Your employees are your company

In the last post I talked about the relation between company and the media. How they communicate with each other, how the company shares information with researchers and if I talked about the web site’s structure to support and became information available to the media and audience.

As I said, Volvo’s web site is a good source of information about the company, what they are doing, plans, how they work and the list goes on. However is hard to talk about internal relations when you are not inside the company. Yes, I have someone ‘’close’’ to me that work in this company, but I put quotation marks, because this person, unfortunally, is in another country and the communication with her is not so easy.

But with those new tools that we all have to find information and to create content, I found some information about how Volvo works with their employees and also what kind of media they use to manage the relation with their staff.

The first thing that any company must do to have a good relation with their employees is diffuse the company’s culture, which is the internal brand of the company. The company’s culture will mold the way that employees will behavior and how will be their relation with the company. Also, the company must share this culture and advertise it.

Volvo has its own way to share the company’s culture with the employees. They create ‘’ The Volvo Way’’, which is a kind of recipe of how to be the best inside and outside the company. It is about how to do things that are the best for the company and the people who works by the employees’ side. In addition, this program provides and share information about the vision and values of the company, what is the function of each employee inside the company and another things to stimulate the staff to walk in the same way as the company and grown up together.

To share the ‘’ The Volvo Way’’, Volvo uses different medias around the globe. First of all, Volvo is a global company and brand, which means that what is said and done in Sweden, is the same that has to be done and shared here in US. For that Volvo uses a powerful intranet that provides to information, news, rules, announcements, and one of the most important things when we talk about relation between company and staff, the dialogue. In this intranet, employees can discuss and generate content about the company, clients, problems, solutions and subjects that can help the company and others employees to improve each day.

One example of interaction between the company and staff was a Jam that Volvo did with all stores ‘staff around the globe. Volvo created a game in which the employees must create a team and answer questions about the ‘’The Volvo Way’’ and another things about the brand. It was a game to see what was the employees’ knowledge about the company, brand, vision, values and other things that involves the day-to-day inside the company. To stimulate the staff, Volvo gave to the winning team a trip to Sweden and Russia, where the winners could participate of the last part of the Volvo Ocean Race and also know the HQ of Volvo.

I don’t have access about the information if Volvo has or not a internal blog, but I know that they have internal magazines, announcements (on line), news feed 7/24 for the employees and board. On one hand, I saw just an official blog that communicates with the external public; it’s a blog about Volvo’s environmental. On the other hand, their web site provides so much information about what is going on in the company that I can’t see a reason to create blogs and blogs about the group and brands that Volvo has. With this, Volvo can have the content’s control. And just to remind what I said in the last post, Volvo is present in different social networks with segmented profiles to establish dialog with their externals stakeholders.

Another topic of this post is about spokesperson and how companies can use this tool to personify the brand. Talking about Volvo, the company doesn’t have an advertisement’s spokesperson. Volvo doesn’t uses celebrities or characters to communicate with the target. I made a research about Volvo’s spokesperson and didn’t find anything instead of the official employee that is paid to speak for the company.

However in my opinion, use enthusiast kind of spokesperson would be the best way to have someone talk about Volvo in some segments that the company works with, like trucks, cars, rural equipment, sub divisions of the company which works directed with the final consumer. The company could use real people with real experiences with the brand to talk about those things and how the company is in their lives. The relation of Volvo and real consumers would be the best kind of show spokesperson to represent and personify the brand into the public’s mind.

Quase lá...

O tempo voou esse final de ano, nem parece que faz quase 4 meses que estou aqui e que daqui a poucas semanas estarei de volta a terrinha de ferias, para matar a saudade da familia, amigos e de um bom pagode. hahahahah

Foram meses de aprendizado, tanto academico como para a vida. No academico tive uma comprovacao que me deixou feliz, comprovacao que fiz uma ótima faculdade no Brasil e que essa me deu um grande suporte para esse mestrado aqui nos Estados Unidos. Quase tudo o que eu vi aqui foi o que eu aprendi dentro das salas de aula durante os 4 anos de faculdade. Mas dessa vez com muita mais leitura e base teorica para os trabalhos. Nas primeiras 4 semanas de curso, foram 4 livros e 4 grandes trabalhos.

Já na segunda parte do curso, houveram alguns problemas com a parte burocratica, mas tive um grande apoio de todos dentro da faculdade. A nova materia é satisfatoria e correspondeu ao que eu quero para o futuro dentro de grandes coorporacoes, pelo menos espero que assim seja. Na parte da vida, aprendi que somos mais resistentes e fortes do que imaginamos, pois se voce achar que chegou ao seu limite, tente ir mais além, eu vi e qualquer um que esteja lendo isso pode ter certeza, que nos fazemos nossos limites.

Agora é so aproveitar esse tempo aqui antes de aproveitar um fim de ano que promete. Recebi diversas noticias essa semana que me deixaram muito feliz, quero aqui parabenizar meu grande amigo Rafael Amaral que conseguiu alcancar um objetivo que sempre sonhou e projetou para sua vida, outra coisa é que desejo muita boa sorte para o WIRMO na nova caminhada e velha cidade dele, todos nos tempos grandes potenciais e Wirmo, as vezes temos que dar um passo para tras, para que possamos dar dois a frente.

