Category: Social media

The Fraste FS 250 drilling rig, which is manufactured in Italy, can be used to find aquifers located hundreds of feet underground.

This post was extracted from Liminal, 2011 Razorfish Customer Engagement Report which was recently released by Razorfish. It has been modified in part to make it more relevant for the Headlightblog.com audience.

In December 2008 Samir Balwani wrote a blog post about how Scott Monty, the head of social media for Ford Motor Company, stopped a Ford PR disaster. Balwani noted that Ford had taken a huge step in innovation and that the company’s foray into social media was to be applauded. His post kicked off with the assertion, “What many people don’t understand about social media is that it isn’t truly a marketing tool. Instead it’s a way to build connections with your customers, solve problems, and strengthen your brand.”

Earlier this month Mini USA posted to its Facebook page a video of its CEO, Jim McDowell, (who, I might add, is a former Porsche executive) challenging Porsche to a race on June 21, 2010. Porsche politely declined the offer, despite being re-challenged.

When I was checking @AJTheFiesta’s twitter stream the other day, I learned that AJ was hungry (“AJ needs food. (Fuel level is 24%)”), and was having a generally good day (“No rain…no pain! Current conditions: fair (day)”). For a split second, I forgot that AJ is one of two net-connected 2011 Ford Fiesta test cars on the roadtrip of a lifetime.

Editor’s Note: Headlightblog.com recently caught up with James Spahr, a UX Lead at Razorfish and pictured below, who has been working on the Mercedes-Benz USA (MBUSA) account since Razorfish was selected as the digital agency of record in January 2009. This past summer James worked on a mobile website for MBUSA as part of the agency’s work to support the 2010 E-Class launch. He was interviewed for Headlightblog.com by Kyle Outlaw, a regular Headlightblog.com contributor who is also a UX lead at Razorfish and one of the agency’s mobile subject matter experts.

Ever since the open source software movement started in 1998, businesses across all industries have learned the benefits of cooperative activity and collaboration. And with the recent growth of Web 2.0 technologies, cheaper creative tools and a cost-saving mentality forced by the recession, it is no surprise that there has also been a trend of leveraging the mass community -– crowdsourcing, as some call it -– to achieve business goals in innovative ways.

Next year, the Ford Fiesta makes its U.S. debut. The superefficient, sporty compact has proved enough of a success in Europe and Asia to draw the attention of American drivers, and their newfound thirst for all things small. It’s become an object of transatlantic envy — much of it expressed in online forums — since its launch late last year. In past years, such yearnings were likely to go unrequited. But Ford Motor’s “One Ford” strategy, which is pushing toward a single global lineup, means this small car will be navigating American roads in 2010.

In recent months, the automotive industry has quickly established a sizable presence on Twitter, the Web’s most popular micro-blogging service. A high-level review of its presence, however, reveals that – like many industries – it’s making the leap to the still newish communication venue with varying degrees of success. While some participants have taken to the medium swimmingly, it’s surprising how many treat Twitter almost solely as an opportunity for naked self-promotion, seldom or never engaging directly with their customers, providing customer support or other useful information.

Scott Monty heads up social media efforts for Ford Motor Company, an effort he began in July. In that role, he’s responsible for internal and external adoption of social media strategy to help improve Ford’s overall reputation. I sat down with Scott last month to discuss his approach, before what could only be categorized as an extremely active period for Scott.

It’s no secret that automotive marketers will be slashing budgets over the next year. Social media programs, often classified as experimental, may likely end up on the chopping block, but perhaps wrongly so. In 2009, marketers mustn’t drop social media all together in a recession; instead they should refine what social media means to their organization by adopting the following three strategies: