The Dealer Impact Blog

New Years Hours

Dealer Impact will be closed on December 31, 2010. Happy New Year!

GMs New Social Media Marketing Agency Is Staffing Up

It looks GM is putting some weight behind their Social Media Marketing.

Big Fuel, the New York-based agency that handles all of General Motors’ social media marketing, is opening a Detroit office to service the account and is on a hiring binge. Avi Savar, the CEO and founder of Big Fuel (pictured), said he has about 15 people on the ground in Detroit right now and is looking to double that number by March. The agency has another 80 people in New York and handles other clients including McDonald’s, Neutrogena and Colgate-Palmolive’s Wisp toothbrush. Savar said he hopes to have a staff of more than 200 by the end of 2011.

Big Fuel was brought on about three months ago. Previously, the agency had been gearing up to work with Hyundai, but when Hyundai’s lead marketer Joel Ewanick moved over to GM (after a short stint at Nissan), Ewanick persuaded Big Fuel to come over. The agency hasn’t executed any campaigns on behalf of GM yet, but Savar said a few are set to launch in January. This includes one for the Chevrolet Cruze called “Cruze-arati” that gives Cruzes to people who have big followings on social media.

GM’s social media marketing had previously been handled in house by, among others, Chris Barger and Mary Henige. The two were behind a program back in March in which eight teams of drivers/bloggers attended South By Southwest on GM’s behalf. GM’s social media marketing, however, has often been overshadowed by rival Ford, whose Scott Monty has more than 48,000 followers on Twitter. Ford also made a splash this summer when it introduced the Ford Explorer on Facebook and, in November, began circulating videos featuring celebrities like Snoop Dogg and Bret Michaels responding to consumers’ questions about the model.

via: Mashable

Holiday Hours

Dealer Impact will be closed on Friday, December 24 for the Christmas Holiday.

Social Media Success: 5 Lessons From In-House Corporate Teams

While implementing a successful social media campaign is something to celebrate, longer term, policy-based programs (which may not garner as much immediate publicity) can be even more rewarding.

Here we are highlighting five companies that have enjoyed long term success with their own social media teams and taking a look at some of the measurable returns they have seen as the results of their programs.

Key personnel from within the five companies below (in alphabetical order) have commented on their teams’ successes to offer you an insight into their various processes. Meanwhile, please be sure to let us know in the comments about any other companies that you feel should be recognized for having strong in-house social media teams.

Via: Mashable

Dell Has Some Interesting Twitter Sales Numbers

It looks like Dell is having great success with their @DellOutlet account.

Dell continues to be one of the more visible corporate behemoths actively using social media, and today they’re out with new numbers to demonstrate some of the success they are having.The company tells us that they’ve now generated a total of $6.5 million in revenue from their Twitter presence, where they have nearly 1.5 million followers on their @DellOutlet account (and 3 million “connections” across all social sites).

Via: Mashable