Homenagens a parte, vou voltar a contar o que acontece aqui. Agora as coisas estao tranquilas, a minha aula esta quase no final e quase tudo esta terminado por esse semestre, tenho apenas uma meta ate o fim da minha estadia aqui, terminar as 4 temporadas de Prison Break (nerd) hahahahah. Ano que vem eu esperava fazer estagio em algumas empresas, mas nao tenho muitos contatos por aqui e o que pode rolar é um estagio no departamento de marketing da universidade, nos proximos dias ficarei sabendo se vou poder estagiar aqui ou nao. Mas nao pensem que é ruim, pois é uma universidade com reputacao e que gasta um bom dinheiro com marketing e campanhas de publicidade em Connecticut e nos estados proximos.

Esse post ja esta bem longo e eu vou parar por aqui, hoje é quinta-feira e acho que vai rolar alguma festa por aqui, tenho que ir...Abracos e beijos a todos ai no Brasil, vejo voces em breve!

Volvo and the relation with medias.

With the raise of new medias and on line medias a lot of concepts about how to do communication changed. In the past communication was a way with just on direction, from the company to the audience or from the issuing to the receptor. Once these new technologies came, business communication has changed and become a change of information and experiences.

However, old medias are still on the market and business still uses them. In an integrated communication, all medias must be used to get the target where it searches and consume information. But, audience doesn’t not just consume information anymore; they started to produce information with the new medias that came and corporations started to be, sometimes, content of this audience’s information.

A connection and one computer in power of any person can transform her into a journalist. This is called citizen journalism according to ‘’Digital Strategies for Powerful Corporate Communications; Argenti, Paul.’’, and once the  word is in audience’s hand, they want to be listen.

This is an introduction about what come next and why Volvo, as a global company, still uses old medias and how Volvo uses the new ones. To be easily to understand why they are still using old medias I have questions for you that are reading, who are Volvo’s target? Where are they? What are the medias that they consume? And there are a lot more to be a foundation for what comes next.

Volvo still uses old medias because they have different profiles of target, which can start sitting and driving a truck until an investor in Wall Street. The company can get in contact with the driver using Radio and with the Wall Street investor by his smartphone. This difference between targets is what makes Volvo’s communication use different approaches in different medias.

Of course that they must think how to use each media and always innovate, each media has a different way to produce and engage the content with the audience. Volvo uses TV, Radio, News and Magazines (external and internal), guerrilla marketing, events and also on line medias.

So, when Volvo produces content for traditional medias they also produces content for new medias once that these contents goes on line. Videos, spots, press releases, images, news used by Volvo are posted and archived into their web site and available for audience, stakeholders and also journalists.

This strategy of integrates contents between traditional and new medias make Volvo able to transmit and also answer their target.  It is the new relation between company and consumer. Any one is able to go to Volvo web site or in Volvo’s social networks profiles and talk with the company, as a personal experience, they will answer you, according to their polices and personality.

Integrating contents provides to Volvo’s stakeholders and the media one easy way to get information about the company. I’m talking about this new audience, which produces content and wants more and more information to be the foundation for new ones. This strategy of provides information to this new audience and to the media has been working. Based in my personal experience as a content producer, I had been able to find information and search about the company with the company provides me. With that, I could transform that information in this content that you are reading now.

It happens with the media; otherwise real journalists have access to more information and are treating in a different way, a way that goes on with the company and the media interests. 

Personality that is maintained in this strategy of integrated communication. One of Volvo’s visions is ‘creating value for customers in selected segments’’; this value is about creating trustable content for the consumers, stakeholders and media.

@Volvo

When I first saw this assignment and what it is about, I though ‘’ Oh my good, how am I going to do it from Volvo’s web site once there are so much information?’’ But reading more about the subject and the texts, I realized this inventory doesn’t have to be long, but consistent.

I’ll start by the questions about on line medias that the company uses. The first question is if Volvo uses social networking? Yes, Volvo is present in many social networks, at least the most used by their audience.

However brands and the Volvo Group, these two divisions, divide the company are present in social networks as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Linkedin, Dailymotion and Delicious. One interesting thing is that each segment of the brand has one profile in two or three of those social networks. Those profiles provide better communication and relation between the company and consumers.

Another kind of online interaction between company and consumer are the videos and photos that the company provides. In Volvo’s website, the section About Us, on the left side, there is one link called Videos. Clicking in this section the consumer can watch videos about the company, but that’s not most interesting. What are better are the division and the quantity of videos that each division has.

Group, History –Hybrids –Technology –Sponsorship – Environment Safety Our Employees, divides the video sections. Each section has many videos that explain and share information with consumers. Also in all sections there is a link to Youtube Volvo’s channel, where the consumer can find more videos and information.

