If I were running Mazda, or Mazda NA, I would hire someone (and volunteer for the job :D) just to spend all day monitoring this forum and the others discussing current Mazda products. They would learn about complaints, compliments, false rumors, true rumors, warranty abuse, dealer problems, and a million other things.

I have seen no indication that Mazda DOES monitor this Forum (or the Miata.Net Forum), but does anyone know for sure? Do we have a secret Mazda lurker? I'll probably never know for sure. (My gut tells me that, for some reason, Mazda has decided not to do it.)

And for that matter, I wonder about other makes. Again, does anyone know?

(P.S. I know that Bob Hall, one of the "fathers" of the Miata, does hang out on the Miata.Net but that's a little different, since he's not formally representing Mazda.)

Originally posted by Hard 8
I have seen no indication that Mazda DOES monitor this Forum (or the Miata.Net Forum), but does anyone know for sure? Do we have a secret Mazda lurker? I'll probably never know for sure.

I don't believe it is anyone's official job, but they do watch, sort of to monitor the pulse of the community. When I was at the Miata paddock at Concourso Italiano in August this year (day before the Monterey Historics) and was chatting with a few Mazda people, one of them thanked me for my contributions on the forums, said he liked reading my posts! :eek: They know me through my involvement with the Mazda Advisory Council (I'm the Canadian Region representative), a group formed from the remnants of their short-lived Miata Owners Club, but it's not like they just look for my posts. They do lurk!


Now, if only anyone from Mazda Canada would bother lurking... :mad: ;)

Regards,
Gordon

I work for Mazda and do help out the NZ and Aussie RX-8 Owners.

Yes, they do - to a certain extent. There were posts by someone who works for Mazda North America. I don't remember the handle though. I'm sure someone remembers the forum name of that person.

How much they do it nowadays and how much do they use the information they gather is not clear.

I seriously hope they listen though.

Originally posted by Hard 8
...true rumors...
huh? ;)

I know Mazda Australia do. There was that post about the guy who drove a demo - his g'friend worked for a dealer, met him for lunch on his birthday with it as a surprise drive. He posted about how he caned the crap out of it etc...

It wasn't before some correspondance from Mazda Australia went to all the dealers asking them for a "Please Explain!"

Cheers,
Mark.

Interesting. Thanks, all. I hope Canzoomer's mods don't get too much attention, warranty-wise. (Or maybe they should, since it sounds like Mazda could learn something from him.)

Hmmmm.... I wonder what they think of the post I made about manufacturer responsibility to the cat/mpg issue?

Zoomer? Who ist der "Zoomer"?

I know nothing, NOTHING.....

From at least a PR standpoint, Mazda is almost certainly monitoring all forums specifically related to them. The reason I say this is from my own experience when I worked as a PR Consultant for an International Fortune 500 Corp. The department had software and special subscriptions that gave us a rundown of everything written about the company around the world. It didn't matter whether the newssource was from Alma, GA; Rio; or Moscow. Everything was analyzed.

Hopefully Mazda's engineers are paying attention also...

I just keep hoping and praying that, with enough grousing, we'll get a miracle free ECU reflash with another 25 or so ponies .... Nahhhh.


(Now my handle reads "Hard 8 ... Member." I'm so proud that my member is a hard 8.)

I'm sure Mazda is watching. Even Alfa Romeo America in it's last days before leaving the US watched the Alfa Digest at digest.net. Digest postings help them identify and develop a cure for a problem with power seats occasionally jamming when run fully back as I recall. We occassionally have postings to this day by Alfa employees in Milan.

If nothing else, Mazda America marketing people are reading. Actually, 'lightly skimming' would probably be more accurate. The short attention span of the typical marketing person is pretty short...I sincerely doubt they could make it to this sentence in this post! And here I was going to praise them for that great commercial where the red '8 hugs the owner back! <grin>

Well Mazda certainly "looses" as we band together to gather information. I'm sure the dealers hate it when we go in talking about oil pans and they say they know nothing about it for us only to point out how many people world wide have already had the issue resolved. And so many other issues. In the past, manufacturers reduced their issues by keeping information limited. The web has changed much of that. They would be leaving “leverage on the table” if they didn’t scan these back for information.

I know I’ve read of dealerships that go to local race tracks and take pictures of vehicles that have been “raced” to prove warrantee rejection. This stuff is already documented for them. I’ve been in IT all my life and certainly not a “big brother” fearer, but to me, it just makes sense to always write like they are reading … :D

Canzoomer, Blue350Z were mentioned by name at the SevenStock banquet by the RX-8 program manger.

