Comments on: Corporate social responsibility: mitigating reputation risk in a crisis

By: Eric Goldman

Eric Goldman — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 05:39:23 +0000

Great Post – thanks!
As Craig said, there are many options. One is technology to reduce the cost of using social media to listen in on what people are saying about your company and products.
Reputation Analytics, as we call this new form of software, monitors blogs, tweets, Facebook, news feeds, etc, searching for mentions of a word or phrase. Natural Language capabilities assess the sentiment: positive or negative? The report states (among a host of options) numbers of mentions, ranked by their authority (this site’s reputation by numbers of readers). This allows you to concentrate your attention on the sites of importance at that moment. A trusted site is suddenly negative about one of your products? Begin a dialogue immediately by commenting on the site, and emailing the blogger to begin the conversation.
These automated approaches reduce the time needed to participate in the social media space to about an hour a day – a task which can be spread amongst all your CSRs, and thus be achieved with no increase in people costs.
Social media, monitored in this way, and then responded to by participating in the conversation (blogging, commenting on other blogs, online forums and groups) provides a feedback loop between a company and its clients. It creates a community.
This feedback loop is the ultimate form of Customer Service: it allows the customer to drive product design.
Our website (www.inbound-marketing-automation.ca) provides an overview of these ideas, and our blog describes how customers can participate in the product design process via these new Inbound techniques.

By: Craig Badings

Craig Badings — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 22:05:22 +0000

Sean, that’s why the debate is so fertile, there will always be another opinion on this and Friedman’s quote has been debated for years. The problem I have with it is its black and white nature. Today the boundaries have blurred and I would challenge any business to survive remaining focused solely on its business with scant regard for the current environmental, social and political milieu in which it operates.
Cheers
Craig B

By: Sean Williams

Sean Williams — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:27:33 +0000

Craig, the business of business HAS to be business, or there is nothing to put in the CSR budget pocket. The responsibility to the owners (shareholders) of the business is a legal distinction. If you can state to the stockholder that CSR activities help the business operate effectively, then you’re on solid footing. But this apparent paradox is a grave concern for many companies. If your firm is suffering in the recession, with lower revenue and poor financial results, you need to direct investment toward the items most likely to help you work through the downturn. That may involve reducing CSR budgets. The halo effect helps you in some ways, but don’t be surprised as such investment falls along with revenue.