I’ve carried on a bit in the past about how Saab could make great use of the current trends towards online social media. Saab’s ownership base seems to be quite media and internet savvy.
There’s some great online resources for Saab enthusiasts. Whether it’s history, specs, performance, culture…whatever you’re after can be found somewhere online. The sites are all well indexed and ranked by search engines and with the exception of The Saab Network, all seem to be happy to link to other sites. You get a great initial resource and links to more.
My recent interest in Alfa Romeo has proven to be very frustrating from this point of view. There are resources out there, but many are years old and you’re not confident of being able to ask questions if needed.
That’s one side of online life. The sites are maintained by enthusiasts for the enthusiast audience. The side that’s just starting get tapped by some companies, the side that Saab have barely tapped at all, is the corporate blogging and social media side.
I’ve written about this before and yes, I know that a corporate site would impose limitations, but check this out.
Alfa Romeo have recently launched a blog for their new compact car, the MiTo, and it’s doing some of the things that no other company sponsored and constructed site has done yet - some of things I’ve implored Saab to do in my previous posts here.
The asks you to register in order to comment. This gives the company a definite point of contact with the visitor. You have to use a real email address to comment as you’re asked to confirm your registration via an email they send to that address.
Alfa have already engaged the public in order to name the car (though they over-rode the result and called it MiTo instead of the public’s choice - Furiosa). They’ve also had a recent vote on the site to decide the font work for the badge on the car.
Comments are encouraged and right now with the MiTo in launch stage, they’re also rewarded. Alfa Romeo are selecting various commenters, based on location and participation, to cover various bits of the MiTo’s introduction.
For example, here’s some video of one of their MiTo visitors at Centro Stile, Alfa’s design studio. It’s fairly short and it doesn’t reveal a whole lot, but the interest on the MiTo site in being selected for experiences like this is quite pointed.
There’s almost three thousand people signed up for the MiTo site already and word is only just starting to get around. Knowing how these things work from the TS map, etc, there’s probably ten times that number that are perusing the site from time to time each day.
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Just in case you think it’s just me riding my hobby horse with all this, check out Bob Lutz in this interview on the rise of social media.
He’s an advocate for it and likes the way he can set the story straight when a writer gets the story all wrong. It’s not just an accountability tool. It’s a chance for meaningful interaction between the company and the customer. It’s a chance to reward the customer in the way Alfa are doing and have others learn from the experiences.
I try and do the same thing here, too, with press events that I can’t attend personally. It’s a great thing as people get to attend an event that they couldn’t attend otherwise, see the company machine in action and most importantly, get personal experience with the new vehicles. The person representing this site appreciates the opportunity and I appreciate being able to share the story here. Everyone’s a winner.
Saab already have an audience online. They have plenty of stories to tell and running their own interactive social multimedia site would be a very cost-effective way to get their message out.
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There’s some great online resources for Saab enthusiasts. Whether it’s history, specs, performance, culture…whatever you’re after can be found somewhere online. The sites are all well indexed and ranked by search engines and with the exception of The Saab Network, all seem to be happy to link to other sites. You get a great initial resource and links to more.
My recent interest in Alfa Romeo has proven to be very frustrating from this point of view. There are resources out there, but many are years old and you’re not confident of being able to ask questions if needed.
That’s one side of online life. The sites are maintained by enthusiasts for the enthusiast audience. The side that’s just starting get tapped by some companies, the side that Saab have barely tapped at all, is the corporate blogging and social media side.
I’ve written about this before and yes, I know that a corporate site would impose limitations, but check this out.
Alfa Romeo have recently launched a blog for their new compact car, the MiTo, and it’s doing some of the things that no other company sponsored and constructed site has done yet - some of things I’ve implored Saab to do in my previous posts here.The asks you to register in order to comment. This gives the company a definite point of contact with the visitor. You have to use a real email address to comment as you’re asked to confirm your registration via an email they send to that address.
Alfa have already engaged the public in order to name the car (though they over-rode the result and called it MiTo instead of the public’s choice - Furiosa). They’ve also had a recent vote on the site to decide the font work for the badge on the car.
Comments are encouraged and right now with the MiTo in launch stage, they’re also rewarded. Alfa Romeo are selecting various commenters, based on location and participation, to cover various bits of the MiTo’s introduction.
For example, here’s some video of one of their MiTo visitors at Centro Stile, Alfa’s design studio. It’s fairly short and it doesn’t reveal a whole lot, but the interest on the MiTo site in being selected for experiences like this is quite pointed.
There’s almost three thousand people signed up for the MiTo site already and word is only just starting to get around. Knowing how these things work from the TS map, etc, there’s probably ten times that number that are perusing the site from time to time each day.
——
Just in case you think it’s just me riding my hobby horse with all this, check out Bob Lutz in this interview on the rise of social media.
He’s an advocate for it and likes the way he can set the story straight when a writer gets the story all wrong. It’s not just an accountability tool. It’s a chance for meaningful interaction between the company and the customer. It’s a chance to reward the customer in the way Alfa are doing and have others learn from the experiences.
I try and do the same thing here, too, with press events that I can’t attend personally. It’s a great thing as people get to attend an event that they couldn’t attend otherwise, see the company machine in action and most importantly, get personal experience with the new vehicles. The person representing this site appreciates the opportunity and I appreciate being able to share the story here. Everyone’s a winner.
Saab already have an audience online. They have plenty of stories to tell and running their own interactive social multimedia site would be a very cost-effective way to get their message out.