So, yes, they do pay attention.. so watch out!!

hey Dan! what's shaking over there at rotarynews. how's your RX-8 coming along?

anyway on point- Mazda has watched this board pretty much since it went online and as dan says still do. they are very aware of things said on here. power to the people!

but they don't always listen- if they did many of us would have the UK oem lip spoiler on our cars in the states by now. and too late for me now if they do make it available. i'll have the loop spoiler on saturday. well they could of had my dollars for that if they had just listened. if they are reading now i would appreciate it if they would lower the price of the rx-8 logo wheel centers to something a little more sane so i could get my wife to allow me to buy them. at the list price they are now she'll never let me buy them.

Would be surprised if they didn't browse. The Admins can probably see whether or not the site is accessed by addresses within Mazda domains.

I'd think it would be very difficult for anyone in an official capacity at Mazda to contribute to the forums though. That would just be a minefield.

Well Mazda certainly "looses" as we band together to gather information. I'm sure the dealers hate it when we go in talking about oil pans and they say they know nothing about it for us only to point out how many people world wide have already had the issue resolved. And so many other issues


If your dealer is not aware of the problems before you come in they are not interested in keeping the customer happy.

IMHO.:D

BTW how does Mz "loose" in the deal?

Can automated site scanning be far behind ... or already here ...

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY: Quick fix
Nothing hurts a new vehicle's image like a postlaunch problem. New IT tools -- some linked to dealership service bays -- are finding glitches early.

By Ralph Kisiel
Automotive News / December 15, 2003

Nearly 250 new or redesigned vehicles will hit the North American market in the next three years, and rules that took effect Dec. 1 will provide the government - and product liability lawyers - with a wealth of information about postlaunch problems.

Many in the industry fear that this avalanche of warranty and customer service data will provide lethal ammunition for product liability lawsuits. And they're arming themselves with IT tools designed to find and fix new-vehicle problems faster.

They are called early warning systems, and they use software to make sense of the mountain of information - from the dealership, assembly plant, owner surveys, customer call centers, public records and replacement parts sales data - that can spot a troublesome part or vehicle system.

Key to this is the ability to analyze information from dealership service departments. Data from mechanics - their details about the thousands of problems diagnosed and fixed daily and recorded onto service bay computers - contain a gold mine of data for spotting problems.

Software can scan key words, spot patterns, identify trouble and keep isolated incidents from snowballing into widespread defects.

Tight lips

It is an emerging technology, and automakers won't talk much about it. A General Motors (gm.com) spokesman, for example, says "GM is not looking to go public with what we are doing in this area."

But in August 2002 - two years after the first phase of the highly publicized Ford Motor Co. (ford.com) recall of Firestone tires - Ford saw the benefits of early warning technology. It faced another tire recall, this time with tires from Continental Tire North America (continentaltire.com). The tires were prone to vibrate, wear unevenly and, in some cases, separate from the tread.

Continental voluntarily recalled 600,000 tires on Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator SUVs. Neither company will talk about the event. But at the time of the recall, Ford, which used IBM technology (ibm.com), credited each company's early warning system for spotting the problem.

Kevin Mixer, research director at AMR Research Inc. of Boston, says the companies were able to pinpoint the problem in less than a year. Typically it takes 18 months to identify a problem in the field, he says.

IT-based early warning systems are expected to play a larger role in helping the industry battle rising warranty costs as well as complying with the TREAD Act. Congress passed the TREAD Act in 2000, after the Ford-Firestone debacle. On

Dec. 1, automakers began reporting a wide variety of warranty and customer service data to the federal government. The goal is to prevent recalls the size of the Ford-Firestone tire campaign.

AMR Research (amrresearch.com) estimates that liability claims are likely to triple with the public dissemination of TREAD Act data. The company has just completed a study that recommends automakers and suppliers put early warning systems into place to reduce liability exposure and reduce warranty expenses.

The North American auto industry pays out $12 billion annually in warranty claims, AMR Research estimates. That works out to about $712 for each vehicle sold, based on North American light-vehicle sales in 2002.

True, automakers already analyze warranty claim data. But that analysis is typically limited to structured information, such as diagnostic trouble codes.

Going to the root

Those codes don't always capture the cause of a problem, says Barton O'Brien, vice president of business development at Attensity Corp. of Salt Lake City (attensity.com).

Attensity would not identify the automaker clients using its text analysis software. But O'Brien points to a manufacturer that identified the cause of clogged fuel filters just days after beginning to use the software.

