Dealer Rating Sites = FAIL for Consumers and Dealers

Car dealers understand that they need to use the Internet to market themselves, some are doing a very good job, others are getting their wings and some will buy just about anything, because they have seen support for the product from named experts in the industry.

One of the biggest cool aide fueled concoctions to come along is dealer specific rating sites.  These sites provide an industry specific sounding board for consumers to vent frustrations and give praises of their sales and service experiences.  However they never give an accurate benchmark that consumers can rely on nor provide the marketing leverage they claim to deliver.

A few of these sites are www.dealerrater.com, www.carfolks.com and www.edmunds.com

Generally you have two extremes based on reviews given by consumers at these types of sites.  One is an exceptional number of positive experiences with more ratings than any other dealer in a specific market area or the only reviews the dealership have are negative.  Almost always these reviews are given anonymously or are crafted by dealers referring consumers to these locations to post reviews or even worse paying a marketing company to send consumers to these controlled environments.

Generally these sites steal traffic from the dealer from consumers who are already looking for them and used against dealers to validate their cost to encourage them, dealers, to pay for moderation and marketing perks.  They do this by stealing spots in the search engine results pages when consumers are searching for a dealer by name to deliver the consumer to a site where they see the dealerships ratings and encouraged to look at other dealers in their market area and be exposed, most of the time, to advertising not related to the dealer in question.

Much more reliable reviews can be found at sites like Yelp.com, Google Reviews, Yahoo Local and even Ripoffreport.com and are not subject by outside influences, as much, as auto industry specific review sites.  Also these industry neutral sites provide a platform for dealers and their employees to interact with consumers who have expressed a problem.  A dealer will have more credibility handling a problem in the open and having their consumers give freely of their opinion.

The reason dealers are suckered into the dealer review phenomenon is they are given a false sense of security in knowing that they have the ability to cut off a negative review before it is published.  Where as a true web savvy consumer realizes these review sites are more of a facade and a cash grab by their operators.

Consumers also do not give much weight to opinions given online, both negative and positive, published by unidentified people anywhere near the way they would if the consumer were willing to come forth with their face and name like could be done on a dealer owned testimonials page on the dealers site or blog.  Unless the negative reviews are overwhelming and demonstrate a common problem they really do not prevent consumers from engaging a dealership.  Where as unidentified individuals giving positive reviews do not give the consumer a way to identify with the consumer and look like a fabrication by the dealer or site operator and may do more harm than good as far as the individual dealer credibility.

Dealers, by encouraging consumers to review them at these sites, are giving away valuable web content that they could use to leverage on their own supporting properties thus not increasing search engine competition for their own name.  This is truly a waste of marketing budget and effort for the dealer.  However dealers are used to paying others to build up the authority of their sites as can be witnessed by cars.com and autotrader.com.

From Tactical Technique - If the primary goal is to rank well on page one, where is the logic in helping someone else’s website work towards that same goal?

When dealers have review sites poll their database of customers to solicit reviews they are also exposing their most important asset to compromise.  No amount of assurances by these companies can really guarantee that the dealers customer list is secure, nor does it show any consideration for the consumer.  Big companies have data breeches and dealerships are already prone to litigation by consumers, placing sensitive customer information in the hands of others to built their site with is like playing Russian Roulette.

While industry experts are stating that 81% of consumers use rating sites before buying a car from a dealership it would probably be safe to assume they are looking for ratings on the vehicles.  Dealer rating sites are not transparent enough for consumers to put any real faith in.

Consumers can see past the dealer rating sites, can the dealers?

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• Where is Your Dealership’s Blog?
• Consumers are Talking - Everywhere…
• Back at it as a Dealership Employee….

Technorati Tags: car dealer ratings, carfolks.com, Consumer Reviews, dealerrater.com

Automotive Blogging Double Standard

Double standards exist all around us in both personal and business situations. The car business sure has it’s share of them. The industry has a long way to go in getting in sync in many areas but this post will concentrate on:

Automotive Blogging

There are some great blogs that have a decent amount of readership. DealerRefresh, AutomotiveDigitalMarketing, DealerDex, Why Buy Used Cars, Tactical Technique and the DrivingSales Community Blog are some great examples. (if yours is not listed here contact me.  Jeff I rolled you, return the favor?)

