RonAmok!

Dec 17, 2008

Ford, Fansites, and Firefighting

On December 9, 2008 at 6:10 p.m (EDT), Jim Oakes, administrator for a fan site called The Ranger Station posted to the group’s message boards saying that TRS is being attacked by the Ford Motor Company. Within two minutes the first response came in. Over the course of the day, 916 more posts flooded that thread, with all sorts of angry responses to the big bad Ford Motor Company who was obviously picking on a loyal 10-year old fan site. 22 hours and 26 minutes later, Jim Oakes posted Our (my) Agreement With Ford (remedy) to announce the resolution.

Frequently when an event like this happens, we acknowledge how well it was handled, perhaps write a blog post or record a podcast about it, and then collectively move on to the next example. This case contains too many of the subtleties of New Media to do that – subtleties that are frequently overlooked by executives who want to bring similar capabilities into their organizations. Therefore, I’ve spent the past week diving into the details to create a case study about it called:

The Ranger Station Fire: How Ford Motor Company Used Social Media to Extinguish a PR Fire in Less Than 24 Hours.

If you like it, please pass it onto a corporate executive near you!

Tags: Ford Motor Company Ford Twitter Scott Monty ronamok New Media Evangelist The Ranger Station Fire

Filed under: New vs. Old, corporate, transparency

Mike Kilroy

Nice, thorough reporting, Ron. I could almost hear the clock ticking on the time bomb that was defused.

Kwam

Very thought provoking as usual, Ron. Think how much potential embarrassment Ford was saved by the quick firefight. If the MSM had gotten hold of it....

Bryan Person

Nice recap, Ron, and I plan to point to this presentation/case study often as an example of how brands can properly engage with fans/key stakeholders through social channels.

One technique Scott used that was also helpful was hashing most/all relevant tweets with #Ford. Others picked up on it and did the same. This made it much easier to follow the story (on search.twitter.com) across multiple Twitter accounts.

BTW, Ron, good to see you in Phoenix a couple of months ago. Hope to meet up again in 2009. Merry Christmas!

Bryan Person | @BryanPerson
LiveWorld

ronploof

Mike: Thanks. I was going for a Grisham novel:-)

Kwam: Had this problem been run through normal PR chanels, it would have gone to the MSM...and who knows what would have happened then.

Bryan: Thanks, and excellent point about the hashtags. The approach I took with regards to this case study was from that of those outside the fishbowl. I was trying to execute a delicate balance between the technological details and their relevance to business. To me, hashtags are a more advanced topic to cover for my intended audience. Very valuable -- yet without an understanding of the basics, have little meaning.

But of course, now that we have the Ford lesson under our belts, we can have a 201 class that involves hashtags!

Mia

This really helped breakdown EXACTLY how social media was used and how it benefited FORD. Nice job explaining how a social networking employee might benefit a business beyond brand recognition.