For months, trouble codes kept pointing to the fuel filter. But in its analysis of service technicians' comments, the software isolated key words and phrases that revealed the real problem: A supplier was drilling mounting holes in the fuel tank, and shavings were falling inside. Eventually, those shavings clogged the fuel filter.

The software helped pinpoint the problem by picking out phrases such as "with plastic shavings" and "from fuel tank assembly" and "from manufacturing."

"It ended up being a fairly major problem," O'Brien says. "They were replacing fuel filters, fuel valves, fuel screens. We enabled them to hear the voice of the technician in a summarized way."

Attensity is not the only company vying for auto industry business. In March, IBM Corp., of Armonk, N.Y., and software vendor SAS Institute Inc. (sas.com) of Cary, N.C., began selling its version of early warning software. Their software analyzes data from a range of sources, including service bays, the assembly plant, customer surveys and call center contacts.

Wealth of information

"The text data is the difficult data to really get your arm around," says William Lang, IBM's vice president of global automotive solutions. "But the text data actually is today the data that is holding the wealth of the most information."

Three automakers and one Tier 1 supplier are using the IBM-SAS product, Lang says. He declined to identify the parties.

"What you are trying to do is reduce the lead time in finding out that there's a problem in the field," Lang says. "There is a lead time before they see a trend and can react, and it's in the 200-day range."

Compressing the time to spot trends will lead to reduced warranty costs, higher customer satisfaction, and safer vehicles, Lang says.

But don't expect the automakers to publicize their successes.

"If they talk about the benefits, they acknowledge that they have a problem, and they don't want to acknowledge that they have a problem for liability reasons," Lang says. "That's the Catch 22 that they are in."

Originally posted by markpmm
If your dealer is not aware of the problems before you come in they are not interested in keeping the customer happy.

IMHO.:D

BTW how does Mz "loose" in the deal?

markpmm,

I've seen several situations pointed out on web sites that are only fixed if the owner knows of the issue. The dealership line from the manufacture is to explain away particular issue rather than resolve them all. They are really on ready to resolve the issues that have been recalled that are widespread. When we gather information together, we prevent that particular technique from working. IMO

From Autoweek July 29, 2002

Flies on the wallpaper: Carmakers catch buzz while camping out on enthusiast websites


Typical focus group: airtight room, white walls, moderators, No. 2 pencils, ambiguous questionnaires, a coffee break, lunch if you’re lucky. Result: Pontiac Aztek, et al.

“What focus groups say they would really like in their next car is not reliable, because they are, in the research, not really paying for it,” according to a now-legendary memo to General Motors brass from product development boss Bob Lutz.

Automakers aren’t giving up focus groups, but some are finding better ways to listen to, or in on, the thoughts of people who really care about the brand in question via Internet chat rooms and e-bulletin boards.

Nissan did just that the day it started showing its 350Z concept at auto shows, says Fred Suckow, senior manager of 350Z marketing. Nissan began combing sites such as www.z-car.com (“Gary’s House of Z”), www.freshalloy.com (the destination for Nissan enthusiasts) and www.zcca.org (official website of the Z Car Club Association) to scope the skinny on Z’s resurrection.

Although Nissan floated photos and specifications for the Z, it stayed away from posting any messages. Then Suckow’s minions sat back and monitored reaction.

“Here are my four things,” wrote one visitor to www.zdriver.com in April 2001 after seeing photos and viewing the concept car at an auto show. “Front intake needs to be more aggressive. Headlamps should be more scooped or horizontal. Back end needs to be slimmed down. A little more glass on the cockpit.”

Karthik Iyer, who leads business development for Intelliseek, a company that monitors web buzz for a number of automakers, says unsolicited feedback from true enthusiasts is sometimes the best advice.

Intelliseek helps corporations act as a “fly on the wall,” he says, identifying the most influential voices in chat rooms and on message boards. The company organizes relevant and reliable feedback and provides it to clients seeking information on everything from new vehicle development and current vehicle improvements to what fans of the competition are saying.

For example, on a project for Lincoln, Intelliseek found the top complaint of LS owners was a lack of trunk space. People who didn’t buy the LS said the same thing.

Currently, the research firm is evaluating buzz surrounding next year’s Mazda RX-8. Much like the 350Z, the RX-8 has an enthusiast following and Mazda is particularly interested in collecting data on the car’s strengths, weaknesses, potential and acceptance, says Mazda spokesman Kevin Everhart.

A perusal of enthusiast sites such as www.rx-8forum.com and rotarynews.com should give Mazda a good read. One enthusiast suggests that the prototype “doesn’t look enough like the 7,” another laments the shade of yellow shown in Detroit is rumored unavailable on the production versions. Yet another begs Mazda to “just accidentally ‘leak’ a tidbit here or there to keep the rotor-heads fed.”


