Last week I was musing about the social media performance of the big automakers, Ford v. GM, and in particular, Chevy’s social media presence and publicity successes at this year’s SXSW (for additional perspective on their differences in strategy and social media best practices, read Jeff Bullas’ recent blog post, “Who is Winning at Social Media, Ford or General Motors?”).

This discussion of social media and competitive advantage turned to trajectory and how social media tools and platforms allow for, and in fact encourage, new and different kinds of competition. As we’ve witnessed, trajectories that may have been flat can quickly turn upward on the wind of raving fans and buzz. SXSW was a mega-mall of ideas and innovation, social media and apps, big brands and startups. But as fast as trajectories can rise, companies, programs, products, apps, etc., can become roadkill, which reminds me of armadillos (seeing as we’re discussing SXSW in Texas!), but I’ll come back to that a little later.

Where Ford has its best practices right out on the web (slideshare, scribd, etc.), GM has been a little quieter. But don’t let that fool you. In terms of trajectory GM has put its pedal to the metal with recent efforts. So they won’t be the social media armadillos (aka roadkill) of the US auto industry, and Ford will have to work that much harder to keep innovating and keep the lead. Remember, winners can’t get complacent – EVER.

Now, if we look specifically at the social media race for best practices in social recruiting, we’ll find that there is NO winner in the auto industry. These companies are overlooking the recruiting opportunity beyond the marketing buzz. As a result, they are all roadkill compared to AT&T (HQ in TX, for those of you who don’t know), Agilent, Deloitte in New Zealand, Sodexo, DaVita, Zappos, and a select group of other like-minded early adopters.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the social recruiting track is wide open. You need to open her up and let ‘er rip. Please comment with your best practices in social recruiting, and we’ll catalog them and post them for all to view. The most innovative NEW social recruiting success story will win an iPad!!! @TheRecruiterGuy, @ImSoSarah and @jjbuss – are you up to helping judge the entries and determining the winner?

So back to the armadillos I mentioned earlier. Known as the world’s most recognizable roadkill (before impact, of course), armadillos are the butt of many jokes and much lore in Texas. Next week I’ll tell you my favorite, about a blue armadillo whose moniker, “the dude” pretty much sums up his philosophy on life. While I was in Texas during SXSW, I happened to get into a Twitter conversation with those dueling dudes of Detroit, Scott Monty and Christopher Barger. And since we were in Texas, we talked armadillos (by the way, @scottmonty and @cbarger, your armadillos are on the way). I’ve affectionately named them Barger and Monty… sounds more “Texan”! And stay tuned for next week’s post about the Blue Armadillo known as “the dude”.