Ford
Ford Motor Company spent a reported $60 million on a multi-media campaign called Ford Bold Moves.
The campaign's promise: Bold Moves puts you at the heart of the story, letting you engage, debate and get involved in what's happening at Ford right now.
Having seen what happened when Chevy Tahoe sponsored an earlier social media campaign and lost control, Ford tried to maintain total control of its message.
Ford's Bold Moves site
Ford's sales are in the toilet; Toyota is whipping its butt; The company is in debt up to its gonads; and its stock has been downgraded to junk. So if there ever was a time to "rip out the BS," this would be it. That's what Mark Fields, Ford president of the Americas, promised the company will do in Bold Moves. The Future of Ford.
And they did… in a big company, old media, ad-agency's-idea-of-social-media-marketing sort of way. What they produced, in 30 episodes, is an advertorial with little or no solution to Ford's dismal problems. The response? A great big yawn from blogs and mainstream media alike.
Ford Bold Moves veered off its stated bold course and became a very glorified PR effort promoting big engines and fast cars. And community buzz continued its self-congratulatory path. It surely wasn't the promised paradigm shift to transparency or customer involvement.
Why spend all this money on Bold Moves? Why not just ask your customers, "What are your suggestions for turning Ford around?"
And then listen, respond and change. Rinse, repeat.
