Scott Monty is head of social media for Ford Motor Company – here is his blog. 

Notes from session with Scott Monty at BlogPotomac (mainly direct quotes from Scott):

There is no greater crisis than for the auto industry at this time (how about that for a conversation starter…). Any good crisis is about taking a negative and turning it into a positive. 

What’s going on with Ford? – EX: last december – Ford was here in DC last December to show that we are all interconnected – “I was doing some serious digital hand-to-hand combating” – trying to add value on my end (Ford).  This really wasn’t any way to support our initiatives.  About 10 days after – www.therangerstation.com (a user site) – said that Ford was suing this site…$5,000 and hand over URL. Scott sent off emails internally to help gain an understanding – “I always turn to Twitter to pulse the first line of response” – just after the Motrin moms incident.

We obtained the facts and used a number of different tools and platforms to communicate these “facts” – I sent an email to the owner of the fan forum (www.therangerstation.com) – had a 20 minute conversation with him to make sure we understood our individual needs.

Lesson 1 – you have to monitor these platforms. Not every brand has this issue, but it is very important.

Lesson 2 – you MUST respond and invite them into the process to come to a conclusion with you – leverage this community.

Lesson 3 – have a digital hub where you can quickly post updates…and link to as many of the platforms as possible to help spread these updates.

What we did in early December we developed www.thefordstory.com. Constantly evolving and always under construction – this is our social media hub. A combination of Ford produced content and others content. What people are saying about you and your brand is so important.

Never before have such conversations been public. We know that people are going to go to other sites vs. ours (i.e., via Google). We want to make sure and capture others comments.

[Scott provided a great example of this with the Fiesta Movement example.]

I’m one person at Ford – finally hiring #2, we’ll see how that works out. 

The tools are irrelevant – they will always change – give people guidelines and a process to let people get out there and speak on behalf of the organization.

We have an online communications policy – our ethics statement: I will tell the truth, write accurately, correct mistakes promptly, never delete posts, stay on topic, disclose topics of interest, keep issues private…that are private (I’m sure I missed some of this…but you get it).

The goal – humanize Ford & our brand – we are trying to put faces to the blue oval and connect people with Ford employees and others with our initiatives.

Q&A Summary (Highlights):

Without senior-level support…any SM program will fail. It’s been an easy sell at Ford. I was used to doing the up sell but they were incredibly open to allowing me to do my thing. I’m within Corporate Communications but it shouldn’t sit there. You should apply this across all organizations, departments, geographic areas, etc. Show them how it is done & do it.

Become the world’s leading social media brand in auto – accomplished. Now our goal is to become the world’s leading social media brand…period.

I’ve often referred people to GM, Toyota, etc. It’s about providing value – not to sell cars.

Story: the desk was placed in the middle of the workplace for everyone to see whenever others were using this new technology (this was from the 1930’s and was the telephone). POINT: corporations have been resistent to change (technology change) since the telephone – email – Internet – and now social media.

Follow the stream of conversation about Scott and his session from Twitter here & here. Enjoy & please join this conversation!