Many including myself have expressed opinions and views in their blogs that that others disagree with or may of not been completely flattering to a vendor or individual.  That is the spirit of blogging and increases traffic and viability for all parties.

Many blogs do not publish trackbacks and moderate content even if it shares opinions and interactions with vendors that are not completely flattering from one vendor to another.  Those interactions need to be shared with the online automotive community and it gives both sides the ability to tell their story and not restricted to Kumbaya style other vendor mentions.  If content is going to be restricted in this format then people will stop contributing.

Trackbacks are ways to drive traffic in both directions.

Not publishing them is bad form even if they disagree with the opinion expressed in the original post, however the “old school” mentality exist that if it is not 100% flattering then it is negative.  This is because the old guard does not understand the new rules of the game and they will be summarily crushed if they do not learn the ways of the web.

Perceived negatives are just that perceived.

Many times when something that exposes a flaw in a how support people, marketing paradigms or platforms are discussed, no matter the source, it gives those those companies and individuals feedback to make changes or address concerns.  Censoring content based on opinions and experiences is bad form, just because it is not flattering, and benefits no one.

Just as this post will be construed as an attack on a certain community blog it is not.  It is pointing out some of the flaws and double standards that exist.  If a vendor were to publish something flattering about another vendor it would be allowed to stay.  If it points out a problem it is either edited or deleted, while vendors are allowed to talk about what they do and leverage the power of their marketing budget and name while opposing views are stymied or proof of flaws is deemed negative.  (I have examples but will not share them unless asked)

If your spirit is to share best practices with dealers and exposing problems or false marketing paradigms with a vendor contributes to best practices formation.  However in my opinion the spirit is to protect those with the largest marketing budgets regardless of the truth.   You can’t out market pitfalls, you need to adjust and make changes in thought, products and processes.

To have a positive impact on the web community it has to be give and take as it stands they just take and do not wish to reciprocate by giving back to the web that helps drive traffic.  It is the world wide web not everything needs to point to me web when running a blog that is supposed to have interaction.

What Can Be Done?

If you do not wish to be subject to censorship you can go places that do not have any or you can publish on your own.  Every vendor in the space should have their own space and be willing to contribute in others if the effort can product rewards and still fall into terms of service at a shared platform.  This does not even start to address blogging for car dealers.

Please give your thoughts and opinions?

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Technorati Tags: automotive blogging, automotivedigitalmarketing.com, dealerrefresh.com, drivingsales.com, tacticaltechnique.com

Automotive Social Networking - Still Needs Some Help

Automotive social networking still has ages to go as far as recognizing how things work in social settings.   Right now we have two very large extremes going, one has strict guidelines and the other tolerates aggressive spam tactics.  Personally I am not an advocate of using spam techniques or highly redundant content and attaching my name to it, for some it does not matter.

On the other hand restricting content because it uses a vendors name and it is not favorable to a specific automotive provider is actually worse than the latter.  People who spend anytime on social networking sites recognize spam and can see past it.  While I do like rules that do not allow overly self promotional content, wordpress.com thrives with these rules in place, but censoring free content which speaks out about vendor interactions or pointing out flaws in marketing pitches is anti social networking.

While it can be considered a privilege to contribute it these arenas and they can be great marketing arenas if you provide value to the conversation these types of sites do need our content to survive.  Neither extreme builds interaction or willingness to contribute and that is possibly why neither platform is doing extremely well.

I have had my comments edited at and trackbacks deleted to www.drivingsales.com, the site with higher than normal standards, when they actually provided value to the conversation and drove traffic to the site.  On the other extreme at www.automotivedigitalmarketing.com, site with tons of spammy content, I have people attack on a personal level in a very unprofessional manner.

I can now understand why the guys over at www.DealerRefresh.com do not spend much time in either place.  They spend their time working on their own property and building their own their tribe at home, where as I have tried to spread out all over the world wide web.

In a recent post at www.drivingsales.com the admin deleted a vendors name when a consultant blogged about Cobalt Websites trying to take credit for his work.  While there is no way to verify the validity of his claims but Cobalt does have the ability to respond and offset it or try to make the situation better.   However when the post was edited Cobalt’s website division may not know they have a problem and it may possibly cause this great contributor to not give them anymore content.

Maybe it is best to provide the real content on your own property and just use the commenting to drive traffic to your own property instead of building someone else’s.

