FIR Interview: Catching up with GMnext - February 23, 2008

GMnextIt has been six weeks since the launch of GMnext, General Motors’ ambitious communication effort aimed at tighter integration into the social media space and earnest, comprehensive engagement in conversation with customers and other constituents.

In this FIR Interview, Shel Holtz talked with GM’s Scot Keller and Christopher Barger about the initiative’s first month-and-a-half, lessons learned, surprises, things that have gone as expected and reaction from mainstream media and the blogosphere. They also provide insights into events that followed the activist takeover of the comments section of four user-uploaded photos.

About our Conversation Partners

Scot KellerBorn and raised in Southern California, Scot M. Keller is a third generation car executive whose career spans 25 years. He has broad based experience in automotive marketing, communications, motor sports, heritage, and brand management with brands including Alfa Romeo, Audi, Chrysler and Jeep.

In 1999, Scot joined General Motors Corporation where he currently holds the position of Director Communications GMnext. In this capacity, Scot directs the corporation’s day to day activities around the global centennial celebration and GMnext digital experience. He also has responsibility for GM’s Heritage Communications directing the corporation’s involvement in key events including The Amelia Island and Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegances.

Scot currently resides in Grosse Pointe Park, Michigan with his wife and two children.

Christopher BargerChristopher Barger is Director, Global Communications Technology at General Motors, and leads the company’s social media communications efforts.

Christopher is responsible for setting General Motors’ communications strategy in the emerging social media that make up “Web 2.0” (blogs, wikis, podcasting, user-generated content, social network engagement, and others). His team coordinates and counsels authors for GM’s corporate blogs (FastLane and FYI), builds and manages GM’s relationships with influential voices from across the social media landscape, and develops new social media resources for GM content and information.

Prior to joining General Motors in mid 2007, Christopher held a similar position at IBM where he was involved in such ground-breaking work as the investor relations department’s ”IBM and the Future Of…” series of podcasts.

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If you have comments or questions about this podcast, or suggestions for future interviews, email us at fircomments@gmail.com; or call the Comment Line at +1 206 222 2803 (North America) or +44 20 8133 9844 (Europe); or Skype: fircomments; or comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR; or at Jaiku: fir.jaiku.com. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

This FIR Interview is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years. Information: www.ragan.com.

Podsafe intro music - On A Podcast Instrumental Mix (MP3, 5Mb) by Cruisebox.

Posted by shel on 02/23 at 02:22 PM

  1. My day job is the EVP of Engineering and Operations at company here in SIlicon Valley (the name of which I won’t mention here) that runs online communities for Fortune 100 companies. I really enjoyed this episode and recommended it to the senior staff here. It was a very familiar story about the advantages but also the hassles with running online communities. I thought that GM handled the feedback and the controversy around their site well. This is the kind of behavior we recommend to our clients. Well done.

    Posted by Chris (Amateur Traveler podcast)  on  02/26  at  03:45 PM

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