The Past is No Longer Really the Past
The past is effectively no longer the past, given the level of media coverage in the societies we live in. The internet and social networks have made it very easy for past actions - be they those of a particular brand, organization or person - to be rehashed and put back on the media agenda for no reason.
From the perspective of a public relations professional, This turns out to be a less than favorable scenario, especially when it comes to managing clients' reputations. While it's true that this type of situation is more common when we're talking about celebrities - the case of Cristiano Ronaldo and Kathryn Mayorga may be the paradigmatic example, the truth is that this type of situation can also happen to organizations and companies.
How, after all, should communication professionals protect their clients against such cases?
Prevention is the first step. Protecting customers“ privacy, with special attention to ”personal" social networks, can help avoid this type of crisis. Secondly, alerting customers, especially when they are going to have some kind of media exposure, to the fact that there are certain types of events that should not be made public, even if they seem innocuous. Planning what is going to be said is particularly important. In a third phase, and if it is no longer possible to avoid a crisis of this type, we should try to understand how public opinion is reacting to the news and try, in a very calculated way, to explain what happened in a sincere way and as quickly as possible.
Managing this type of situation doesn't have a mathematical solution and each case has its own particularities. However, although these types of crises can be avoided, they tend to happen more and more and communication professionals must be prepared to deal with them.