Type ‘Kardashian’ into your search engine and see the screen fill with page after page of drama and news. The family’s popular TV series ‘Keeping up with the Kardashians’ has made them household names.  Their popularity is also helped by their very active social media accounts, which keep them constantly in the limelight.

While you might not like the Kardashians, you have to admire how they have captured the national obsession with fame and utilised this to their benefit: becoming famous for…being famous.

The well-known quote ‘hated, adored, but never ignored’ summarises their approach to a tee. With matriarch Kris Jenner at the forefront of the empire, they’ve created a business enterprise, which has profited greatly thanks to the family being so PR savvy.

However, what are the consequences when it all goes wrong?

Last week, Rob Kardashian, Blac Chyna’s now ex-boyfriend, created a scandal on Instagram by publically outing his girlfriend as a cheat and exposing personal message and images. While we all love a good online scandal, the results for Rob included his Instagram page being taken down and legal charges potentially brought against him for releasing explicit images of Chyna. We can only imagine the panic of his PR team (and his mum) at the realisation of his online outburst.

With the digital boom, social media channels have become one of the main ways for organisations to share news and relevant content with their audiences. PR teams are responsible for creating a positive impression of their clients, but what happens when this is taken out of their hands?

The power of social media in distributing news and changing public perceptions is truly remarkable. Within 15 minutes of the pictures being posted by Rob Kardashian on Instagram the images had already received nearly twenty thousand likes.  The speed of this demonstrates how quickly messages can resonate across various demographics and countries.

With this in mind, it’s clear to see the importance of companies having crisis communications strategies in place to effectively deal with unexpected disasters or unexpected events that may lead to unfavourable publicity.

Got yourself into hot water? Get in touch with the team at JAM on 0161 850 0565 to see how we can help out.