When the Media Turn Against Your Company

WyzeWhen Wyze Labs first launched its smart home WyzeCams in 2017, they were wildly popular. But since then, the company has gotten a black eye from security issues, buggy hardware updates and a lack of customer support.

It has gotten so bad that Wyze Labs was recently called out by Wired (owned by the New York Times), as the company’s home cameras are no longer being recommended. Other media outlets also have stopped recommending WyzeCams.

I have personally experienced these issues. After one hardware update made one of my cameras stop working, I no longer updated my cameras altogether. Another one of my cameras had an issue that no one at Wyze Labs would address (like many other companies, Wyze Labs relies on a peer forum in which users answer each other’s questions). Even after performing numerous factory resets on the camera, I ended up having to throw the camera away.

What’s worse, Wyze Labs has not contacted its customers to inform them of the recent security issue in which users could see other users’ camera feeds. I guess that’s par for the course for Wyze Labs, which was aware of a security vulnerability FOR THREE YEARS but didn’t tell customers.

Is it possible for a company to bounce back from a major hit to its brand reputation?

Yes, and like in any crisis PR scenario, it’s not only what the company says, but it’s always what it does. The company must:

  • Acknowledge the situation,
  • Explain how it will address the situation,
  • Apply its solution, and
  • Explain how it will prevent similar situations from happening again.

At the same time, the company must express remorse for its actions or lack of actions, and it must express sympathy toward its customers.

Wyze Labs has too many competitors on the market (e.g., Ring, Blink, etc.) to continue to sit idle. Time will tell if it takes action.