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Technorati Tags: automotivedigitalmarketing.com, cobalt websites, drivingsales.com

Search Spam + Bad Marketing = Indexed Inventory

In my last post here I gave 10 Car Dealer Website Myths and received positive and negative feedback via email.  One email I received was from a dealer who is changing website providers and heard the “indexed inventory” pitch from a potential provider and asked me to expound on the reasons why it is not a good idea to have indexed inventory.  So I am setting up a new category here that will be exclusively about “Automotive Online Marketing Myths”, they are everywhere in car dealer online education and in marketing materials from online providers.

Indexed inventory is a bad idea -

Having individual inventory items show up in the search engine result pages pointing to a dealers website has many negative implications from both a search engine optimization stand point and from a marketing perspective.

From a Search Engine Optimization View:

The search engines are continually changing their algorithms looking for ways to improve the user experience and having pages indexed that no longer exist, or have zero content, could cause your whole website to get dropped from the index. Not notifying the search engines that a page no longer exist after a car is sold can result in hundreds or thousands of pages in the index that provide no value to the search engine user.

Here is what search engine users see if the individual inventory items are not removed from the search engine if they click through to your “indexed inventory”:

^^Indexed Phantom Used Car^^
^^Non Existent New Car^^

^^Where did this one go?^^

What is even worse there is no real branding for the dealership in the top two examples with a clear call to action to see other inventory items.  This is a severe flaw in the inventory platform and provides a poor user experience for the search engine user.  These screen caps were taken after clicking through to actual search engine results for model and geographic area search quires.  Not listed here to not embarrass the web site provider or dealers.  Proclaimed relationships due to being Adwords certified will not save these sites from being placed in the supplemental index or removed all together if Google takes notice.  Then the only effective traffic generation will be dealer search engine marketing.

Having on site inventory search results showing up in the index may be beneficial if you have a large selection of those type vehicles in inventory. However,  Matt Cutts from Google.com has stated:

Proxied copies of websites and search results that don’t add much value already fall under our quality guidelines (e.g. “Don’t create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.” and “Avoid “doorway” pages created just for search engines, or other “cookie cutter” approaches…”), so Google does take action to reduce the impact of those pages in our index.

Google themselves does not follow these rules.  A recent search for used Rolls Royce Savannah showed AOL Autos in the top placement and after clicking through to see the results displayed there was not a Rolls Royce in Savannah displayed without modifying the search after being taken to the AOL Autos results page.  What was clearly present was Google ads, so removing these search results from the index would negatively affect Google’s revenue model.  Thus increasing the possibility of a click on paid ad as most consumers want the information they requested and may not understand how to redefine their search.

On another search result for Lincoln Continental Virginia Beach Cars.com search results pages wins the top spot with a page that requires further action to see cars within 30 miles of VA Beech while their second entry in the search engine results page showed real cars.  Also easy to identify was the Google powered search found at cars.com absent though was sponsored links from using that search.

Until Google stops profiting from allowing search results to show in their index that may be the best way for dealers to use their inventory to gain entries into the search engine results page.  Still though individual highly dynamic single listings that provide the users with the images above when clicked through to is still pure search engine spam and has zero value to the dealer, potential consumers and pollutes the search engine index.

From a Marketing Perspective -

It may take a while for personalized search to gain any real traction for the everyday search engine user, but when it does if you return results like listed above to a search engine user and they determine your site offers them no value all they have to do is click one X and you will never show up again for them on that search.  This will force you to use paid advertising for them to ever find you again if this comes to fruition:

Image Scarfed from Dealerrefresh.com

This will catapult dealers marketing cost and alienate visitors. It is a well known fact that the majority of search engine users do not click on ads and only a small minority that do account for the majority of clicks, which are typically below the fold consumers.

Car dealers already have a bad reputation for bait and switch advertising and consumers may also view nonexistent inventory items showing up in search results as an extension of this stereotype.  Which may cause them to never want to engage your dealership.

Unless a website provider that touts indexed inventory make the changes to meet Google’s webmaster guidelines and allow the dealership’s web property to Do No Evil and ruin the search engine user experience they should be weary of the claims of the necessity for inventory to be indexed.  It makes framed in inventory appear to be a better alternative for now.

