Why proactive communication matters in an age of misinformation
For public agencies and organizations working on controversial issues, one of the most consequential communications decisions often happens before a controversy erupts: When should we start talking to the public?
There can be a natural tendency to wait. Wait until every detail has been worked out. Wait until people start asking questions. Wait until the project becomes news.
But communications research, as well as our own experience at Cook + Schmid, suggests there can be a significant cost to waiting. When accurate information is absent, an information vacuum can develop. And once misinformation fills that vacuum, correcting it can be much harder than communicating the facts in the first place.
Misinformation has a head start
A landmark MIT study published in Science examined approximately 126,000 stories distributed on Twitter by roughly 3 million people. Researchers found that false information traveled “farther, faster, deeper, and more broadly” than truthful information. False stories were 70 percent more likely to be retweeted, and false information reached 1,500 people about six times faster than truthful information.
The problem isn’t simply the speed at which misinformation travels. It is what happens after people have accepted incorrect information as truth.
A meta-analysis published in Communication Research examined 32 studies involving more than 6,500 participants and found that correcting misinformation does not necessarily eliminate its effects. Corrections were less effective when misinformation had been repeated or when more time passed between the original misinformation and the correction.
In other words, it is easier to establish an accurate understanding than to replace an inaccurate one.
That has important implications for public relations and community engagement. Waiting until misinformation gains traction puts an organization in the position of trying to undo an existing narrative rather than establishing an accurate understanding from the beginning.
The value of communicating first
Public-relations research reinforces the point.
Researchers studying a crisis-communication technique known as “stealing thunder” found that organizations benefited when they proactively disclosed potentially negative information themselves rather than allowing another source to reveal it first. Organizations that communicated proactively received higher credibility ratings.
An earlier study involving journalists similarly found that PR practitioners were viewed as more credible when they proactively disclosed information rather than waiting for journalists to learn it elsewhere.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has distilled a similar body of risk-communication research into three straightforward principles:
Be first. Be right. Be credible.
The CDC advises organizations to provide verified information quickly and to monitor and correct misinformation as it emerges.
For us, there is an important distinction here. Getting out first does not mean rushing out incomplete information or trying to manipulate public opinion. It means recognizing that if an organization with credible information does not participate in the conversation early, less-informed voices will.
Housing Matters: What happens when misinformation fills the vacuum
Cook + Schmid experienced this dynamic firsthand through our Housing Matters campaign for the County of San Diego Health and Human Services Agency.
Permanent supportive housing was intended to help people experiencing homelessness and mental illness establish stable lives. Residents received independent housing combined with support systems and services intended to help them maintain stability.
Yet before Cook + Schmid became involved, misinformation had helped define public perceptions of supportive housing.
Our research, which included interviews with County staff, neighbors, homelessness experts, supportive housing residents, and developers, found widespread misconceptions. Some residents envisioned supportive housing as essentially a homeless shelter. They feared people experiencing acute psychiatric crises would loiter outside, crime would increase, trash would accumulate, property values would fall, and neighborhoods would become less safe.
Those perceptions had real consequences. Community opposition became so intense that one proposed development was abandoned before completion.
But the image driving the opposition did not accurately reflect permanent supportive housing. The developments provided independent homes combined with services intended to help residents maintain their recovery and stability. Research examined for the campaign also showed that supportive housing did not produce the feared effects on crime, property values, or surrounding neighborhoods.
The challenge, therefore, wasn’t simply opposition. It was opposition built in significant part on an inaccurate understanding of what was being proposed.
Changing the information environment
Housing Matters was designed to change that.
Cook + Schmid developed a two-pronged strategy: educate San Diego County residents broadly about supportive housing while simultaneously conducting proactive outreach in communities where developments were planned or under construction.
Instead of waiting for controversy, we provided residents, community groups, planning groups, and the media with accurate information through fact sheets, FAQs, presentations, videos, direct mail, advertising, media relations, and a dedicated website. Testimonials put a human face on supportive housing by allowing residents to describe how it changed their lives and neighbors to describe their experience living near supportive housing.
The campaign ultimately generated more than 49 million advertising impressions and reached residents through television, radio, billboards, buses, bus shelters, print, online communications, and community outreach.
Most importantly, the results were measurable.
Awareness of supportive housing increased from 16 percent to 27 percent. The number of residents who could accurately describe supportive housing tripled. Support for locating supportive housing for people with psychiatric disabilities within a half-mile of respondents’ homes increased from 64 percent to 71 percent. A development that had already been encountering strong opposition was successfully completed, and the campaign records report that subsequent developments did not encounter neighborhood opposition during the campaign.
Ultimately, 12 permanent supportive housing projects were successfully built with minimal opposition.
Don’t wait for the rumor to become the story
Housing Matters taught us a lesson that has become even more important in today’s fragmented media environment.
Public engagement should not begin when opposition appears. Communications should not begin when misinformation starts trending. And accurate information should not be saved until somebody asks for it.
Organizations should anticipate the questions people will have, understand the fears and misconceptions that could emerge, and proactively provide credible, accessible information before speculation hardens into conventional wisdom.
That doesn’t mean organizations get to “control the narrative.” In a healthy public process, communities will reach their own conclusions.
But organizations can help establish the factual foundation on which that conversation takes place.
Because once misinformation takes hold, the communications challenge is no longer simply explaining the facts. It is persuading people to reconsider something they may already believe.
The best time to establish the facts is first: correct misinformation before it becomes misinformation.
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