Case 1: GM’s many voices
General Motors created quite a stir when it launched its conversational initiatives in 2005, including the Fastlane and FYI blogs. Fastlane is decidedly focused on the vehicles, with brand fans and GM critics alike contributing ideas and asking questions. Posts are written by a number of GM folks, most notably Vice Chairman Bob Lutz. You’ll read about GM vehicles, racing, the auto business and GM best practices from a number of corporate executives and department heads, including the head of GM’s racing program.
The employee-authored FYI claims to be more news-focused, but has taken a turn toward encouraging enthusiasm for the various GM brands. You’ll see quite a few photos posted of people enjoying their Buicks, Pontiacs and Saabs. In fact, GM encourages people to help make photos easier to find by promoting a social tagging structure. Posters to Flickr and other such sites can tag their images with the tag "GMFYI" so that their photos and galleries can be identified with GM.
The company is doing a pretty good job of keeping the conversation going. From time to time, as conversations develop you’ll see GM personnel following up in comment threads. While GM isn’t yet to the point where all comments are addressed, you can see them making the effort. Going forward, it would be nice to see GM take ideas posted in comments and turn them into new threads so that customers can see how GM focuses on their ideas and criticisms.
