Strengthening corporations’ crisis readiness: the roles of corrective communication, employee backup and social media influencer in debunking crisis misinformation

Purpose Misinformation targeting corporations is on the rise nowadays, often leading to significant reputation crises. Effectively addressing crisis misinformation has therefore become a critical focus for both public relations research and practice. This study aims to explore how corporations strengthen their crisis readiness to mitigate the impact of misinformation. Design/methodology/approach An online experiment was conducted to examine the effects of varying crisis misinformation management strategies (corrective communication by the corporation vs employee backup vs social media influencer (SMI) vs control group) on perceived crisis readiness, belief in misinformation and corporate reputation. Findings Results suggest that employing a denial strategy, leveraging employee backup and partnering with a SMI reduced belief in misinformation and enhanced corporate reputation through perceived crisis readiness. Originality/value The study is novel in integrating READINESS frameworks into the context of crisis misinformation. It provides in-depth insights for crisis managers to involve multiple key personnel such as the corporation, employees, and its associated SMIs in a cohesive strategy to enhance perceived crisis readiness to combat misinformation.