The Use of Media In Crisis Communications
Media relations is central to crisis management and in this article, we highlight 12 aspects that are integral to effective crisis management.
- Media Risk Management – Managing media risk during the crisis. Identifying the areas of exposure and being able to develop and deploy a structure and process to manage that risk from end to end. A media specialist enables this to be done in the most practical way with tangible results in terms of limiting damage from negative coverage or conversation or narrative propagation across media platforms.
- Shaping Media Response – Shaping the public response is an integral part of media relations and reputation risk management during a crisis. The media specialist or Communications Lead is tasked with the responsibility of crafting media messaging ensuring it strikes the right tone and addresses the issues at stake. Includes the 4 Cs – Context, Care, Commitment and Control.
- Media Messaging – Tailored messaging for the media. The crisis response should also include messaging that is tailored for disseminattion to the media. It must be clear and consistent and be useable across the selected platforms.
- Integration of social and traditional media response – Ensures consistency of messaging and alignment of strategy across traditional and social media platforms as relevant and appropriate. This to ensure that no audience is left behind in the coverage. Particularly in a public information crisis, or emergency/disaster crisis or major reputation scandal, there may be a need to take deliberate effort to ensure that the message travels as far as possible and penetrates to the depth required to reach all categories of stakeholders and audiences.
- Media Platform Strategy – Identifies the most relevant platforms to leverage on based on stakeholder mapping and the issue at hand. This includes TV, Radio, Print, national, regional, community etc. E.g if a business has foreign investors and it is facing a major crisis, it would need to target international news platforms like CNN or BBC to get its message across. This media targeting must be an intentional approach. You cannot assume that the news will get the coverage that is required. You must ensure it gets covered either by sending to the relevant correspondents; making TV studio appearances where necessary or inviting correspondents for a site visit, press briefing etc.
- Media Content Strategy – Decides the format of content appropriate for each platform and throughout the crisis lifecycle ie visual, editorial, etc. Every criisis requires some level of tell and show. The Crisis Communications Lead should work with the Crisis Leader and the operating teams to ensure that the most credible and compelling evidence is presented as part of the visual content strategy or referenced in the response. It is important to determine if and when/how to use videos, photos, infographics and written statements. The choice of content format needs to be strategic – based on your knowledge of the audience and the sentiments being expressed. The purpose of each content must be clear i.e. to clarify, validate proofs; discredit dangerous narratives or provide context etc
- Media Monitoring and Sentiment Analysis – Tracks and maintains 24/7 vigilance on conversation online and across all platforms. (Mentions and sentiment analysis). Media monitoring is very important in crisis management as this is the only way to transparently assess how well the media response is going.
- Media Narrative – Crafts the narrative to respond and protect reputation and resolve the underlying issues. Ensures the narrative is effectively disseminated and is credible and persuasive. In crisis management, it is the role of the Crisis Communications Lead to present a counter-narrative to whatever is being circulated negatively externally. In order to effectively counter the narrative, it is important to diagnose the existing narrative and break it down into issues that need to be addressed one by one. The goal is to displace the negative narrative and replace with the more balanced or accurate one.
- Media Perception & Reputation – Monitors perception and brand reputation during and after the crisis to ensure there is no lingering damage to reputation. The crisis does not end when media coverage goes silent. It is important to do an online sweep to assess how well the counter-narrative did and also discover if it was credible enough to engineer a notable shift in sentiment in the conversation that was previously negative.
- Media metrics – Develops the most appropriate metrics to measure for the crisis at hand e.g de-escalation of negative sentiment, share of voice in media mentions, narrative shift from negative to balanced or positive on key platforms, perception shift as measured by modern AI media monitoring tools.
- Media Communications and Engagement – Engagement with relevant media personalities as relevant and appropriate. Media appearances, background briefings, press conferences as appropriate. In media relations, there is the communications element as well as the engagement piece. And it is important to make room for both. The media is also a stakeholder to be engaged in crisis management – just like government and community. What the media believes is important – so taking the time to engage them off-camera is important to ensuring there is contextual understanding ahead of the print report or on camera analysis. These engagements help to provide context of facts that may not ordinarily be accessible to them in the public domain.
- Media De-escalation – De-escalation of the crisis in the media space with post-crisis mop-up to ensure that all negative narratives are effectively countered and there are no lingering issues left unaddressed in the media space. Clean up the digital footprint to ensure the balanced narrative has the last word.
Sola Abulu & Associates (SA&A) is a strategy and communications training and consulting firm dedicated to enabling businesses, brands and institutions to achieve their desired objectives through strategic communications, organizational effectiveness and reputation risk management.
Enrolment is ongoing for the Issues, Crisis & Reputation Management Course scheduled for July 30, 2026 from 9AM – 4PM West Africa Time via ZOOM.
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