After the announcement of the loss of 5000 jobs, Qantas Frequent Flyer produced a great example of ‘dark content’ for the embattled airline.
What is dark content?
In times of a crisis people will turn to digital media. A dark site or dark content is pre-built content or even a whole website that can quickly be distributed in times of crisis or a website that can replace your current website in a crisis management situation.
The death of Steve Jobs produced one of the most famous examples of a dark website, when Apple replaced its standard website with his iconic image within seconds of the announcement of his death.
It is easy to look pretty bad in a crisis if you adopt a business-as-usual attitude. It is better to show your concern and make a statement than just look like you don’t care.
Burson-Marsteller’s 2011 Crisis Prepared Study revealed that 59% of the businesses surveyed that had experienced a crisis in the past and did not have a crisis plan were 41% more likely to see a drop in revenue compared to 30% for those who did have a crisis plan in place.
Dark content enables a company to be at the central point of information and can help suppress damaging rumours. Not communicating is seen as hiding, which frequently causes crisis when a brand tries to hide online.
Many companies have drawn-out processes for what they will publicly say or announce. This process takes time, and in the world of social media, that is exactly what you don’t have: Time to plan out an approved response.
The best way is to be prepared. Do scenario planning and ensure you have a process and content prepared in the event of a crisis.
What people want to know in such a situation is:
Rapid response time is essential in managing a crisis situation. A pre-built dark site can be customised and brought to publication in a matter of hours.
It is better to plan when there is no crisis. Prepared content should be simple, social media ready and SEO ready and consequently very cost-effective as well as managing risk to your organisation.
Fi Bendall is the managing director of Bendalls Group, a team of highly trained digital specialists, i-media subject matter experts and developers.
Fi Bendall is chief executive of The Female Social Network and a Westpac-AFR 2015 100 Women of Influence, who was described by CEO Magazine as “The CEO’s secret weapon”. An expert and pioneer in digital strategy, she has over 23 years’ experience in the digital and tech sectors.
