Leadership Lessons From Ford’s CMO And Bet On The Electric F-150

Ford, GM and other major automakers committed to going all-electric by around 2035. That means tinkering with iconic, best-selling vehicles and risking the farm. The Ford F-150, for example, is the best-selling truck in the U.S., and has been for most of its 45-year history. Yet, Ford took the giant risk of reinventing it to make it 100% electric. All the market research in the world cannot guarantee success, so there were probably a lot of sleepless nights for folks at Ford who prayed that their bold risk would pay off – or at least not be a catastrophic failure.

So far so good — and a lot of lessons. As Suzy Deering, Ford’s Chief Marketing Officer, explained on my Electric Ladies Podcast recently, Ford’s new F-150 Lightning ended up attracting totally different buyers than the traditional F-150s.

Deering herself is new to Ford and to the automotive industry – literally. She joined as CMO only about 2 years ago and had been Chief Marketing Officer of eBay for about 5 years, Executive Director of Media, Brand and Engagements (a few roles) at Verizon for about 10 years, and prior to that at Disney for about 5 years. She had served as CEO of an advertising agency called Moxie for a few years too.

She started from scratch

So, Deering came in with what some would call a beginner’s mind and started learning from scratch. She thought about the marketing of Ford’s iconic brand and vehicles completely differently, which she said was daunting and invigorating.

“The thing that really struck me was, it’s been a long time since I’ve had to learn an industry from scratch,” Deering explained, “So coming in and I forgot just that ramp and also how frustrating it can be because you want to feel like you know everything. And the reality is, that even at two years in, there’s still so much for me to learn. Then at on top of that, the entire industry is changing, transforming.”

She also realized, unexpectedly, how much her experience at Verizon and eBay had prepared her for the challenge of marketing Ford’s new line of electric vehicles, including the F-150 Lighting, the new 100% electric version of the best-selling truck in the U.S.

“What I didn’t realize is, that my experience at Verizon, the parallels of when I came into the wireless industry, which was at the very, very, very early stages, and what I see right now with electrification is unbelievable,” she emphasized. “The parallels are unbelievable. Infrastructure…jobs. So, when I look back, I think, (it was) the biggest thing that prepared me without me realizing it.” She knew some things would work and some things would not work, but she had to try them, she said.

She also said that her experience at eBay came in handy “when covid hit and that entire industry of ecommerce just exploded,“ because she had the perspective of “running” a massive digital platform.

Reinventing meetings and the whole ecosystem

As Deering set about to reinvent Ford’s marketing with its reinvented vehicle line, and a transforming auto sector writ large, she reinvented meetings with her team and the larger Ford organization.

“I started this meeting every Friday that was called Marketing Modernization, but, really, it was kind of almost like an open mic type of meeting, because I had teams come in and they could make a choice as to what topics (we would talk about). I’d say, ‘What is it you feel that we’re not doing that we should be doing? Or what’s holding you back from making some of the changes we need to make?’ It’s my favorite meeting of the week….It’s not just my team, it’s multiple different people across the organization.”

Realizing that the whole Ford ecosystem was changing, Deering left space for new ways to look at the customer, to pay attention to new customers, new dealer needs, and beyond. “You have to think about the customer who’s evolving as well….(and) there’s still kind of an unknown there,” she said. Then she acknowledged the changes in their supply chain and the dealer-manufacturing ecosystem, “even our dealer network and how do we retrain and rethink our dealer network, which we believe is a complete asset to us.”

The new Ford customer is an “early adopter” model

What seems like the key thing Deering did not expect was how well-aligned her previous experience in technology is with the moment, including that Ford’s electric vehicle customers are not their traditional customers. “The F-150 lightning, the traditional F-150 market is not the traditional EV market,” she said, adding that, “about 76% of those customers are new to Ford, which means they’re coming from various different places.” She added that, “the majority of those people, (of) that 76% that are new to Ford, they’re new to trucks and they’re new to electric (vehicles too).”

“The easiest way for me to define it is…We’re looking now at true technology-type adoption curve, because you’re looking at this first round, which are early, they’re the early adopters, they’re traditional early adopters,” just like with early technology adopters.

These early adopters buying Ford’s electric F-150 Lightning fit a different mold than their traditional buyers, she said: “They have a higher income….We get a broader base from a diversity and ethnicity standpoint, and they’re younger, and that’s me comparing it to my traditional F150 customer.” They also come from different regions: Yes, there’s a large percentage of them in California, but there’s also in Texas and in Florida. So, it’s very interesting in the sense of when you look at it through that early adopter model, it changes everything.”

When I interviewed Ford’s Linda Zhang, the Chief Engineer of the F-150 Lightning at the MOVE-Mobility Re-Imagined conference in Austin this week, she reiterated this point about how different the market for the Lightning is.

Deering’s experience reflects several leadership lessons as the 21st century economy and customers evolve, including how to look at who your buyer is anew — and starting from scratch.