By Josh Sommers
December 11, 2009
You don’t have to be a public-relations expert to figure out that Tiger Woods needs to learn a lot about crisis management.
One of Nike’s first campaigns about Woods featured children running up a hill with golf bags and taking their first swings. Each of them said, “I’m Tiger Woods.” When that spot aired it was intended to create an emotion, depicting Woods as what we can all aspire to be.
If we saw that spot on TV today, as I heard one brand expert say this week, that will create a much different emotion.
For most of us, Woods right now is a cheating husband leaving a desperate voicemail message on an alleged mistress’ cell phone. Indeed, the Tiger Woods brand is broken.
Silence can be damaging
Woods failed to deploy basic crisis management strategies. Instead of controlling the story, his lack of disclosure fueled public speculation. He blamed the media, rather than come clean. Woods also allowed third parties, like alleged mistresses and disappointed friends, tell the story for him. What’s worse, the story isn’t going away.
Some things, like marital problems and adultery, should remain behind closed doors — for most of us.
But Woods, who is paid millions per year to put his image on everything from cars to watches, unfortunately doesn’t have privacy as a luxury — especially with the way the scandal unfolded.
All that remains are more questions — forcing the media to dig and feed the hungry public.
Woods’ public relations team has more work to do, as leaving these questions unanswered only make matters worse. It’s time to sit down with Oprah and do a stint with Letterman.
Letterman came clean — publicly
Letterman handled his recent adultery crisis perfectly — at least with the public.
Letterman took control of the story by coming clean on his show. He poked fun at his missteps, acknowledged he is human, and said, in a convincing way, he was sorry and that his wife deserved better. He sold audiences, and hopefully he was as sincere behind closed doors.
Americans like comebacks, and in Wood’s case — redemption. We know, indeed, he is not perfect. Woods doing a media tour with more disclosure and a sincere message will bring this story to a close faster and begin to rehabilitate his brand.