Then again Google.com does not police themselves and skirts acceptable practices, in their eyes, to drive their revenue models.  Which at the end of the day reemphisizes the mantra many practicioners of SEO and affiliate marketing use.  “When a search engine worries about my revenue model I’ll worry about theirs”, because after all Google is putting their revenue model before the user experience as well.

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Technorati Tags: automotie seo, automotive digital marketing, car dealer web site, dealership website, indexed inventory, seach engine marketing

10 Car Dealer Website Myths

Car dealers realize that they need websites and just a handful really understand web marketing.  Many vendors in the niche use education as a sales tool for their platform, but how much of that education is accurate and how much of it is smoke and mirrors to push a product that does not perform well in other aspects?

Having listened to presentations, heard the education offered and heard the excuses from car dealership website vendors given to my clients and myself, it is time to bring some of the myths to the forefront.  Some of the things they do for dealer go against acceptable web practices. They are probably to wow the dealer and close a deal rather than concentrating on conversion and getting consumers to click deeper into the site.

Here are 10 Car Dealer Website Myths:

1. SEO Takes Ages and is a Waste of Money - Search engine optimization is a very quick process if you have both a platform and a technology provider who understands it.  SEO is the most cost effective way to get visitors to your website and provides a better demographic customer than pay per click.  Just because you do not own the platform your website is on does not make it a bad investment of money or time.  Not doing search engine optimization on a contracted platform would be like not servicing a leased car.  SEO delivers better value than Pay Per Click for car dealers.
2. Indexable inventory is important for SEO - Having individual cars indexed in a dealers website may provide small amounts of traffic but eventually it will frustrate shoppers and the search engines.  You, online shoppers and the search engines would be better served by having inventory search result pages indexed that way if the “long tail” they come in on is sold they are presented with other options.
3. Auto Played Audio “Welcome Messages” help increase conversion - Auto played audio on a dealers website will actually increase bounce rate, make your visitors leave.   Plus it is bad manners.  Do you like it when someone starts delivering a message to you that you have no desire to hear?  Give surfers the option to engage with the audio if you fee it is a must have.  Web vendors need to be advising clients to not use this if it is asked about, not using it as part of their presentation.  Sure, most dealers think it’s great to hear their own voice, but if visitors wanted to hear you, they’d turn on the radio.
4. SEM Certification means they are qualified - Being Adwords certified is a 90 day process that  require some testing done online, open book.  The 90 day part is relative to a spend amount of $1000 per month on average for three months.  It ain’t rocket science.  It is a badge of honor that Google gives to people to help them push Adwords spends.  It does not mean they have vast knowledge of the Google algorithm.
5. Breaking the back button will increase leads - Delivering surveys and pop-unders when a website visitor uses the back button or navigates to another page will increase bounce and is annoying.  Many times if they figure out how to leave the site you will never see them again as they search for a less frustrating experience.
6. Vendor analytics - Website traffic stats need to come from an independent third party, not the ones taking credit for the traffic.  A branded analytics program is just that.  They control the stats and it is subject to manipulation by them.  I have heard about a larger, well-known dealer website vendor doing just this and refusing to deliver server stats when requested.
7. Site changes requires tech support - It may require tech support from the vendor delivering the third party plugin or training on the car dealers website platform but it should not require tech support from the car dealer website vendor thus incurring more charges.  Simple things such as adding a landing page, url or site navigation should be easy for dealership personnel or consultants to do.  Requiring tech support to add third party analytics or make simple changes to meta information means that the technology the dealer website vendor is using is archaic.  Mention object based programming to them and if you get the dear in the head lights look, run, do not walk.
8. All these cool navigation options - One of the larger players in the automotive website niche uses “Mystery Meat Navigation” (also abbreviated MMN), a term coined and popularized by author, web designer, and usability analyst Vincent Flanders to describe user interfaces (especially in websites) in which it is inordinately difficult for users to discern the destinations of navigational hyperlinks — or, in severe cases, even to determine where the hyperlinks are. The typical form of MMN is represented by menus composed of unrevealing icons that are replaced with explicative text only when the mouse cursor hovers over them.”  You have seen this if you have looked at more than one dealer website.
9. Bigger is better - A huge organization with a huge marketing budget does not mean you are going to get better service it just means they can out-market the next guy with high powered presentations and claims.  What really matters more than anything is getting what you pay for.  Your website is not “set it and forget it” and you should not be either after the sale.
10. How conversions are defined - This does not just happen in the website vendor arena. It probably originated with classified vendors counting map views as “conversions”.  A conversion is how you define it, not how the website vendor does.  Using vendor supplied version metrics is part of their sales process and can actually be a shell game.  The only conversion that should be counted is a submitted lead, a direct phone call or a printed coupon brought into the dealership.  That is the only measure of effectiveness.  Map views, contact page views, inventory drill downs and specials page views are not actionable measurable conversions.  So when you hear high conversion ratio give them your definition of conversion and then determine how high it really is.

