When current events put a shade on your brand

The company RODEEO offers me via Instagram to rent a motorbike in Marseille and even offers me a promo code ..... In the light of the recent Roadeos (wild car and moto driving) terrorising the major cities in the South of France, this promotion seems completely inappropriate.

But as a marketing consultant, I know that it is difficult to predict future events and those can sometimes, by the greatest of chance, have a direct consequence on a company and therefore on its activity. Remember the Corona beer brand in the middle of the pandemic...

This nevertheless highlights three fundamental principles:

1/ Keep a constant watch on current events in order to assess potential reputational risks.

2/ Put emergency processes in place well in advance to deal with the different types of crisis. For example, in this case, it would have been wise to reduce media exposure by stopping all network campaigns.

3/ Choose a brand from the start that is in line with its core business and that improves the customer experience. Does renting a car have to be a rodeo?

If you want to set up monitoring protocols or think about the future of your brand, please contact me.