Medecins Sans Frontieres: Social media lessons from the Haiti crisis

By Silvia Cambié

When an earthquake of catastrophic magnitude struck Haiti on 12th January this year, Médecins Sans Frontierès (MSF) was quick to realise that this disaster was no ordinary humanitarian crisis.

MSF had been working in the slums of Port-au-Prince for 20 years and, with a strong presence of 400 staff, was one of the largest humanitarian organisations present in the country. However staff and patients were now missing and people were turning up in the thousands to what was left of their medical facilities.

“We knew this disaster would be a very big news story, and we were in the eye of the storm,” remembers Siân Bowen, International Managing Editor at MSF International in Geneva.

Adopting social media

For the last 2 years, Bowen has been helping MSF to consolidate their image and review their branding. Prior to the Haiti crisis, the organisation had experimented with Facebook, YouTube and Flickr by setting up accounts on these platforms but had not fully embraced them yet.

With Haiti, the situation called for a tool that would help MSF communicate fast while conveying a sense of what was happening on the ground. It was no time for relying on traditional media. MSF knew social media would do the trick.

Embracing Twitter

“We decided to just go for it,” says Bowen. “We sent in communicators by day 2. They started tweeting, tracking what people were saying and using social media to send out bite-size chunks of immediate information.”

That’s when MSF experienced what Bowen calls “public lobbying in real time.” When their planes weren’t allowed to land due to the restrictions enforced by the US military, MSF sent out a press release. A strong tweet on @MSF_USA went with it: “Doctors Without Borders Cargo Plane With Full Hospital and Staff Blocked From Landing in #Haiti http://bit.ly/6H2srP”. This message was retweeted by hundreds.

NBC news anchor Ann Curry’s retweet was picked up by @usairforce, which was quick to answer “@AnnCurry We’re working it right now. More to follow…” By the end of the day, the US military would give MSF permission to land its planes as proudly announced by @usairforce: “RT @MSF_USA: Doctors Without Borders cargo plane finally lands in PoP #Haiti. 2nd plane to arrive 3pm Plz RT.”

This example demonstrates how social media is turning press releases into public lobbying tools. Bowen however believes that “this should not become the modus operandi every time you send out a news release.” The secret is to use this approach sparingly and only when it really counts.

Stepping outside their traditional footprint

The group blog Boing Boing had not been high on MSF's social media list. The situation changed dramatically when a photographer with no relation to the organisation went to a location near Port-au-Prince and shot photos while a large inflatable hospital with 300 camp beds was being assembled. Fifty photos in a time lapse were uploaded on Boing Boing. MSF found out about the post through Twitter and quickly posted a link to it on its site. The inflatable hospital story quickly turned into big news with reports on BBC and CNN. Celebrity magazines like OK! soon chimed in. Suddenly, new audiences were discovering MSF. 

Filling the triangle

To Bowen, a successful social media strategy looks like a triangle. “At the base, you have your web site. Then you want to add your audiovisual with YouTube, Boing Boing and Flickr. But Twitter will always be at the top.” The triangle needs to be filled with topical and interesting content. “If it is not full, it will collapse.”

MSF’s social media work led to a 3,000%-increase in the usage of its site. A large number of these visitors came from the US and Canada which share a time zone with the troubled area. MSF was able to raise US$ 90 million in six weeks. So far, US$ 50 million have been spent to help the 300,000 Haitians who were seriously injured by the quake and the 1.5 million who lost their homes.

Small team, big impact

“What amazed us is how few staff you need to make a big difference with social media,” says Bowen. MSF employs more than 26,000 people worldwide, which makes them the largest global medical organisation. Yet, only six people were working on social media during the crisis, with two on the ground in Haiti. “A lean and mean team meant we kept people on track without contradictions.”

Good internal communication was also essential in order to coordinate the messages of the different parts of MSF around the world. The organisation works in a decentralised, federal way with no headquarters to kick off initiatives. Whoever is on the ground takes the lead operationally.

During the Haiti crisis, the Canadians and Americans would take over from the Europeans in a 24-hour communication cycle. Every time a myth developed, it had to be addressed in real time. Mythbusting messages like “Healthy dead bodies do not spread disease” and “Cholera takes time to come about” helped to reduce hysteria and take people back to the facts.

Communicating with NGOs

Bowen’s advice to companies that want to engage with NGOs is to first study the organisations they want to advocate and link into their existing social media. “Dip your toe in the water. Leave a comment on their blog or social networking site.” This is likely to generate a big-fish-little-fish effect. Engaging with NGOs through the web enables corporations to become part of bigger networks and identify trends and conversations that are developing online.

Miss Disaster

Before working for MSF, Bowen completed stints at Plan International and the NHS, making her no stranger to humanitarian communication. In fact, she was even nicknamed “Miss Disaster” at the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent in Geneva having worked for 4 years handling tsunamis, earthquakes and hurricanes.

Next up for Bowen will be a position at the International AIDS Society where she will be working as their new Senior Communication Manager. Bowen is set to join the organisation in September.

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About Silvia Cambié

Silvia Cambié is the author of “International Communications Strategy”, nominated for the FT Goldman Sachs Awards. She is based in London, where she consults organisations on strategic communication and social media. Silvia blogs at X-Culture and is read by an audience of 11,000 each month.