The first headline I saw in my newsfeed today was “Bloodied Passenger Dragged From United Flight At O’Hare Airport.”  Upon reading the story in numerous international publications, I checked various social media channels to learn more about the incident.  Not surprisingly #BoycottUnited and #Flight3411 are trending hashtags – and the story doesn’t get better for United the more I read.  After last week’s #leggingsgate incident I fully expected to see a concerted effort by United’s team to deal with the chatter.  Listen to all the experts – the first 24 hours in a social media crisis are critical.  Communications in this phase are the number one priority.  A sound communications strategy starts with acknowledging the incident occurred.  Next step – apologize – without pointing fingers at people or policy.  Finally develop and commit to a plan of action – which may involve holding employees or partners accountable, and changing policies and procedures.  The goal here is to understand what happened, prevent it from happening again, and most importantly keep your customers loyal.  There’s plenty of noise on social media now calling for United’s head. United has chosen to defend their position with “We apologize for the overbook situation.”   This position doesn’t acknowledge the results of the incident, and while they use the word – isn’t an apology.

Don’t be United.  Develop a sound Social Media Crisis plan in the event you ever need it.  Mzinga can help.