Social Media Monitoring part1: Let's Go Places Toyota

Introduction

About the Toyota

Do you know which is the world’s best selling car? The Toyota Corolla remains the best-selling car in the world, with 1.02 million copies sold. My car is Toyota RAV4, which is not look good as Lexus or BMW but is Fuel-efficient and lasting value. Toyota was founding in 1937, Mintel states that Toyota now owns and operates the Lexus and Scion brands and has a majority shareholding stake in Daihatsu and Hino motors, and minority shareholdings in Fuji Heavy industries, Isuzu Motors and Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation. A Japanese principle is that entails making continual small improvements to business processes, which possibly has contributed to its wholehearted adoption of social media. Toyota has taken a leap from being recognized as a traditional and somewhat boring manufacturing company to a digitally-savvy and -driven brand. They’ve gone from displaying print advertisements to running creative social media campaigns to increase brand awareness and customer acquisition. In the age of digital media, companies embrace social media as a center part of their business strategy to reach and engage customers.

Toyota and Social Media

#Facebook

Toyota USA’s Facebook page is fill of Toyota goodness. Sharing images and videos help Toyota get their fans to empathize and connect with aspects of the brand as a whole, rather than just pimping out its cars. Open-ended questions are regularly asked, many accompanied by nostalgic photos asking fans to remind about their Toyota memories.

When not promoting its line of cars and trucks, Toyota regularly engages in some philanthropic activities and posts their event photos on their Facebook. It is a good way to build reputation in society and maintain customer trust and loyalty.

#Twitter

@ToyotaGB with 40.1K followers is a Toyota official account in the UK, which has more followers than ToyotaUS. 

Toyota’s account operates between 7am and 10pm, which is handy for out of office car researchers. As a criticism though, it would be even more helpful if the operating hours were stated within the Twitter profile itself. Every morning and evening a customer service agent tweets hello or goodnight and states what time they’re open until or reopen next. It is good way to narrow distance between customers and company.

Here’s another simple and effective tactic that Toyota uses, instead of replying directly to the @mention (thereby making it a conversation only followers of both users can see) Toyota lets everyone see a user’s tweet by inserting its own text before the @. It’s important that a brand has a human side and helps to build deeper relationships and loyalty. It’s also key way to enrich the story of your brand.

Toyota understands the importance of social customer care. As the account doesn’t deal directly with ecommerce as such, it would be very easy for the brand to fob off any enquiry to a relevant dealer or even just ignore them. Instead Toyota responds quickly, with relevance, personalization and answers the user’s question fully. It’s not just customer enquiries it responds to; Toyota also cheerily joins in on indirect conversations too.

#Pinterest

Toyota’s Pinterest account features 21 boards, 360 pins and 45000 followers. The board with the most followers is “Toyota Infographics.”

Toyota invests heavily in their Pinterest account to improve their brand appeal. To portray itself as a fun and exciting brand, Toyota often posts photos of their shiny vehicles at motor shows or stylish pictures of Toyota race drivers at racetracks.This is an approach you can use to help humanize your company, develop emotional appeals for your products, and make your brand seem more approachable without looking too advertisement-like.

To leverage Pinterest to enhance brand appeal, take photos at community events, behind-the-scene activities, or products in use.Today's customers expect a different type of relationship with companies, and customers will reward brands that create friendly ways for them to engage.These images help consumers see the fun side of your brand and deepen their connections with your company. Customers are truly passionate for those activities and they have a strong affinity for each other, which is the most essential to be successful. 

#Website-online community

Toyota has partnered with the National Audubon Society in an effort to encourage drivers to get off the highway and spend more time in nature. Through Exit the Highway Toyota fans can share destinations, stories, and photos of the scenic on their social media platforms. Every week a user submitted photo is chosen and showcased on both the program’s website and Toyota USA’s Twitter account. 

Analytical Data Observations

Social Mention 

According to the SocialMention.com, Toyota has 60% strength, 18% passion and 40% in reach. People can use many key words to search relevant information, and the most common word is Toyota. The listed sources on SocialMention.com shows that Toyota appears in many different kinds of social media and the most famous social media is twitter. There are 25 retweet one day. Moreover, this brand will be mentioned every 4 hours. 

• STRENGTH: a likelihood that your brand is being discussed in social media
• SENTIMENT: a ratio of mentions that are generally positive to those that are negative
• PASSION: a measure of the likelihood that individuals talking about your brand will do so repeatedly
• REACH: a measure of the range of influence

Google Trends

let's look at the Google Trends. It shows how often a search-term is entered into Google searches across the world and in various languages. Worldwide searchers for Toyota peaked in February 2010.This is because of extensive recall in Europe.  
Ice Rockets

This graph from Ice Rocket shows the Daily Blogs Citation Trend of the term "Toyota" (the blue line)  from Sep7th. to Oct 4th. Clearly, it has fluctuated a decent amount over the course of the month. The term Toyota averages 220.97 posts per day.

Conclusion
The Toyota Company can use social media to listen their customers, which effectively engage their customers and build a good relationship with them. The more you engage, the more feedback you obtain to increase your business performance. Low cost and Low control social media technologies totally change business world. Company use social media to drive customers awareness and increase word-of-mouth.