177: Is it Okay to Post on Social Media During the Ukraine-Russia Conflict?

Over the past two weeks I've been asked this question via email, text and social media. Is it okay to keep posting on social media while the world is watching? What is happening in Ukraine? This week on the podcast, my thoughts on keeping business as usual when the world is not. Welcome to the Indestructible PR podcast where we use current events and test and media and PR strategies to help you manage a crisis and build an indestructible reputation. In this episode, let's discuss how to be appropriate on social media while the world is watching what is happening in Ukraine. So the question is what is appropriate to post on social media or through email marketing during a time of unrest? So here are just some thoughts on how to handle social media, social media marketing, email marketing over the next few weeks, should you continue with social media posting and marketing? In short, yes. The world is watching heartbreaking conflict from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As the Russians advance, people are watching every video. They're listening to the sounds of battle of air raid sirens. They're watching civilians refugees share firsthand accounts in most cases via social media, but also through news accounts. People are universally stressed watching this coverage. It's as if you're experiencing the conflict with them. It's scary, it's unnerving. So naturally that's going to just bleed into your day to day, especially if your day to day involves work. This conflict at a time during the pandemic, it's wearing on everyone. And that is what you want to keep in mind when you are posting information online or sharing information to the public or to your customers and consumers. A golden rule for posting anything on social media. How will that message be received before you hit enter or before you hit send on any email or any social media post or any type of content? Ask yourself, is this appropriate for now? Am I saying something that will offend someone? Is this video about our silly promotion the right video to send right now? What about the sound? What about the music that we're using? What about the graphics? What about being sarcastic? Are you going to complain about something? And are you going to complain about something online? Is it going to sound petty, like a first world problem? So ask yourself before you do anything, is it appropriate or important to post it right now? Now, does that mean you have to post everything under a veil of sadness and fear? No, not at all. If your organization or if you are supporting Ukraine, a lot of social media platforms I know, like Facebook will allow you to put it on your profile picture that you support Ukraine. There's Hashtags for supporting Ukraine. There's so many things that you can share so you can be out front and open with your support. You can also be very aggressive in using your platform to directly support the people of Ukraine. Any type of drive or any type of support or any type of donations, and you want to share that, now's the time, by all means. Now, let's say you're not doing something directly. What is it that you can post and what you cannot post? Well, the same rules apply. That happened in April of 2020. What were you doing then? Okay, we were weeks into the pandemic. Everything was new. April 2020 is when people were trying to figure out what the heck are we doing? How are we keeping our business afloat, essentially? So what did you do with your channels then? What did you do with your marketing? If you think back, most of you are going to say, we were informing the public, we were informing our customers, we were telling them how we can help them, how we're adjusting things. What's happening in the Ukraine right now is likely not impacting your business, certainly impacting a lot of businesses out there, but for most of us it's not. So we're not going to have to do that in case of emergency type post. But you want to keep the spirit of what you were doing during the pandemic alive. That spirit of helping, that spirit of compassion communicating in a world where everyone was consumed by news and the news wasn't good, and it wasn't just news that people wanted more, more than news, they wanted information. What can you tell me that will help me? Information is always safe. Information, if it's the right information, is always important. It helps people. And the more information also settles people, it calms people, the more they know. The occupation of Ukraine by Russia, that's a big unknown. Every time you watch video or you go online and you find out what's trending now, where is Russia now? It's stressful, but so many people feel compassion for Ukrainians worldwide. Not only in Ukraine, but worldwide with COVID still being an issue. And out there, people are raw these days, they're still raw. They're more sensitive to their pain, but they're also more sensitive to other people's pain, other people's stress. So that is what you can keep in mind. Do your posts help people? Do they inform people? Do they show empathy for people? Doesn't mean they have to show empathy for refugees coming out of Ukraine, though. That would be nice. But just now's the time to Be compassionate. Show your heart. Wear it on your sleeve. Whether personally or just as an organization, now is the time to show that you care. In every podcast, I share an indestructible PR tip. This is the tip that's going to help you keep your reputation strong and intact. When the invasion was first starting, I think it was two weeks ago now, I was on a Twitter space chat and I've talked about it before the P hour lunch hour. And one of the first questions we talked about was this, is it inappropriate to post? And one of the questions posed to me was about someone had mentioned their client wanted to release bad news in the hopes that it would go unnoticed. My advice then is my advice now. On the podcast. Even though people are paying attention to Ukraine, even though the world is watching, keep in mind where they are watching. People aren't just paying attention to one thing. If people are being driven to news sites, to social media platforms, they're watching everything. Algorithms make sure that you see everything. Your bad news will likely not be hidden by what is happening online. It increases the likelihood that someone will notice. That's all for this week on the podcast. Thanks so much for listening. Bye for now.