Exclusive Insights

After examining consumer engagement with B2C brands last month, this month we’re looking at B2Bs. Overall, consumer engagement was down 38 percent in Shareablee’s business services category, vs the period (Nov. 1-Nov. 30) one year ago.

Ray Kerins has held senior communication positions at Merck, Pfizer and most recently at Bayer, where he was SVP, head of corporate affairs. We talked to him about the keys to fighting cybercrime.

Companies are collections of people. So, one way to judge them is how they measure up during challenges, or a crisis. A Salesforce survey of 12,000 global consumers and 3,600 B2B buyers provides evidence.Polling people during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the survey found 90 percent say how a company acts during a crisis demonstrates its trustworthiness.

There used to be a belief that businesses could, and indeed should, stay away from the campaign trail. Sure, they donate to candidates and often have lots of lobbyists. But, it was not seen as their role to try and support or strengthen the democratic process itself. That all changed in 2020.

Reading McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski’s ill-conceived comments about recent shooting deaths of two children in Chicago (including one in a McDonald’s drive-thru) prompted out contributor to write about the Emotional Intelligence Quotient, or EQ.

This month’s terms to know include Decentralized Autonomous Organization and WhatAboutism.

While smaller companies have less room for error during a crisis, crisis pros argue a mix of preparation and free or low-cost tools can provide a solid foundation before one begins.

Viewing the threat of ransomware through numbers illustrates its gravity. It takes an average of 280 days to identify and contain a breach and costs $1.85 million to remediate, double the 2020 figure. More than half (52 percent) of all breaches are deemed malicious.

More than half of organizations compromised in the past three years deployed some form of automated security system. This suggests that technology alone is not enough. The IT team must purposefully build, review and test a cybersecurity plan. So, how can communicators contribute? They can partner with experts to clearly explain this complex topic to the C-suite and employees.

Jes Staley wasn’t the first financial-sector heavyweight to step down after reports surfaced that he had ties with the late, notorious Jeffrey Epstein. Preceding the CEO of Barclays to the exits was billionaire Leon Black, CEO and chairman of Apollo Global Management, a private equity firm. Similarities between the Staley and Black stories are useful for crisis communicators.

With the holidays coming, B2Cs are looking to interact with core audiences on social. A slight surprise: the number of posts year-over-year was down 8 percent, yet a far larger surprise was the considerable fall in actions, or consumer engagement, off 35 percent year-over year (YOY.