There are many website vendors in the car business today.  Some have been around for a long time and others are just getting started.  Most of the education provided in the industry by dealer website vendors is self serving to move their product.  One thing you have to ask though is what does this education really mean to you, the dealer or dealership employee.

Big web vendors should be able to provide you with endless case studies of how well their sites perform, not hand pick a few dealers who are doing well with their platform.  Where as a smaller vendor with just a handful of clients who have raving fans probably provides more value.  An automotive website provider with thousands of clients with only 5 or 6 success stories to share probably means they are not as successful as a vendor who has 20 clients with 18 happy campers.

Car Dealer Website Vendors

• Pure Dealer.com
• TK Carsites
• Dealer.com
• BZ Results
• ADP
• Cobalt
• AutoRevo
• Nexteppe

While this list is not all-inclusive of auto dealer website vendors and I did not intentionally alienate any vendor.  Please let us know of your platform if you are not listed in the comments below also please disagree with and add to the “Dealer Website Myth List”.

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Technorati Tags: autorevo, bzresults, car dealer websites, cobalt, dealer web site, dealer.com, nexteppe, pure dealer.com, TK car sites

Without Traffic Everything Fails

You can have the best trained certified staff, excellent process, the ideal inventory and all the lenders in the world, a high converting website and barely move metal because you rely solely on antiquated media to drive prospects to your dealership and online property.

On the other side of the coin you could be using an old (insert website vendor name) site, not really work your leads that hard, rely on customers to secure their own financing and move more cars than those in the first example because you make it easy for people to find you and your staff online.

The key difference is you have traffic and understand that without traffic EVERYTHING fails.

Online traffic comes in many forms and using only one method to generate it is limiting,  like buying the back page of the phone book as your only advertising source. Just as you use many methods to deliver your message using antiquated methods of advertising, (print, radio, television, billboards, grocery store benches, you get the picture) you should explore all methods of generating online traffic.

It is not just about dealership website traffic, that is just one aspect of online traffic, even though in my opinion you should take care of home first and all online traffic generation sources should point back to your main website.

You must have a dealership website where all online roads end, even without all of the other necessities. A high dollar ILM/CRM, 200 tracking numbers, process training, email templates, phone scripts, online sales training, a huge properly priced inventory and the best converting website in the world are worthless without traffic.

There are many ways to generate online traffic for car dealerships:

Read more

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Technorati Tags: car dealership traffic, dealership website traffic, online traffic

What happened to the Biz - An interview with L.B. Gross

The good thing about what I do is that I get to meet many interesting people day in and day out. I was really astonished when my old used car manager, L.B. (Low Ball) Gross, contacted me after he had his secretary run me down.

This brought back memories of some of the things he taught me back in the day, 1990 to be exact.  For example, how he introduced himself to customers on a T.O. “Hey, Joe, how much do you owe…” in his slow, long southern drawl and my favorite, “Do you think we can get it for a dollar,” his way of saying that he was not going to book a trade.

Today, Ol’ Low Ball has one of the most profitable Buy Here Pay Here lots in the country and wanted to come school us young bucks on how the car business really should be.

He told me before our interview he wanted to set up his own blog and was going to show us how it’s done.  I offered him a compromise, because there is enough competition in the automotive blogosphere here and here.  I told him he could access one that is already up and running, with readers and advertisers.  This way he did not have to worry about setting up a new shop and he could have a desk and get a portion of the profit with none of the expense.  (He really liked that idea by the way.)

Paul Rushing (PR) : Ol’ L.B., I am glad you took the time to run me down.  Seeing as how I thought you would be in a nursing home or dead by now.  How did you find me?

