Crisis PR for Aladin Foods
Or how we managed to minimize the brand reputation damage made from a viral video with over 14 000 shares.
When one of ТHE BIGGEST STREET FOOD COMPANIES in Bulgaria, with 30 restaurants situated in 15 cities, is threatened by a video purposefully made to damage the brand’s prestigious reputation, everything needs to be tackled in a quick and calm manner with all possible resources. Not to mention the tabloid media managing to spread the video even further which resulted in having the worst possible scenario.
Aladin Foods has presence across all social media channels, with 300 000 fans on Facebook, and all posts, users comments, reviews and etc. are closely monitored in order to keep the trust customers have towards the brand.
More about the range and seriousness of the problem:
On the 10th of November 2016, a man publishes a video in his Facebook profile. The clip is filmed from a client’s perspective, in front of one of Aladin Foods’s restaurants, and suggests that the food chain offers poor quality meat. In addition to the shooting position and lighting of the viral video, the man adds the following bold statement:
“Look at what meat you are having at Aladin Foods.
Please share, let everyone know what their children are consuming…“
which confirms the idea that the meat filmed is slobbery and sticky. The truth is that the clip reveals the process of removing the foil meant to protect the meat during transportation.
This is how the video starts living its life in the worlds biggest social media platform. There it is the subject of hundreds of angry comments, personal messages on the company’s official website and gets SHARED OVER 14,000 TIMES. The video is not left unnoticed from some of the biggest tabloids too. They usually do not follow the good journalistic practices of checking the information they stumbleupon and contacting the brand prior to further spreading the news.
Crisis PR on Facebook or how we managed to put the situation under control in just 48 hours.
The critical situation required immediate action and our team had to reach as much clients of the brand as possible. But, before we go into further detail, it is important to outline that for the long partnership that we have had with Aladin Foods, we have managed to build a strong customer-brand relationship and great trust towards the brand, with a response rate of 95% and under 1 hour response time. It is no accident that there will be great emphasis put on good communication between brands and their audience in the marketing trends for 2019.
So, the hundreds of messages that followed, most of which were from angry customers, received their instant response, containing information on how the meat is prepared and transported.
Moreover
We quickly managed to contact the man who published the video creating false impressions about the meat contained in the brand’s products. He was personally invited to be assured of the true quality of the meat Aladin Foods uses. This was included in the hundreds of conversations with troubled customers and helped strengthened our standing point.
A live video was immediately organised in one of the food chain restaurants where the whole process of removing the “foil of discord” was revealed. We decided to “play around” with the tabloid media and attract more attention to the live broadcast by using a caption exactly in their style:
“SHOCKING!!! ? The owner of Aladin Foods is about to unpack a skewer. Is he better than a doner chef? ? ?
The idea was to show that actually there is nothing shocking but just a standard procedure in accordance with high hygiene practices. In order to gain maximum reach, the live video was enhanced with a Facebook ad, optimised for “Reach”, where we also did not miss on answering to every user comment.
Along with the live broadcast we published an informative video, which was also boosted, tracing the whole process from production to transportation of the meat.
To reinforce the messages we virtually enforced, that there is nothing wrong with the meat shown in the viral video, but just the opposite, that it reveals the high hygiene standards at Aladin Foods, we announced a few dates for “open doors” in the company’s production facilities.
In conclusion
For 48 hours we managed to mitigate the “tone” of communication with all alarmed customers. After communicating with the man who posted the video – the scope of the video was limited as he removed it from the web. An informative campaign was launched from various Aladin Food’s restaurant locations, which showed the product preparation process in uninterrupted and not regulated conditions, which further increased trust towards the brand.
