Summary
Now that the new GM has emerged from bankruptcy, it faces its biggest challenges. While it has shed debt and transformed itself into a leaner company, it has yet to prove itself more customer focused. If it cannot attract customers, sell them more, and sell them products on which GM makes a decent profit, the entire bailout and bankruptcy process may have only postponed the ultimate failure of the company. The retention of Bob Lutz to head sales and marketing would indicate that the company understands the monumental nature of the challenge it faces.
Analysis
If GM is to emerge from its bankruptcy process as a successful, going concern, it must do three things: find more customers, sell customers more and make more profit on what they sell. In a good economy with a sterling reputation these are difficult to accomplish. In a recession with a tarnished image it might be impossible. It is also a challenge that a meet and greet by senior management with some consumers will not overcome. While pressing the flesh makes for good publicity, it may do little to regain a customer who had a nearby GM dealer close and now must drive by Ford, Toyota, Honda and BMW dealers to get to a Chevy dealer. Much as GM might like to ignore it, the convenience of having a local dealer does enter into the consumer purchase decision.
An area where this executive level, man on the street research may cause problems is that GM runs the risk of being run by anecdotal research where everyone' opinion is given equal weight. The truth is that customers exist in three basic flavors: loyal, neutral and vulnerable. Where GM now stands with each of these groups and the relative size of each of these consumer segments. The vulnerable have probably long since departed for Toyota or Ford. Neutrals might be swayed but they will be actively pursued by the competition. The loyals have probably stuck with GM but the size of the segment has probably shrunk considerably.
After months of nothing but bad news, GM is in a very deep hole from a consumer perception standpoint. Catchy jingles and shiny cars in exotic locales won't turn the ship around. It is going to require daring and imagination. Fortunately, GM has decided to place responsibility for sales and marketing and the re-crafting of the GM imagine in the hands of one of the most imaginative executives in the cars business: Bob Lutz. Let's just hope he is given the tools, budgets and freedom to re-ignite America's automotive imagination.