L.B. Gross (Ol’ L.B.) : Well buddy, I am glad I found you as well.  I saw your picture when my secretary printed out a newsletter, for me to read, from that other site you are involved with.  I told her to get in touch with you.  She used the computer to find you she said.  I don’t know about all that.  We have one in my office for the grand kids to waste time on myspace.com and for her to get my emails from olelb@aol.com.  I have not been able to check it myself since they quit telling me when I had mail.

P.R.:   Well the business sure has changed since we worked together 18 years ago.  I guess you don’t have a website since you are still using an AOL email address.  Don’t you realize that AOL is more washed up than Detroit?

Ol’ L.B.:  All I know is if people want to send me something via that email, that is the one my secretary tells them to send it to.  I have had it since the mid ’90’s when I got my son the computer that he gave me back 5 years later after he bought a new one.  I don’t know why he did that though, it still worked fine after he showed me how to use AOL.  Then, I had to pay for my email, plus get off the phone to check it.  Now I have to get Sally Ann to turn off the soaps to check it.  She has to unhook the cable TV in her office to do it; I like that.  ‘Bout them boys in Detroit - they really blew that one I think.

P.R.: You know L.B. she just needs a $2 part and some extra cable to not have to turn off the soaps.  But what I really want to know is, how do you think they blew it in Detroit this week?

L.B. : About that part, it did not come with the computer and I ain’t puttin’ no more money in that mess.  I think she is tricking me anyway.  The other day I told her to get my email and the picture was still on.

About them asking for money like that, they really messed up.  You know I am flashy as all get out, especially when I travel to a place like Vegas, but come on Paul, if you’re gonna beg, look like a beggar.  I am sure they had an old K Car or Maverick on the back line they could have all piled into and driven to D.C. It would have taken them prolly 6 hours to get there.  Heck, I bet Marvin, my old auction driver, could have done in 5.  Plus, they should have wore some old kicks, not suits that most people can’t buy with a month’s pay.  You save those for special occasions.  Don’t tell no one but the jacket I got on in that picture came out of the trunk of a car I stole, er bought, at an estate sale.  It still had the plastic on it from the cleaners, but I would’na even wore that.  Some overalls or somthin’, look poor if you gonna talk poor.

P.R. : You have always had a flair.  Now I know why you can burn money like you do.  You don’t pay for much.  What do you think the Internet has done for dealers, seeing how it is a less expensive way to reach people who are really looking for car and not lining bird cages?

Ol’ L.B.: Well, I have not got my website up yet and won’t until my contract with the newspaper is up.  They guaranteed me the back page every Wednesday, coupon day, if I signed a 10 year contract with them for $16,000 a month.  I know it is still working because my salespeople always come to me to work a deal, asking where this or that car is.  I bet 400 people a month miss those special deals we put in there, like the ‘07 Prius for $9,000 and ‘02 Odyssey van for $2,500.  We switch a few of them to cars we really have and Kapowee, we sell a car; only every now and then does it cause us a problem.  See I tell my people when they call on those “Specials” they need to tell them it is here right now but they better hurry.  Someone is coming in on it.  It is always sold by the time the marks get here.  Every now and then someone calls us from on of those danged cell phones on the lot, but we have gotten good at wiggling around that one.

P.R. : Wow, I am surprised your search engine reputation is not screwed up.  I’ll have to check on that and let you know.  I noticed you used “Kapowee, you sold a car” and wiggling.  I guess you have seen the Badger Commercials.  I thought you did not know much about the web.  You had to be surfing the web to see those, right?

Ol’ L.B. : I get my grandson or my secretary to play them for me and to go to some other places.  I was hoping to get the Badger in here to train my sales people; he knows his stuff.  They also show me other things on the computer, too.  There are a few people around this online stuff that know what they are doing.  I like it when I see the same people putting the same stuff everywhere, or ending all of their writin’s with the same 5 paragraphs at the end.  That looks smart to me.  I am just trying to figure out what a spammer is and why my grandson keeps callin’ it that.

P.R. :  Well, Ol’ L.B. it looks like you got a lot to learn about the right way to use the Internet.  Those things are as dated as your white shoes and belt.  How often do you think you can contribute and start your education?

