Perception management becomes particularly important in crisis situations. Public perception was important in industries recovering from product tampering related deaths in the 1980s, or the e. coli outbreaks at Jack in the Box restaurants of the 1990s. Resort industries deal with them all the time when someone drowns in a pool or dies on a ski slope. People rarely act on raw facts alone, but on how they interpret those facts and understand their personal implications. The same applies to information processed through any human senses.
Perception management in its finest application does not mean falsifying or concealing facts, but arranging their presentation so that subjects prioritize and interpret them as intended. Ideally, perception management also shapes people’s understanding of what others say as well. This presentation can include choosing specific words over others, or creating an environment that makes target markets more amenable to your message.
Governments and businesses have long practiced perception management intuitively. For example, Abraham Lincoln’s issuing the Emancipation Proclamation on the heels of Union victory at Antietam had less to do with actually ending slavery than with keeping England — which had already outlawed slavery — from getting involved in America’s civil war.
However, perception management was not a defined practice then. That began in the 1950s with the military. The military intentionally lies — or provides misinformation — in its perception management strategies. As businesses picked up the military pattern for managing perceptions, that element remained intact at first. Spokespeople for the tobacco industry, as a major example, made it a point to smoke during filmed interviews. In these, they specifically denied any evidence that smoking causes Cancer. We know now that the industry intentionally suppressed study results to the contrary.
Under even normal circumstances firms need to know what Philip Kotler calls the four dominant psychological factors that direct consumer behavior: motivation, perception, learning, and beliefs and attitudes. Joel Garfinkle describes applying these in a four step process. First, you need to define how you think you are perceived. Second, find out through surveys and feedback how the public actually perceives your organization. Then, determine how you want to be perceived and finally decide how to implement that perception.
If perception management is not already a part of your organization’s risk management strategy, you start at a disadvantage. The difference between emergency perception management and routine application is preparedness. When a plane crashes or a chemical plant explodes, there isn’t any time to conduct surveys to assess the gap between your desired perception and the public’s actual perception.
All the data you gain in day-to-day marketing assessment needs incorporation in risk management plans. Contemporary risk management strategies regarding managing perception must now begin with avoiding disinformation. Consequences for getting caught lying now no longer outweigh the risk of trying it, and thanks to the Internet, the liklihood of getting caught has increased. Instead organizations now apply more subtle techniques that really put the art and science into managing perception.
Consider the advertising practice of showing young children alone encouraging one another to use new products, like Life cereal’s landmark, “He likes it! Hey, Mikey!” As long ago as 1981 a University of Georgia study established that young children respond well to peer influence on trying new products, and that ads showing child peers influencing one another in TV commercials have a similar effect as if real peers were involved (Stoneman & Brody).
There have also been some very misunderstood approaches such as the fad of subliminal messages. This was long misunderstood as including a message below the threshold of perception in some form of programming with the idea it would influence action. In fact, in 1993, Timothy Moore established that “subliminal” messages in that sense do nothing, but messages registering at the threshold of perception can influence behavior of those predisposed to it. Since then the most effective applications of the idea have been in two realms. Those are semantic infiltration and product placement. The latter was practiced effectively for a long time before such studies.
According to The Diamond Empire, a 1994 documentary on PBS’s Frontline, nearly a century ago DeBeers planned to make diamonds a “cultural imperative” in U.S. markets. They did it by making sure scenes of diamonds being given for engagement rings got placed in movies, and that
celebrities wore huge diamond necklaces in public appearances.
Semantic infiltration is most obvious in the use of the terms “Pro-Life” and “Pro-Choice” in the abortion debate. Its basic concept is that when one side in an argument can get the other side to use its own terms, then it has already begun altering the way opponents think. The “Pro-Choice” term emerged as abortion advocates, understanding that negative moods can create negative associations, chose to so define themselves to avoid a “Pro-Abortion” label. Abortion opponents, seeing the negative association with the word “abortion” now hurting their cause began using “Pro-Life” instead of “Anti-Abortion.” What they did not realize is that by doing so, they actually submitted themselves to their opponent’s agenda, and the result has been a polarity of public opinion benefiting “Pro-Choice” interests above “Pro-Life” interests.
Other valid psychological concepts applied in perception management include creating pleasant moods to enhance critical thinking, and negative moods when it helps to hamper it (Baumann & Kuhl, 2002). Occasionally it benefits perception managers to place one image before a consumer while they hear something different (Tiippana, Andersen & Sams, 2004), which makes them more amenable to a message they might otherwise reject.
Even leading a consumer’s gaze where desired can affect their openness to a way of thinking (Urry, 2010). All of these things, and more, need inclusion when planning perception management strategies as part of risk management. Keeping your eyes open for how constantly it
goes on around you can also help your own perception of how to apply it. In election years, it is particularly prominent, so often a part of the process that one of Gov. Mitt Romney’s spokespeople let it slip, referring to resetting the “Etch a Sketch” after the Republican
primary. It is so important that the election’s outcome could be indicated by whether “Romney Hood” or “Obamaloney” becomes a more commonly used term. Talk about semantic infiltration.
James Scott is the CEO of Princeton Corporate Solutions, a corporate globalization and political strategies firm. PCs offers a unique blend of think tank, corporate and governmental communication strategies to expedite the facilitation of long lasting relationship building in these necessary sectors.
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Perception Management: Crisis Management in Critical Situations
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