About images, in news and media section the consumer can find images about the company. This section is also divided by sub sections whose are the brands of the company and the group. Doing that, the company can supply the demand and needs of their consumers focusing the consumer with what is interesting for him.

When I did the first blog post, I talked about mission, values, history and others subjects. One thing that a company’s history brings and makes is creating confidence for the consumer. With that said, the Volvo’s history has being creating confidence a long the years. In their web site, in my personal opinion, can’t be different. They must communicate true information about what is happening inside and outside the company and I don’t believe that Volvo or any other global company would post fake content in their web sites.

In addition, I hope that those information are real, otherwise all my posts for this class will be wrong and fake. Volvo’s web site is really useful for their consumers, I can say that because most of my information to write this and the past post where token from Volvo’s web site.

And I glad to have this source of information, what shows me that this web site and his sections have being making by professionals. The design, distribution, content and navigation are good all over the web site. It’s a clean and objective web site. They have a lot of information, but once you go to a section they make an introduction about the subject and if the consumer wants to go deeper, this can happen by doing one click.

This easy navigation provides also a good interaction between company and consumer, inside the web site there is a section called Contact Us. There Volvo’s stakeholders can find different ways to get in contact with the company, going in the same way with what the stakeholder wants to do.

The Contact Us’ section has different approaches, from the most simple on that the user can leave a message and e-mail, then the company will answer consumers message, until the phone number of physical installations of Volvo around the globe.

On one hand Volvo is not paying me to say all those things; I’m saying it as a professional of communication and marketing. Of course Volvo is not perfect and has a lot to improve, but I’m analyzing the web site and some of functions that it has. On the other hand, there are some aspects that I couldn’t be able to discover, like who created and manage the web site. However, I don’t have any doubt that the web site was created and is manage by professionals like us.

A brand called Volvo

In now days the uniqueness is something rare, but this is a problem or an evolution that has being happening since the Industrial Revolution. When the manufactory gave place to industries and mass production. Thousands products started to be produced in large scale and without difference between products of the same segment.

Henry Ford took his place in history when he used the mass productions with cars, a new kind of product, expensive and different of any kind of transport. Henry started to produce black and cheap cars in large scale. What made him and his company got the first place in sales at that time.

However, times changed and also the ways of produce and offer cars and others devices of transportation to an audience that wants more than transport and increases knowledge and desires each day. Companies now have to offer more than what his consumers need; they must offer what they want. And one thing that now days’ audiences wants is be the one, be unique.

I’ve read some examples about uniqueness that tells stories about regional products and services, that they are unique because there is only one, in one place in the world and no one can copy them. But how have uniqueness when you are a global company and lots of other company sell and offer the same products and services as you?

In my point of view if a company is global, it already has her uniqueness and took it from one place to the entire globe. Otherwise, the company must offer the uniqueness inside their products and offers services that no one offers, or if any company offers, is not the same as yours.

Volvo has been doing it for many years, always innovating their products and looking for give back what the consumers expect from the company. As Volvo says in your web site their uniqueness is based on “using our combined expertise to create transport-related products and services of superior quality, safety and environmental care for demanding customers in selected segments.”

This uniqueness happens also because their program of R&D, that allows Volvo to look for new technologies and now what are the new needs, desires of their consumers, stakeholders, society and the environmental.

In addition to this uniqueness, a company has to be authentic. But be authentic is not about be different, is be true and trustable.  In a connected world the best way, in my point of view, is to show the true about a company reporting every action and being in contact with their stakeholders.

Volvo does that in their web site, there audience can find all kind of information about the company, products, services, what the company has done, have been doing and is preparing to the future. Statements are upload on Volvo’s Web site regularly letting the audience knows what is going on inside and around the company.

With all that, in each Volvo’s store the consumer has access to more information and are allowed to talk with well trainer professionals that can answer questions about the company, products and services readily.  That takes to another point of the UAT filter, which is ‘‘talkability’’.

The company has channels of contact online, on telephone, mail and in their stores. If a costumer wants to complain, give their opinion or show the satisfaction about what have received from the company, all the channels are open and will give readily the answer to the consumer. Another channel are the social medias, that Volvo is present and always given the audience the opportunity to change ideas and information.

One thing that is really important is the companies force been able to answer questions and resolve problems of their consumers. Volvo has a program called ‘’ The Volvo way’’ that was made to capacity their employees about the company in all aspects. And all Volvo stores around the globe must do tests about that program to be in the market working with Volvo’s consumers.

Here were some examples how Volvo works with the UAT filter and how it being successful to the company and their stakeholders. Other thing that influences in company uniqueness is it’s visual identity.

Company’s visual identity is composing by colors, logo, type and all the things that involves design. Volvo in this point is complete because has a base color that is related with the origin country of the company, has it’s own typography and the type is their logo.

A visual identity is fundamental once the first contact with the brand is visual and provides right way to the audience that is the company that is talking to them. Other point is that Volvo provides a manual about how to use their brand to all stores around the globe, doing that they have the control that the visual content of the brand is being use on the right way.