By Gerard Braud – The New York Times called me Friday for a comment about Rand Paul’s hostile interview with NBC’s Savannah Guthrie. When the Times starts calling for observations, that means the political season is in full swing. Reporter Alan Rappeport does a great job covering candidates and the things they say in his […]
By Gerard Braud – The Rolling Stone Magazine retraction of their University of Virginia gang rape story is filled with parallels I often warn of in my media training and crisis communications programs. Here are 4 realities: 1) Reporters love an underdog and generally value the word of the accuser more than the word of […]
By Gerard Braud The media, especially the 24 hour cable news channels, are asking some really dumb, speculative questions as they cover the tragic crash of Germanwings flight 9525. In media training the trainer should teach the spokesperson to never speculate. Yet many spokespeople don’t always deflect the speculative questions as well as I would […]
By Greg Davis – [Editors Note from Gerard Braud – Today we have a guest blog from Greg Davis of Arkansas Valley Electric Cooperative. Greg wrote this as a follow up to my March 5, 2015 blog about utility companies avoiding a crisis by communicating with customers who take their complaints about high electric bills […]
By Gerard Braud – Why are so many powerful people oblivious to the potent, negative power of social media? Every day there is a new crisis communication case study and today it is from Aaron Schock, who has resigned as Congressman from Illinois. Schock created his own crisis with excessive selfies and posts on social […]
By Gerard Braud – Secret Service Director Joseph Clancy said it took five days before he was informed that a car carrying two agents struck a security barrier outside the White House. How long does it take in your company for you to find out about an event that could be a potential crisis that […]
By Gerard Braud – Robert Durst has a crisis on his hands here in New Orleans. He is under arrest on murder charges, because of a major media interview goof-up. While being videotaped for a documentary on HBO, he went to the bathroom while still wearing the wireless microphone. In every media training class I’ve […]
By Gerard Braud – Judgment day in the Biblical sense is the Godly determination of your fate at the end of time. We’ve been taught that we do not know the hour or the day of our death or judgment. But in the world of your brand, your products, and your services, we do know […]
By Gerard Braud – The media love their gadgets. They also love promoting their gadgets. At KSLA 12 in Shreveport, Louisiana, LifeEye12 was our mother ship. That is why I laughed so hard when the opening scene of the movie Anchorman shows Ron Burgundy stepping out of his helicopter. I’m not, however, laughing at CNN’s […]
By Gerard Braud – Today’s crisis communications tip looks at what happens when angry customers take to Facebook to complain about your company. Complaints on your Facebook page or complaints on a Facebook group page built for and by the complainers is creating public relations problems for companies. All of us can learn from this […]