Devoted to Managers and those that seek to improve their management skills

What happens when rumors hit the Internet or news, and they have a life of their own? Is there a way to manage them? Do we want to manage them?

The rumor that drumming great Travis Barker was found dead in his garage has been exploding around the Internet. You can read about it at bizofshowbiz (read first) and thealphamarketer.

The reason I bring it up here is to look at rumors from the point of view of management. Rumors, is many cases, can't be managed; at least until they slow down and people stop their interest in them.

Rumors do have power, whether they're good or bad; and if they're good, we obviously don't want to do much to manage them. Thing of the coverage and free marketing Travis Barker is getting (assuming he's alive) - which it seems he is as of this writing.

In that case, you wouldn't want to do anything to stop the rumors. He would even want them to continue to play out till they slow down, and then toward the end, let everyone know he's alive. That would generate a whole new buzz that would allow the story and coverage to continue even longer.

Travis Barker Drum Solo OCDP

The thing we can do for rumors is interject things to help guide their flow. Until the "rage" and interest slow down, you might as well try to stop a raging river as a rumor and gossip.

If it's bad stuff about us or our company, we may simply interject statements along the way that deny the rumor categorically, etc. Over the course the rumor runs, it then acts like a deterent that slows it down and takes some of the fun out of pursuing it.

Once you can get it slowed down, or it slows down itself, from there you can make longer and more specific statements that deflate it and cause a minor backlash to take the power and positioning it's received in the minds of people.

Even a rumor that is helping your company get a name can be guided in a similar way I've talked about for negative rumors. All you do there is reverse it and do everything you can to keep it going. You can even add little tidbits to the rumor, among many things, to keep the interest of people perked over a longer period of time.

Rumors can be managed, but most the time through little pushes and shoves, rather than attempts to stop them in their tracks of keep them going beyond what people can handle. Positive or negative, we can only interact in smaller ways then we would wish. That's simply the way the game is played.

The only thing we can do is shorten negative rumors and lengthen positive ones. Try anything else and it could backfire.