Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Okay, so obviously the first person to blame when untrue and potentially dangerous rumors spread on Twitter or other social media sites is the person who started the rumors. If you haven’t already guessed, I’m referring to a jackass named Shashank Tripathi, a hedge fund analyst who was, until recently, the campaign manager for Republican congressional hopeful Christopher R. Wight, and who got his jollies during Hurricane Sandy by tweeting alarming but false tidbits of non-news from his account, @ComfortablySmug.

Examples of his jackassery during the storm include tweets which read: “Breaking: Con Edison has begun shutting down ALL power in Manhattan”; “Confirmed flooding on NYSE. The trading floor is flooded under more than three feet of water”; and “BREAKING: Governor Cuomo is trapped in Manhattan. Has been taken to a secure shelter.”...

[Big challenge of social media verification and risk in a crisis compounded by media rushing to break a story first based on iReporters, citizen journalists and social media reports. ~ Jeff]

The unfortunate reality is that we need to be more prepared now than we were 10 years ago -- no matter what part of the country we live in -- in the wake of more flooding, ice storms, earthquakes, blizzards, and tornadoes.

Whether a national brand or local business, you have to be prepared for how your business, your employees and your customers will be affected by Mother Nature.

As New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said, “We have a 100-year flood every two years now.” It was a quip with a thread of levity to ease a strained time, but it was also layered with truth. He went on to say: “That is not a political statement; that is a factual statement…We have a new reality when it comes to these weather patterns: We have an old infrastructure, we have old systems. That is not a good combination and that is one of the lessons I will take from this, personally.”...