Often when issues arise within a business and there is negative chatter in the air (media, poor analyst reports, competitor fodder), all eyes turn to the marketing department and PR to manage the “messaging problem”. And while crisp concise messaging is incredibly important to convey a company’s unique value prop, problems with product offerings, poor customer service or leadership issues cannot be wished away with razzle dazzle messaging or press release announcements. In these cases, the organization has a facts problem, not a messaging one.
Utilize your marketing team as investigators to determine the root cause of the issue and then build a cross-departmental team to begin addressing and fixing it. By acknowledging the problem and demonstrating pro-activity around solutions, the facts will begin to change and thereby the narrative of the story will as well. As an example, after resolving known issues with customer implementations, invite those clients to participate in future product pilot launches and report on the entire journey. Every company has challenges but it’s not magic words that will save the day.