Ranked by Forbes as one of the top 10 influencers in social media, Ford Motor Company’s Scott Monty has been called “an unstoppable force of nature,” “the best corporate social media lead on the planet,” and “a visionary.” We had the pleasure of seeing Scott’s keynote today at NMX 2013. Here are some of the best quotes from his talk:
- “We had the ultimate confidence in our product and we had to turn it over to them. And that’s how trust is built. […] If you have a good product let go of your fear and let others tell your story.”
It doesn’t matter how good your marketing is. If you don’t have a good product, you won’t make money. But once you have a good product, as Scott noted, you need to let your fans talk about it online. Word of mouth is still one of the best (if notthe best) forms of marketing out there.
- “How do we know what they want and value if we don’t listen to them?”
Echoing something Amy Jo Martin said earlier in the day, Scott talked about how important it is to actually engage with your customer, not just broadcast your message. Poll your customers. Ask for their feedback. And above all else, show that you’re listening and that you care.
- “People want to be part of something bigger than themselves.”
Encouraging your fans to be a part of a bigger community helps to break down those barriers between customer and brand and instead just be on a level playing field, where everyone is just talking about something they love (like cars, in Ford’s case). Scott talked about how important it is to add that element of fun into what you’re doing so you’re not just selling, but also entertaining.
Want to see Scott’s entire session? All of our keynotes are being live-streamed and archived. Head over to NMX University to see our keynotes and additional bonus content live from the show.
About Scott:
At Ford, Scott heads up the social media function and holds the title Global Digital &Multimedia Communications Manager. He is a strategic adviser on all social media activities across the company, from blogger relations to marketing support, customer service to internal communications and more, as social media is being integrated into many facets of Ford business. Prior to joining Ford in 2008, Scott served as Consigliere for crayon, a strategic marketing firm,and with PJA Advertising + Marketing, a boutique BtoB agency. In addition to his professional responsibilities, Scott is an active blogger and podcaster.
He writes about the intersection of advertising, marketing and PR at The Social Media Marketing Blog (www.scottmonty.com) and also writes The Baker Street Blog and I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere, two literary undertakings. Scott has been featured in hundreds of news and business publications in print and on the web, in dozens of books, and on a variety of mainstream media, including NBC, NPR, CNN and The Wall Street Journal.
Scott is a recognized thought leader in the social media industry and frequently speaks at industry events. Scott received his Master’s in Medical Science from Boston University’s School of Medicine concurrently with his MBA from BU’s Graduate School of Management. He lives in Michigan with his wife and two young sons, golfs all too infrequently, and has a hidden talent for voiceover work.Oh, and one last little-known fact: Scott coined the Oxford Dictionary of English-accepted term “tweetup.”
Why is he called a top social media influencer?? I know at least 50 other people with more influence!
I could have done without the cheesy contest and engaging the audience as if we are all potential new Ford Focus owners.
The lesson from Scott’s speech is to just be a little more innovative and out of the box than your direct competitors.
What Ford did in its Ford Focus Campaign was actually the traditional model of “Throw money at a big cliche celeb (Ryan Seacrest), add some mediocre but entertaining humor, feature a talking puppet to get kids’ and young males attention, add a little sexual humor for a dose of mild controversy, apply it to a different platform than television” and BAM! you have a viral audience. Fortune 500 companies are not necessarily cutting edge, they’re just finding new ways to sink their big budgets strategically and more effectively through social media, and that is a good take-away for those who are truly innovative at this conference. It shows that industry needs innovators for truly original content yet will still continue the old tried-and-tested, cliche marketing formulas.
There were some good nuggets from Scott’s experience which made the Keynote speech entertaining, but it was not wholly relatable to the audience in which he was addressing.
Sorry you felt that way, Ingrid. I should clarify a couple of things, though: Ryan Seacrest was part of the Fusion campaign; the puppet was for the Focus. And the Fusion campaign was a transmedia effort, which is very different from the traditional model. I probably didn’t do it justice in describing it because of the brevity of that portion of the talk, but it was actually very different.
For anyone who has worked at a large corporation (and I’ve worked for a few and been a consultant at others), you know how hard it can be to do anything different. Internal politics, fear of failure, and CYA behavior runs rampant. I was impressed by Scott’s presentation and the different things that Ford has done. Great job to Scott and team for pushing forward with new (and borrowed) ideas.
I think It is always a good sign when you do a keynote like Scott did and that you have people commenting… “It is so easy that I would have been able to do it my self” or “I would have done better” (especially when it’s from someone with a total of 26 tweets). That only means that you did so well at “Vulgarizing” your content that even the idiots were able to understand it! 😉
I think Scott’s keynote was great for 2 main reasons :
1) He had great case study to show us (what worked and what didn’t work)
2) Gave us the lessons learned from those campaigns. And those were lessons that we can all apply to our day to day practice.
Some will say that he talked about Ford the whole time (at least he didn’t talk about something he didn’t know!!) but he never sold me a car by talking about the fabulous features, and didn’t gave me a phone number to call to buy a Ford (like another “keynote” did!!).
For me it is the best exemple of “How to sell without selling”.
Cheers all!