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Crisis Communications

By: Mistie Thompson | 09/28/2007

Laurie Mayers, MS&L - works with General Motors on crisis communications

• GM has several blogs - FastLane is most well known


• GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz is most popular blogger


• Have five-person blog team - meet weekly


• Recently started doing video blogging


• GM blogging under GM's Communications team


• GM Marketing is much bigger with a significantly bigger budget


• GM executive team knows blogging is long-term, brand-building initiative


• Forrester analyzed ROI of FastLane blog in 2006 - calculated 99 percent ROI in first year - methodology was a little interesting, but it's a great testament to blog power!

--First "crisis" - New York Times opinion piece by Thomas Friedman on GM's fuel price protection program, calling GM dangerous to America's future

• Steve Harris, VP of Global Communications for GM, wrote response on FastLane blog


• Before blogs, would have written letter to editor and/or called reporter - and GM did both, but NYT said letter to editor was too long and that they couldn't use word "rubbish" in letter - GM said forget it and blogged about the exchange with the NYT


• FastLane blog gets pickup on Drudge Report and many other media outlets


• NYT responds with another, longer Thomas Friedman column


• FastLane responds, acknowledging points of agreement with Friedman/NYT


• Very interesting exchange - shows how dialogue with the media has changed and taken the "backroom negotiations" out of working with media

--Second "crisis" - UAW contract negotiations/strike

• Very delicate situation - decided not to comment on blog while negotiations were ongoing other than this "Labor Situation" post that was closed to comments - only time in history of GM's blog that a post was closed - didn't want to invite blog debate during sensitive time - wanted to let GM negotiations team do its job and not get in the way

--Blog comment monitoring

• GM monitors all blog comments - comments policy of no profanity, slander, etc. - publish 90 percent of comments - complaints from customers about specific vehicles sent to customer service for follow-up


• Legal team at GM hasn't gotten involved with blogs at all - courts just beginning to get into subject of blogs and comments


• On a few occasions, if blog posts are about especially sensitive topics, they'll be reviewed "up the ladder" - recent environmental position posts were reviewed

Posted in Crisis Communications, Social Media, Digital Communications, Issues and Crisis Management