Ol’ L.B. :  I am gonna do the teachin’ here, son.  Don’t you forget it.  Seein’ how there is so much room for people to pay too much for Internet consulting; that is gonna be my new sideline.  Seein’ as how I can’t get my friends to sell me their old cars anymore; they tell me they get more from Craig List.  My secretary showed me his website. I don’t see that as a way to sell any cars.  Looks like a bunch of garbage to me.  So now I am going get this going.  I’m gonna give these people an education and show them the right way to leverage the web.  My game plan has not changed in over two decades, it is time to get them back on track.  I’ll be back from time to time.  Can you let them know when I send you something to show them?  Let my secretary know and she’ll print it out for me!

P.R. : Will do LB we are looking forward to it.  They can put their email in up top, subscribe to the feed below or bookmark Internet Sales Manager in Training.

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Technorati Tags: humor, internet training, L.B. Gross, old school

Who is going to survive? The Automotive Day of Reconing

The car business is taking a bath almost everywhere.  Almost all Dealer’s, Vendors and OEM’s suffering.   The big three is seeking welfare, stores are closing daily and vendors are losing customers at alarming rates.   It looks like the demise of many is in the works.  Almost!!

Dealerships and vendors have a chance if they are not deeply tied to status quo.  Actually many dealers and vendors are thriving in this down cylce, the big three has a chance if they can change their thinking.  What has happend is much like old Wile E Coyote running over the side of a cliff.  His legs keep spinning trying to push forward with all the momentum he has built through his misguded efforts to finally realize there is nothing under his feet but air and all of his hard work has failed him. Read more

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Technorati Tags: automotive marketing, automotive seo, the dip

Can You Find the Ball?

The automotive digital marketing space is now the wild west of the auto industry and represents the best opportunity for dealers, who have the ability to make informed decisions, to promote their dealerships and inventory online. Unfortunately for most dealers they rely on recommendations from individuals or companies that have a back end motive in recommending products and services to them. Like the scouting reports that General Custer had before “the Battle of Little Big Horn” and are being lead to the slaughter.

Carnival like atmospheres and gee whiz presentations with recommendations from people who have not changed their game plan in relation to digital marketing in several years is a recipe for disaster. In this space with enhanced consumer awareness and online trends changing at an alarming rate cookie cutter products with declarations of how well they did in 2005 should tell the dealer to be weary. Read more

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Ten Reasons to not use Wordpress.com for a Dealer Blog

Wordpress.org as a blogging platform is awesome.  This blog uses it as well as most of the blogs you see in the blogosphere.  Wordpress.com is good for joining a blogging community to publish your thoughts and to share ideas with others, but it is not suitable for a car dealership blog.

The top 10 reasons to avoid wordpress.com for a dealership blog

Read more

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Winning the Online Game in a Down Market

Your ISM’s are sitting on go.  Your process is perfect.  Leads are responded to within minutes via email and phone, easy to do you are not getting many.  You and your sales people realize that customers are shopping online before they get to the store.  You already know how to handle the customer that has the KBB print out in their hand on how much their trade is worth, just not as many of them walking through the door.

Every time your cell phone rings from friends in the industry you are trying to guess who is closing next or what other bad news they are delivering.  You may even have some pools running on it.  Your marketing expenses are cut to the bone because people are not buying cars and you are wondering how much longer you will even hang on.

You have two dozen deals sitting in finance that you would of spotted six moths ago.  Paralysis is starting to kick in and all you can think about is what can we do to attract more customers TODAY!!  You have the team in place and the inventory just no tire kickers or leads.

The facts are you have two types of buyer in a market like this.  Need buyers, the projects in F&I, and people who really don’t care how bad things are economically, decent income retirees, civil servants and rich people.  The big fat middle is not buying anything….

If you are reading this it should not matter to you!!!

You can easily capture today’s in market car buyers and the buyers who will be in the market when things start recovering, like they always do, by building your Internet presence today.  Chances are you found this page because you are looking for way to improve your business today and in market car buyers will find you if you put it out there for them to notice you.  If you have read this far you have noticed me,  did I do a decent marketing job?

While your competition is sitting back worrying and your staff is pissing and moaning about how bad things are what are you doing to generate traffic to your inventory and your unique selling proposition, if you don’t have one why not?

Cars are widgets, customers know that, they don’t believe the adds 40% off MSRP and below invoice.  Employee pricing means nothing to them if they are 8 K buried in a SUV that gets 14 MPG.  You are not solving their problems and creating yourself one.

You can win in this down market!!

