I’ve also updated back in favour of EA not being a great public facing brand, since it seems to have held up poorly in the face of its first major scandal.
Are there examples of brands which you think have held up better to their own scandals? You say “it’s unclear EA’s perception among the general public has changed (most of them have still never heard of EA)” which seems to imply that EA held up quite well, under the definition I would most intuitively use (perception among the general public).
First to clarify, yes most of the general public haven’t heard of EA, and many haven’t made the connection with FTX.
I think EA’s brand has mainly been damaged among what you could call the chattering classes. But I think that is a significant cost.
It’s also damaged in the sense that if you search for it online you find a lot more negative stuff now.
On the question about comparisons, unfortunately I don’t have a comprehensive answer.
Part of my thinking is that early on I thought EA wasn’t a good public facing brand. Then things went better than I expected for a while. But then after EA actually got serious negative attention, it seemed like the old worries were correct after all.
My impression is that many (almost all?) face large scandals eventually, but it doesn’t always stick in the way it was sticking with EA.
It’s fairly different, but I’ve been moderately impressed with political PR groups. It seems like there are some firm playbooks of how to respond to crises, and some political agencies are well practiced here.
I think, in comparison, there was very little activity by EA groups during the FTX issue. (I assume one challenge was just the legal hurdles of having the main potential groups be part of EV).
I get the impression that companies don’t seem to try to respond to crises that much (at least, quickly), but they definitely spend a lot of effort marketing themselves and building key relationships otherwise.
Thanks for writing this!
Are there examples of brands which you think have held up better to their own scandals? You say “it’s unclear EA’s perception among the general public has changed (most of them have still never heard of EA)” which seems to imply that EA held up quite well, under the definition I would most intuitively use (perception among the general public).
First to clarify, yes most of the general public haven’t heard of EA, and many haven’t made the connection with FTX.
I think EA’s brand has mainly been damaged among what you could call the chattering classes. But I think that is a significant cost.
It’s also damaged in the sense that if you search for it online you find a lot more negative stuff now.
On the question about comparisons, unfortunately I don’t have a comprehensive answer.
Part of my thinking is that early on I thought EA wasn’t a good public facing brand. Then things went better than I expected for a while. But then after EA actually got serious negative attention, it seemed like the old worries were correct after all.
My impression is that many (almost all?) face large scandals eventually, but it doesn’t always stick in the way it was sticking with EA.
I’m also sympathetic to Holden’s comments.
It’s fairly different, but I’ve been moderately impressed with political PR groups. It seems like there are some firm playbooks of how to respond to crises, and some political agencies are well practiced here.
I think, in comparison, there was very little activity by EA groups during the FTX issue. (I assume one challenge was just the legal hurdles of having the main potential groups be part of EV).
I get the impression that companies don’t seem to try to respond to crises that much (at least, quickly), but they definitely spend a lot of effort marketing themselves and building key relationships otherwise.