Lets get the obvious out of the way . . . they shouldn’t have let the leak happen in the first place . . . and they should have had every possible contingency planned for. But since I’m not a submarine engineer or an oil recovery expert, I have to limit my unsolicited advice to things I know.
If I was BP, I would . . .
- Go public at the CEO level as quickly and frequently as possible
- Shut down all marketing activities except for information about their efforts to stop the oil and the cleanup
- Use existing Web and social media channels to talk about the issue, even if that isn’t the purpose of that channel
- Create a Website just so people can monitor the ongoing efforts
- Own the search engines with the BP story. Optimize everything around the disaster efforts and run an aggressive search ad campaign
- Embed your own reporters at key locations and report back on efforts
- Begin proactively funneling money, jobs and resources into the local economies
You don’t like @BPGlobalPR’s new simple distribution system?
It’s like the farmer’s market – straight from the source to you (via the beach.)
But seriously, you’re quite correct. However, I’ve my doubts if they go any of those routes however – they can afford not to.
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