally, able to prove it. We advise clients to establish a chronology and set of facts from the outset - that's then the basis for messages, strategy and many other decisions.
A case in point
During one particularly rough ride in financial markets we advised a client who had become famous for all the wrong reasons. They endured three days of front page news before we were called in. When we were, and assembled enough facts to mount a defence, their credibility with media was already largely demolished.
Permanently.
Why? In large part because they'd not immediately and effectively countered damaging and incorrect claims made about the business they were in, and about their own commercial practices. They were slow to react. When they did respond, it lacked certainty and conviction. Finally, they attempted to use a "small target" strategy in a situation which required a circuit breaker - some form of aggressive defence which clearly showed their conviction in their own position.
Facts that could have been used to mount a valid defence, were lost - swept away in a media tsunami.
It sounds like a complete travesty of justice. Moral outrage at the unfairness aside, this situation is more common than we'd like.
It also might feel familiar if you've ever found yourself on the inside track of a media attack. Sometimes the facts which could exonerate a person or brand didn't get a fair hearing. At other times, the wrong thing is reported and the damage is irretrievable. To be fair, this isn't so common. But it can happen, and contesting your position can help prevent it.
Anatomy of a reputation train smash
In the example above, where the client was really damaged, the first wave of reporting, much of which was speculative, was assumed as gospel truth. So the second wave and wider group of media, clients, industry counter parties, regulators and politicians assumed it was true, believed it and repeated it. With the echo chamber operating at full volume, the sheer mass of negative commentary was so great that later attempts to correct the record had little impact - in halting the continued incorrect claims or correcting the original comments.
With their reputation damaged, our client's key commercial partners lost confidence, causing far more dire consequences.
Our client may well have made mistakes, but deliberately doing the wrong thing was not one of them.
It was a brutal demonstration of the "silence is assumed guilt" principle in issues and crisis management in financial services.
Not running an immediate and strong PR defence was a strategic error, but it shouldn't have been taken as a sign of malfeasance.
Getting it right
More recently as we've seen with the Royal Commission, it's hard - or impossible - to get a new hearing with media once the story has been told a certain way.
By contrast we've worked with plenty of clients whose staff or entities have made mistakes, been upfront in admitting them but also not allowed media to extrapolate from the facts.
As businesses fix issues, they owe various parties a cogent explanation of what happened, how, and what's been done to fix it. Good communication maintains the confidence of the people they need most at such times, and ensures the company is given time and space to fix the problem.
Our crisis and issues management work, done only in financial services, deals with the PR defence or strategy associated with issues such as governance lapses, client errors or systemic business issues, conduct risks such as fraud, theft, insider trading or other forms of trading misconduct, sexual harassment... and more. It's a bleak list but reflects the reality of human nature, and how people sometimes lapse in any environment, rather than the standards of our clients.
As black a picture as might be painted of finance sector firms and banks, we also know how sophisticated and solid many of the systems and processes are in those businesses to avoid issues. But humans, en masse, are imperfect. Even the best-governed and most well-led firms have had their issues. It only takes one smart, motivated and unethical staff member to cause a major legal and reputation issue.
I'd argue that it's not what goes wrong that determines what people think of them - it's how the firm responds. And first up, contesting things that are wrong, is key.
To learn more about strategy #2, 'Contestability', and for some quick tips on how to implement this strategy, watch this short video by MD Carden Calder and Head of Media Jacqui Maddock.
