8 keys to compassionate communication, during and after COVID-19

Here’s how to makes sure your messages are guided by compassion instead of fear, and a map for getting through this crisis no matter what industry you serve.

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As a publicist working in the hospitality space for many years, I have navigated hundreds of crisis situations on behalf of clients, but never have I seen a crisis like COVID-19.

With no road map, companies are trying to navigate their response in times that call for sensitivity. The word of the moment that I keep hearing in Zoom conferences is “tone deaf,” as in “We don’t want to appear tone deaf…” or “That company surely was tone deaf with that Instagram post.”

The word that we need to work toward is “compassion.”

Here are eight tips for handling communications throughout and after the current crisis:

1. Proceed with an abundance of compassion. People are fragile right now during these uncertain times, and need all the TLC your company can provide. Relax restrictions on redemption of gift certificates, subscriptions etc. where possible, and be flexible wherever you can.

2. Don’t blast your customers daily with nonessential messaging just to try and stay top-of-mind. Messaging should be shared only when your company truly has something important to deliver. If you overcommunicate over this period, customers might delete important messages when your business is ready to reopen.

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