If a brand waits too long to respond to a potential social media crisis, it risks things snowballing quickly and getting out of control. But if it jumps in too soon, it may create much ado about nothing.

"Timing is important, but it's more important to be smart," emphasizes Zimmerman. "I'd rather be 12 hours later and have all my facts straight than just kneejerk." She references Dominos Pizza's reaction to a video of two employees doing unsavory things to pizza ingredients, which spread like wildfire on YouTube, as an example of a swift but smart response. "They got dinged a bit for their delay in response," she points out, "but I think their delay was 24 hours, which is almost a joke. I mean, give them a break." 

Carr cites an example of where jumping in too soon would actually have been detrimental for one of his clients. The client had tweeted about its "green" policy on Twitter, which resulted in some people tweeting that the client would be even greener if it didn't print so much literature about how green it was. While Carr and the client debated how to best respond, loyal customers within the Twitter community cracked down on those cracking down on the brand, quickly eliminating the problem, with no action required by the brand. "If it's not going anywhere, then you just let it die," Carr adds.

But, if letting the problem die out on its own isn't an option, how you respond, say our experts, can defuse or detonate the situation, which is why the next three guidelines are all about how your response should be crafted.