"It captured on tape the deaths of four people in an uncontrolled acceleration where the driver was an experienced highway patrol officer. If he couldn’t bring the car under control, who could?"
- CLARENCE M. DITLOW, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety in Washington, on a fatal crash that raised awareness about problems with many Toyota models, New York Times
As Toyota recalls millions of cars around the world, Toyota’s executives are running to traditional media outlets, publishing full page ads in major newspapers and appearing on “The Today Show” in hopes of calming their customers and quieting their growing bad rap. While using traditional media for reputation management can be effective in creating a sense of public urgency, in today’s web 2.0 landscape the majority of Toyota’s customers are online with their very own publishing platforms--sharing their worries with the world. If Toyota wants to effectively communicate with their customers, they will need to meet their customers online.
For Toyota, it is of the utmost importance that they respond to their customers concerns immediately. However, by communicating with their customers through traditional media like television, newspapers and magazines, Toyota is creating a one-way channel for communicating at their customers, not with them. Instead, if Toyota wanted to effectively manage their crisis, they could launch a social media campaign that would allow them to not only communicate with their customers and more importantly, allow customers to communicate with them. By meeting customers online, Toyota could turn their crisis situation into an opportunity and build clear channels of communication with the public, improving their relationship and calming the fears of millions of car owners.
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