Crisis Communications: What’s Brewing Inside Your Utility?
“Do you ever speak on utility crisis communications?” Barry Moline, executive director of the California Municipal Utilities Association, asked me in a recent phone call. I told him I did. He asked if I could speak on that topic at CMUA’s annual conference. I told Barry I would be delighted. Readers interested in my take […]
Utility Marketing: Cash on the Barrel or Cash Down the Drain?
Raise your hand if you think your utility marketing efforts are misguided. Yeah, that’s what I thought. But rather than call out your utility’s marketing team, a less-confrontational approach might be to consider third-party research. That’s what today’s post is all about. You’re not saying it, I am. For years and years, corporate checkbooks have […]
Battling for Employees’ Hearts and Minds? Don’t Lead with “Reliable, Affordable and Safe”
Those words might have worked as a rallying cry 75 or 100 years ago, when the U.S. was electrifying (right). Back then, working in the electricity business was a leading-edge, change-the-world endeavor, like working in the space program was in the 1960s or the perennial search for a cure for cancer. But today, many utility […]
Effective and SUCCESful Messaging for Utilities
Our challenge as utility communicators comes down to two separate yet interconnected things: Messaging and Messenger. That’s the Alpha and Omega of communications. You need to craft a message your audience can grasp and you need to deliver it cost effectively. A great message can be undermined by a bad message-delivery choice. And even the […]
The Simple, Enduring Truths of Crisis Communications
Listening to Bruce Hennes’ talks on crisis communications for utilities, I was reminded of a long-ago quip attributed, as best as I could recall, to Pierre Salinger (right), former press secretary to President John F. Kennedy and a print and broadcast reporter. “The truth can be complicated,” I remember reading him saying. “Sometimes, it’s easier […]
You Wanna Be Right, or Understood, in Your Utility Customer Communications?
I spoke with a utility communicator not too long ago who was having difficulty convincing the highly technical leader of her utility to use easily understood language in communicating with the public. The leader was a stickler for precision and comprehensiveness, which led to long and complicated communications with customers, which the communicator suspected were […]
Is Your Utility Brand Trustworthy?
An old quote — “the more things change, the more they remain the same” — came to mind as I exited yet another conference on the strategic challenges reshaping the utility industry. One much-discussed challenge was the changeover of the generation fleet, from coal to gas and renewables. That one’s way above most of […]
Employee Communications: Showing Your True Colors on Day 1
Sometimes Saturdays come on Thursdays. When you own your own small business, you have to flex around client needs/crises, deadlines, business development, client management and lots of other to-dos. Going hard for three or four days in a row sometimes means your brain needs a day off. There are times my brain can’t wait until […]
“Holy Kilowatts, Batman!” So What’s Your Story?
Have you ever left an energy conference and run into a life-sized Pikachu Pokémon©? How about coming face to face with a Star Wars stormtrooper©? I recently encountered those and many other colorful characters, most of whom I didn’t recognize, when the energy conference I was attending, HydroVision International, was ending while Denver Comic Con […]
Utility Communications: Don’t Overlook (Or Shoot!) The Messenger
When I write or speak about utility communications, I tend to focus on the “message” part of the communications process, i.e., which words should be used and which ones should be avoided in order to achieve a desired result. Like this post. And this post. Last month, when I spoke at the American Public Power […]