Make the web your marketing friend not a nemesis you do not understand.  Process and used car descriptions is not Internet marketing.  That is sales.  The Internet is a marketing tool that creates sales.  To win in the Internet game with any widget you need:

Traffic > Leads > Follow Up> in car lingo Tire Kickers > Interested in Buying > Chase ‘em ’til they buy or die.

Massive traffic gets massive leads which give you warm bodies to follow up with.  The ends of the equation are the only two you have control over.  You can create traffic and manage the follow up, if you get enough traffic the leads will be there.

Create traffic where none existed before

Become a problem solver, today’s buyers have problems solve them and make it easy for them to find your solution.  While your competition is worrying about all of the crap this post started with, you will worry about how to attract more traffic.

You can generate traffic on your competitions makes and brands, competing market areas, perfect conversion tools and brand yourself online with people not in the market today or you sit back and create processes with without leads to run through them.

Internet marketing is not setting up a BDC and having a website, they are just a part of the equation.  It is not about launching dozens of dealer micro sites, with no real purpose,  shady video search engine optimization, creating blogs with keyword stuffed content, buying leads, spamming social networks and email databases.

It is finding customers who want what you have, want to do business with you and you solving their problems.  You can do that faster, with less expense and more effectively with a well planned Internet marketing plan that you can any day by using spaghetti marketing through traditional media.  (Traditional Media is a bad term to use.  The web is today’s traditional media)

Execute this now and reap the benefits today and create a base that your competition will never catch when cycles do as they always do, turn for the better….

Paul Rushing
912-266-1629
www.drivingsales.com
projects@parushing.com
www.ismintraining.com

Contact Me: LinkedinTwitter

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Technorati Tags: automotive internet marekting, automotive marketing, automotive online marketing, car dealer online marketing

Where is Your Dealership’s Blog?

If your dealership does not have a blog you are missing a piece in your online marketing puzzle.  Blogs can accomplish many goals for your store and staff.

Benefits of a Car Dealer Blog

• Make it easier for potential customers to find you - Blogs properly optimized have almost instant search engine optimization.  Blogs can capture national traffic for brands and models you sell in addition to local traffic for competitive brands and market areas.
• Customer Testimonials - There is a lot of buzz about dealer review sites and sales person review sites in the automobile industry today.  The built in marketing that these sites offer may be negated by the fact that they people can visit your competition from these websites and deprive you of traffic when people are already looking for you.  A blog will allow you direct moderation of reviews and provide you with an online brag book that you control the content.  Video, pictures and audio of your satisfied customers can be added on the fly.
• Search engine reputation management - A blog on it’s own domain will at a minimum take up two entries in the search engine results pages for people looking for you buy name your stores name and push down entries from sites like www.ripoffreport.com or www.pissedconsumer.com
• Online promotion of your staff - Your staff can contribute and have their own page on your company blog.  That way when people are looking for them online will find them and who they work for.
• Free Branding on Local Events - Almost all local events will issue press releases.  These can be used in your blog to have online surfers looking for information about these event find it and deliver your branding message.  Whether you sponsor the event or not.
• Build a subscriber list - Many people will subscribe to a blog if it provides useful relevant information.  You can set up contest, polls and blog only promotions that will keep people coming back.
• Search engine optimization and traffic for your main site - You dealership blog will provide SEO benefit and referral traffic to you main site.
• Fresh content updates for your main site - Search engines love fresh content and you can add your blog’s rss feed to your site to keep the content fresh and keep the search engine spiders revisiting regularly.

How to start a dealership blog

Starting a blog is easy.  Over 175,000 are started a day according to www.technorati.com and there are many free and low cost ways to get started.  A word of caution do not host your company’s blog on a free hosting service such as www.blogger.com or www.wordpress.com these platforms can be used, this blog uses wordpress, but not as the place where your blog lives.

Wordpress blogging platform, in my opinion, offers the best CMS to use as it has a huge support network and is the easiest to adapt to offer different ways to present content.  You should set your blog on it’s own domain name and a subdomain of your main site should be avoided as well.  Blog hosting is cheap and can be bought for less than $50 per year.

Need Help Setting Up a Dealership Blog?

There is plenty of information online that will give you all of the information you need to set up your dealerships blog.  Or you can contact me and I can help get you going.  Give me a call at 912-266-1629.

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