One of the more popular auto enthusiast sites, www.vwvortex.com, has a direct link with the manufacturer while remaining independent. The site attracts thousands of snippets of chat per day and Volkswagen closely monitors what’s being jawed about, says VW spokesman Tony Fouladpour. Topics range from owner’s lifestyle to repair tips, from VW-owned Bugatti to VW’s first sport/utility vehicle, the Touareg.

“This is the first SUV I would consider purchasing,” insists one visitor. “If you don’t offer a manual transmission, I will not purchase one.” Twenty-three others weighed in on a manual Touareg, most wanting one in the U.S. market.

Recently, VW used the site to gauge interest in a special edition GTI 337 based on the 25th Anniversary edition GTI sold in Europe. VW of America saw an opportunity to capitalize on the outpouring of U.S. enthusiasm for the car, especially expressed on vwvortex.com, according to Fouladpour.

“You guys asked for it,” reads VW’s 337 online ordering guide, “that’s why we gave our enthusiasts first crack at getting their hands on a GTI 337.”

And you thought nobody was listening.

WHealy,

That was some good info. Thanks.

my dealer asked me if by chance I was MIKEB

they know

kewl

Yo, bruh-san! :D

Originally posted by WHealy
markpmm,

I've seen several situations pointed out on web sites that are only fixed if the owner knows of the issue. The dealership line from the manufacture is to explain away particular issue rather than resolve them all. They are really on ready to resolve the issues that have been recalled that are widespread. When we gather information together, we prevent that particular technique from working. IMO

I read/monitor all the forums and know of more problems than most of my customers do.

;)

I remember a year or two back that VW tried to sue a guy for slander after postings he made on a VW forum. I kind of watch what I say now when I have a complaint about my car :D

Oh, you can be sure Mazda monitors this board. My dealership definitely knows who I am here... Gee, I wonder how they found out? :)

My guess would be that Mazda corporate is taking careful notes of gripes and things people would like to see on the car, and will incorporate fixes and new features on future model releases based on the input they get from this board. They'd be crazy NOT too... what an incredible resource for them!

Hey JleghZ,

I wonder if Bob Moore Atuo plex has fired Okiniawa Mjck guy yet? If ever their was a case..............

Mazda if you are listening my next car may not be the next rx7 but the Nissan skyline GTR 35,OR THE NEXT SUBARU STI SICK OF THE MAZDA LIES ABOUT POWER OUTPUTS .

You may have conned some rx8 owners but not all

MICHAEL

Tell us how you really feel, Mr. Load. :D Actually, I too wonder when Mazda is gonna fess up (again).

Originally posted by Omicron
Oh, you can be sure Mazda monitors this board. My dealership definitely knows who I am here... Gee, I wonder how they found out? :)

My guess would be that Mazda corporate is taking careful notes of gripes and things people would like to see on the car, and will incorporate fixes and new features on future model releases based on the input they get from this board. They'd be crazy NOT too... what an incredible resource for them!

True..the forum is like a free sounding board for the manufacturer. The input here would cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to call each customer and get feedback on thier product.

If your dealer knows who you are on this site you should be happy that the dealer takes the time to check this forum for all the information posted here.

mazda if you're watching please educate your mechanics better. they overfilled my oil level because they don't know where the fill line is on the dipstick.

Big brother is always watching. :)

Big brother is always watching. :)

Hey Dan, that article is the only reason I registered www.rx-8forum.com. I didn't have it before that article came out, then I was like "shit, people are hitting the wrong URL", so I grabbed it :)

I wish the dealers read some of the info on this forum. Many are too ignorant and only know the rumors and thus improperly sell the car. As a man with good rotary experience, I can tell most people I deal with at Mazda dealers really aren't that experienced with the car... but more with (obviously) salespoint and some of the repairs (not many unless they owned one).

Originally posted by Gord96BRG
I don't believe it is anyone's official job, but they do watch, sort of to monitor the pulse of the community. When I was at the Miata paddock at Concourso Italiano in August this year (day before the Monterey Historics) and was chatting with a few Mazda people, one of them thanked me for my contributions on the forums, said he liked reading my posts! :eek: They know me through my involvement with the Mazda Advisory Council (I'm the Canadian Region representative), a group formed from the remnants of their short-lived Miata Owners Club, but it's not like they just look for my posts. They do lurk!


Now, if only anyone from Mazda Canada would bother lurking... :mad: ;)

Regards,
Gordon

I wonder if anyone has ever thanked IKE for his posts....