Leveraging a Digital Strategy to Better Guide the Crisis Discussion  

News Consumption About four-in-ten Americans often get news online % of U.S. adults who often get news on each platform TV Cable, local, network, nightly Online Social media, websites/apps Radio Print newspapers 57% 38% 25% 20% Pew Research Center

Citizen Journalist

Digital Engagement in Crisis Management You now have the ability to go directly to the consumer with your side of the story Provide “controlled” content that feeds the media beast Gain insights on key influencers and target audiences Provides the ability to track your messaging Enables you to engage and address inaccuracies 5

CarMax Crisis – 20/20 Investigation Claimed the company was not being transparent with customers Questioned the company’s 125-point inspection process Had undercover video of sales people providing false information about the recall status of cars on the lot Disgruntled former employee claiming the company was selling unsafe cars Gio Benitez, ABC News 20/20 called in October – turned on to a story by consumer advocates who are after CarMax regarding recalled cars which is a topic for another time. Ingredients of a story that would attack the fundamental brand of CarMax – call into question what separates them from their competitors and damage their opportunity for growth. Questioned quality, transparency, integrity, trust – had disgruntled employee to share that story from the inside.

CarMax Crisis Response Digital Brand Journalism Strategy We used Twitter and Facebook to respond to online chatter – directing them to the CarMax Update website The website enabled CarMax to provide much more detail than what was included in the 20/20 report “Get the Facts” on 20/20 report Video describing the 125-point inspection process Q&A on the recall issue Links to other sites with more background on the issues Paid keyword advertising that would appear on search engines to drive traffic to the CarMax website Based on our research – we decided to go with a digital brand journalism approach – we would use our digital properties to tell a more compelling story about CarMax and the 20/20 story. We used the CarMax twitter and facebook pages to engage online audiences and to take the conversation from the 20/20 site to our controlled properties. Our digital team created a CarMax Update webpage that served as our platform to tell the CarMax side of this story. We included

Our Goal – The story is dead in 24 hours Channel/Audience Volume Twitter 446 Facebook—public posts 91 Facebook—brand page 19 (2 positive) Customer relations Investors 1 inquiry before segment Eoffice (sent to PR) 3 comments (1 positive) Total 560 Darksite 7,268 visit, Quality video 817 total views to date Media Hotline Calls Stock Price Increased $.54 Our goal – to make this go away in 24 hours – team of about 10 people on hand that night to address customer calls, media calls, handle social discussions – Lee from our digital team was there to make rapid changes to the site if needed Here are the results – our negotiations paid off – the story was much weaker. It was no promoted on the show in fact you won’t find it online thanks in part to those negotiations and our relationship with the producer. Note the dark site visits and the number of folks who watched our video – helped to quite down the conversation. Lastly note the media calls and the stock price – at the end of the day, that is how the CEO measures us. No bumps in the road there.

Social Discussion As you can see the story died in less than a day – we discovered that the west coast didn’t engage in this discussion by the single spoke – didn’t seem to care or our messaging was already ahead of the curve.

85% ignore social media 66% don’t practice enough What Crisis IQ Tells Us 29% were prepared 55% didn’t have a plan 66% don’t practice enough 85% ignore social media

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