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.
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Technorati Tags: automotive internet sales, automotive vendors, online marketing

Digital Dealer V - Use it or lose it..

Unfortunately my plans for Digital Dealer V were canceled at the last minute, but the timing was good personally.  It does look there will be a lot of things covered there as there always is.  This appears to be the crowning glory for Mike Roscoe and his publications.

I sure hope that we will see some coverage for the event as eluded to by Jared over at DrivingSales.  If not  the “Dealer Magazine Trio” and vendors in attendance are missing huge marketing opportunities that would allow them to maximize their presence and reach people who were unable to attend or going to the JD Powers event.

I really would of loved to eves drop in on some of the things being presented.  More than anything to see if anything being presented was more than monkey tell, monkey do closed with a sales pitch to buy a training program or process that has not been rewritten in the last 3 years.

Internet marketing techniques and web applications should always be in a state of flux, online presences should be maximized and relying on one size fits all plug and play widgets without real ownership at the dealership level is a waste of marketing capitol.

Just like sales 101 some things will pass the test of time in the automotive Internet arena but that will mostly boil down to process and lead handling, which should always be tweaked as data and trends become evident.

If you are in attendance and take away one idea that could really impact your business make sure you act on it.  It could be as simple as getting back to the basics or as complicated as wiping your online marketing slate clean and restarting from scratch, just make sure you follow through..

Stay up to date on Digital Dealer V and other industry events at DrivingSales

Technorati Tags: dealer magazine, digital dealer, drivingsales, Mike Roscoe, online automotive internet marketing

A recap of a good day on the other side of the Car Biz

Many of my regular readers know that I am not longer In the Trenches as and Internet Sales Manager.  I now am working full time to help build an Automotive Social Network and publish content in many places.  Today has had to be one of the more interesting days since starting this adventure.

• A good friend who I met either here or at another network that deals in Automotive Digital Marketing was announced as the winner of the DrivingSales.com automotive marketing strategy contest.  Eric Miltsch, the winner, is the IT director for Auction Direct USA and a runs a Used Car Blog, by sharing with others how he is leveraging twitter and other properties to sell more cars.
• We had the most post ever at the leading auto industry blog in the world today.
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  Technorati Tags: automotive digital marketing, in the trenches, used car blogs

Where is your Automotive Industry blog?

Why are dealers and vendors that serve them not heating up the blogosphere?

Some Numbers -

• Around 175,000 blogs are created EACH DAY.
• Technorati claimed that on July 31, 2006 that they started tracking their 50 Millionth blog.

It is tough to claim your space in the blogoshpere but not impossible. The reason you see so many blogs being created daily is because most are just pure marketing pieces not designed to build a brand or encourage dialog. They are aberrations of the logical purpose for creating blogs.

Automation is not the key. That is splogging and does nothing to really build a brand. People want to be able to connect with you and a blog is probably the easiest way to do it. It allows you to get your message across in a non confrontational way and give individuals a connection with you and your brand.

Technology has enabled customers to dramatically change their attitude towards marketing. As a result, they are tuning out in increasing numbers and talking back. Customers are shifting massively their entertainment and information consumption away from traditional media to the new web space.

Marketers are responding by shifting their advertising to web properties, but online advertising is struggling to gain trust. According to a recent Forrester survey of US households, only 6% trust search engine ads and 2% online banner ads. Customers trust themselves and each other in influencing their perception of a brand. Yet few marketers have embraced blogging, although it supposedly enables a more personal and two-way interaction with the brand. Logic+Emotion

Traditional media is dying. Our one sided messages are being ignored and those that take the time to differentiate themselves will capture more of the shrinking market share. Blogs can be uses as PR tools, to influence, advertise, build conversations and expand your creativity.

Personal and corporate blogs can widen your reach and tap into other online conversations, that is how you build a brand. If you can establish yourself as a hub for information to those that you are wanting to attract to your business then you have tapped into the power of blogging as a marketing tool.

You can build calls to action in your message
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Technorati Tags: automotive blogging, car dealer blogs, permission based marketing

Automotive Social Networking - Starting to Gain Traction, Finally…

Automotive Social Networking is gaining ground in the Industry at an alarming rate. I did a post here in the past, you will find the link below, that discussed how much room there was for improvement in this sector and now since taking on affiliation with http://drivingsales.com feel that it is time to revisit the subject.

When discussing Automotive Social Networking in this post I am referring to spaces that cater to dealers and their employees, and vendors in the dealer services segments. Not social networks that are designed to reach consumers and engage them. That is a topic for another day. Right now I am just concentrating on platforms that have an open membership and allow members to contribute content other than comments, so no blogs discussed either.

The main purpose of social networks is to connect people with each other to share ideas and experiences

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Technorati Tags: automotive social networking, car dealer social networks, social networking, vendor ratings

Automotive Social Networking - It’s Failing Miserably

Update - New Take on Automotive Social Networking Visit this Link- Update

Social Media Networks in the automotive industry are fledgling and the dynamics created inside of them is atypical of what you see in other niches. Some of what I have seen are complete aberrations and others I have a special kindred for, all have afforded some decent networking opportunities, even the one that is a laudable project. Social Networking also includes blogs but for now I will just concentrate on the networks that I visited recently.

Here is how I rate the networks that are out there:

• Car Dealers Social Network - (145 Members) Very diverse network but a tight group. Lots of effort put in lately to cut down on the spam post. Tends to cater more towards dealership employees and some fledgling vendors. It goes through spurts of activity.
• Automotive Digital Marketing (399 Members) - Seems to be a sounding board for its founder to show off. Not a lot of quality there. I have had some good networking opportunities, but refuse to visit very often due to the myspace feel and the Me Me Me hand waving. Maybe it will make it if they quit spamming other networks trying to take away members and change the layout and feel there. Seems to have the most activity but it is mostly billboards for an outdated wealth of knowledge.
• iMagic Lab Connect - (198 members) I have not spent a lot of time there but like the fact that joining is moderated and they have in their TOS that advertising implicit or overt my cause you to loose your account. They seem to be doing a good job as far as it being real networking but then again the activity level seems to be low as well. (Up Date 4/17/08 Membership has not grown since this post and I have deleted my account there.)

Social Networking is not about showing off it is about community. As in all communities you will have leaders that provide the most benefit to the members but when leaders try to develop a community around themselves it is doomed to fail. I have seen it happen to many times. From forums to social advertising networks (Yes there is such a thing) when people try to over promote themselves or product it becomes ineffective and takes away from value that can be garnered.

All three of the networks listed above are sponsored one way or another by vendors in the automotive arena and tend to alienate their bread and butter, the dealers and are open for consumers to browse. Granted the car business has a bad stigma in the eyes of it’s customers but allowing consumers to see marketing tactics and to hear the general groan taking place in the industry right now is not going to help dealers or vendors to be more profitable. The doors need to be closed (previous post about this) and membership bases need to be strengthened.

To sum it up. The network with the largest number of members is really doing the worst job and has the least likely chance of making it in my opinion. The other two networks actually have a better networking atmosphere and free flow of ideas. They all have a dismal showing for the number of dealership employees and vendors in the marketplace and none of them have real gate keepers to keep the content out of prying eyes. With a rough estimation of 100,000 automobile dealers in the US if only 50% participate in online marketing and only 50% of them looked to enhance or share their knowledge in an online community we are failing miserably based on member levels in these communities.

Update - New Take on Automotive Social Networking Visit this Link- Update

Technorati Tags: automotive social networking, car dealer social networks