GM: Poster child for the executive blog

Since General Motors began the GM FastLane Blog in early January, it's attracted considerable attention from business communicators. That attention has been sparked by who the bloggers are - senior corporate executives, starting with GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz. Links: GM Fast Lane Blog The blog's been under a continuous spotlight with a great deal of ongoing commentary recently on why GM hasn't been talking about broader issues, eg, corporate financials or employment matters. GM made it pretty clear from the outset that the primary purpose of the blog is to engage with customers and car enthusiasts about one topic - GM's cars. And they have stuck to that goal. Judging from the many comments to every post, that's what visitors want to talk to GM about. Indeed, just about the only comments that aren't about the subject matter of a particular post are those by communicators commenting about the blog or the podcasts. In a post yesterday, re-focused responsibilities. The answer is an unequivocal "yes." From its inception this blog has been a forum for GM's leadership to discuss important issues with a spotlight on product... product plans, product virtues and truths. In fact, I hope to see more GM leaders begin to engage in this conversation on the FastLane over the coming weeks. We hear your words loud and clear. We're redoubling our efforts to build great cars and trucks and we'll continue to talk about them, right here. What's especially impressive is here is one of the most senior and influential corporate leaders in any industry who clearly sees that his investment of time and energy into regularly and consistently writing in a public blog and engaging in dialog with visitors has huge potential benefits in building relationships with a wide range of very interested (and often vocal and critical) people. No matter what size organization, and whether commercial or not-for-profit, every CEO - and corporate communicator - should take a close look at the GM website). Get hold of a free copy of (PDF), a new white paper from PR group Intelliseek. That will give you some up-to-date evidence about the reach and influence of this new communication channel. Then you can say, "If Bob Lutz can do it, so can I." Neville Hobson is the author of the popular Crayon. Visit Neville Hobson's blog: