Damaging the Damage Control

There is great little erotic museum here in Las Vegas.  Where else would you expect it to be??  In the last few weeks, they suffered one of the worst Internet PR nightmares one could have;  Their email list server was hijacked or corrupted, sending emails to everyone on the list then resending any responses to the email back out to the list .

This problem caused an almost endless loop of emails and requests to unsubscribe. Everything being sent to the list was being processed and sent back out to the entire list.   Followed by spammers who took advantage of the event by posting things to the list knowing it would be sent back out to the list several times.

Now watching how they handle damage control is a great lesson in What Not To Do when dealing with damage control online.

Their first step was to just let it work its course.  Hoping the hosting service could fix it ASAP and the subscribers could handle a little inconvenience.  When that didn’t happen, an email was sent out explaining what was obvious to all, that they had the list-serv compromised.  And asking for our patience as hundreds of recirculating emails were over flowing our email boxes.

Than came the insult of all insults.  An apology letter.  A nice touch trying to explain how this is such a nightmare form them and they are on top of it and doing everything that they can to stop it.  After all this, it was signed “The Management.”

Yes, the management was on top of this problem, have no worry, the management is here. ..  Not exactly building good tidings and giving me the warm and fuzzies.  The Management is not wearing out my delete key on my computer or making my spam filter go into overtime.

Now on the flip side, I know some of “the management” and I know they are great people, just not the most internet literate people in the world.  They come from the old school of management.  So dealing with an impersonal thing like the Internet, while trying to be personal with email, is a difficult task for some people.

The problem continued and nerves were getting thin.  A private email to the director, stating that it may be a good idea to put a face on the problem, was sent.  Let the people know that a real person with a title was on top of it and taking responsibility for the problem as well as the solution.  Putting a known face to the problem may calm a few people and help retain membership and readers once it is all fixed.  And make it believable.

Shortly thereafter, an email arrived from the list-serv.  It was blank except for an attachment.  OOps, I guess I wasn’t exactly pointed in my suggestion.  When/if opened,  the reader found a properly addressed with a well written letter of apology.  Complete with letterhead and signature.  She included assurances that the problem is almost fixed and a request for forgiveness was asked.

Good idea, bad execution.  Here’s Why:

First: Doing damage control online is not that tricky.  Keep it simple, do it as quickly as possible and make it personal and real.  We are pretty used to being informed and many expect to be kept in the loop as it were.  Not in the dark.  “The Management” is not the answer, it is often the problem.

Next:  People are very leary of attachments on emails as it is.  Especially after being flooded with them from one group or organization.  Now, if I was being buried by unwanted emails from this organization, knowing the email list was compromised, would I dare to open an attachment from them?? In most cases,  Nope…

Worse yet was the fact that the body of the email was empty.  Nothing telling me what was in the attachment or why I should open it.  Leaving the body of an email empty with an attachment will send up red flags to even the worst of the virus scanners.  There was nothing there to assure me this was not a scam letter or virus attached to it.

You want to apologize to me?  Don’t make it difficult for  me to read your message.  Make it easy and make it risk free.  Opening an attachment from a compromised list?  Not happening.  And there is  no need to.  Write it in an email and hit send.  Do this and I will give you my time.

I am betting that if they look at the email statistics, they will see that very few people opened the attachment.  Most hit the delete key without ever knowing what it said.   Her apology, as well meaning as it may have been, fell on empty email boxes.

The problem seems to have stopped, but I am wondering how much damage their damage control did.  One will probably never know.