Toyota Recall – Canadian bloggers need not post?

 I think by now we’ve all heard that Toyota has had a serious consumer safety problem with accelerator pedals.   The pedals would become stuck while driving, and caused the deaths of 12 people.  Toyota’s initial response was “just throw out the floor mats.”  

Needless to say this did not sit well with anyone….the media, consumers, and above all the blogging community.  After a public relations nightmare, the company agreed to recall 4 million vehicles in the United States.   If you go to the web site, you’ll see a link about the Floor Mat Campaign (still no mention of the word “recall” on the home page!).

On top of all of this, it seems that Toyota forgot to notify Canadian vehicle owners about the recall.  On November 19th a Canadian blogger commented that although a detailed letter was sent to 4 million US vehicle owners, nothing was been communicated to Canadians.   Although car sales have slumped across North America, Canada’s CBC news predicts that sales of Toyota products in Canada will approach 200,000 for 2009.  Still a pretty large number to risk injury or worse.

According to a statement by Toyota Canada,

“There is no risk of accelerator-pedal entrapment when compatible Toyota and Lexus Canadian-designed, all-weather floor mats are properly used in the affected models as they are different in design and material composition from the Toyota-supplied mats in the U.S.”

However, after even more bad online coverage by both the media and the blogging community,  Toyota did a complete 360 on its position of Canadian vehicles.   On November 27th, Toyota announced that the company will extend the recall to Canadaian consumers to fix accelerator pedals for 209,000 vehicles in the country. 

What went wrong?  Toyota’s failure to track online statements about the company caused a crisis situation to get worse.   Blogs are not limited by geography.  By missing the conversation, Toyota has seriously hurt its brand in the eyes of consumers across cyberspace.  

What went right? As blogs are open to the world, they create an open conversation about critical issues.   With pressure from a diverse mix of publics including consumer groups, the media, government, and bloggers, companies can be pressured to do the right thing.

Viral Video: What a Week for Hewlett Packard

Christmas time is here, and what better gift under the tree for the family than a shiny new computer?   Well, if you’re a representative of Hewlett-Packard (HP), this might not have been the most wonderful time of the year. 

I caught a story on CNN yesterday about the latest viral video.   In this case the video provides a problem for a company instead of the usual happy wedding dance or Susan Boyle’s latest musical number.

In the video, electronics store employees Wanda Zamen and Desi Cryer test out a webcam built into a HP computer.   One of the selling points of the product is facial recognition in which the camera will follow the users face.  In the video, Zamen and Cryer take turns in front of the camera.  The webcam follows Wanda Zamen (who is Caucasian) as she moves in front of the screen.   However, once Desi Cryer (who is African American) moves into the picture, the camera is still.   Facial recognition and motion ceases to work. 

With such an unusual product flaw, the pair decided to film the product’s shortcomings and post it on YouTube.  

Zamen and Cryer chose to make the shot film for amusement of friends and family.  In a statement on Mashable they remarked, “we thought the video was funny and decided to post it on You Tube. It was our intention to provide a good natured chuckle to our fellow man, and honestly we did not imagine that so many people would watch and react to the video.”

Wow.  That good natured chuckle has now been viewed by more than one million people.  The biggest problem?  The title of the video reflects one of the remarks in the film- “HP computers are racist”.

A sitation like this could have spelled disaster for HP, who did admit to CNN that e cameras may have issues with contrast recognition in certain lighting situations, which could prevent the product working for individuals with different skin tones.

 Instead of hiding its head in the sand, HP quickly reacted on its blog (The Next Bench), and posted a statement that “We would like to thank both of them for bringing clarity to the discussion via the (Mashable) statement they issued this week. I think it’s important for all of us to understand their intentions when they shot the video.  HP continues on by saying, “we invite you to continue to connect with us here on The Next Bench or on Twitter at @HP_PC. We assure you that we are listening.”

We’ve learned that HP’s product is far from perfect.   But by acting quickly and communicating to both Wanda and Desi, as well as the general blogosphere the company may have survived a public relations disaster.   As a result, HP may still have a happy holiday after all.

New media: an internal business communication tool

Well folks, it’s been too long since my kickoff launch of my blog.  No excuses, but with a couple of large projects, a 40-50 hour work week doubled in hours, thankfully only for the short term.

As a part of my first post, what better option to consider than methods for effective time management with social media.    By looking internally first, an organization can build an internal structure to allow for increased dialog and information sharing within a business.

Time is a precious commodity, and how organizations manage it has a great impact on their bottom line.    Effective and efficient communications become even more critical in today’s down economy, as organizations are doing more with less.  

The diagram below points to how social media can be used for targeting consumers, and it is my suggestion that this model may have value on internal use within a business first.   If engagement is an objective of Social media, why not look at it as a tactic for engaging employees?   For example, a blog can be a resource to quickly share information.      By creating an online forum for frequently asked questions (FAQ’s) and methods for internal posts and updates by staff, resources can be posted to allow for efficient distribution of information.  

Source: Awareness Networks, 2009

It’s a reality.  Social media is here to stay.  As marketers, we are expected to be familiar with the content and tools available and analyze them for their value in which to spend resources.   By looking internally first, we may be able to re-energize employees during the downturn.   

p.s.  Expect more posts daily.  Again, my apologies for being MIA. Also, better things ahead:   I got engaged this weekend.  Who knew that was coming?!