Toyota's lost touch a social media opportunity

Toyota Lost Touch, Executive Says, says WSJ on July 22, 2009.

Toyota Motor Corp. got "a little bit lost" in its North American strategy and fell out of touch with customers and the market, its new North American chief, Yoshimi Inaba, said Monday...

"Our sense has been always that we listen to the market, we listen to customers, we listen to the dealer. That element is a little bit lost," Mr. Inaba told a group of reporters.

So here presents a most valuable social media opportunity for Toyota to listen and learn from its customers, lovers, haters, and indifferents. 

After all, as @gennyabouttown said recently: 

From my years in business not directly correlating with marketing of any sort, I have learned that I would pay almost anything to be able to find out what my customers are actually saying about me to their peers, beyond what they said to my face. I don't believe that it would be predominately negative. If a consumer has a bad experience they are 10 times more likely to tell people about it, but if they have a good one, they are 5 times more likely to tell people about it. But the good feedback holds more weight in the consumer mind than the bad feedback, which can be influenced by a lot of factors. You might have to sift through some irrelevant comments, but you would eventually be able to pick up on trends and progressions and get a better sense of the public's overall view of your company or product. Isn't that invaluable in itself?

Well said and how much would Toyota pay to know what their customers and potential customers are actually saying, and who is leading the influence in buying decisions, in hating influence, and in influencing decisions towards their competitors?

In other words a business-oriented, process-driven Social Media Assessment.

So not a market survey, not market research, not focus groups, but real live personal opinions being aired between real people in real conversation, and taking place now. Wow, that's gold alright.

Is Toyota and it's North American CMO too staid for social media, or unaware? No I don't think so in the least. I expect that they are fully aware:

1. They have a social media communications team led by Social Media Supervisor Scott Deyager who shares his experience in the transition from traditional media relations here;
2. Toyota has "clear communications objectives" for Twitter, which seem open and transparent;
3. They have extensive social web presence, as analysed in-depth in the Mindshare Report from the Social Media Academy.

However, what the Mindshare Report itself identified, points to the potential trend of loss of customer touch despite this social media presence, for example in relation to Twitter:

This risk (backlash against foreign auto makers) is exacerbated by the fact that “neutral” sentiment, measured at 34% towards Toyota is much higher than that of Ford, which is 28%. 

Unfavorable buzz could therefore shift that neutral sentiment in the other direction and negatively impact Toyota’s reputation and financial performance. 

Increased vigilance and more comprehensive, proactive, open engagement across a broader array of social media platforms like Twitter could help to mitigate this threat. Additionally, Toyota lags behind two of its key competitors, Ford and Honda, in terms of the requency & depth of customer contribution and participation as measured by number of posts and comment count.

It was also unclear how or if Toyota was monitoring feedback from MySpace, with 739,000 results for Toyota and its brands - some brands having 50,000 friends - or say Yahoo Groups with 1786 related groups with more than 95,000 members.

It is not clear if and how Toyota is monitoring or leveraging the feedback provided by some very passionate advocates.

So all in all the trend of disengagement seemed to be there, and despite the widespread presence in the social media the company was not effectively contributing and participating.

This was effectively detected, in advance, through proper process in a Social Media Assessment.

While this lack of contribution and participation in social media would not be the whole cause of Mr Inaba's problem of "losing touch" it certainly contributed to it, and it may reflect broader cultural issues affecting other customer-related activies within Toyota in North America.

The good news is that social media can play a very positive role in rebuilding the connection with customers for Toyota - with the right Assessment and planning and execution.

The Mindshare Report also gives some suggestions about how this can be done. But better for Toyota to take this on from the inside and with their vast knowledge of the business to craft a new plan for engagement.