A customer’s car search starts with online research before heading into the dealership. 80% of consumers start their search with a different manufacturer in mind than the brand they buy.  Many users are utilizing digital, and there’s a huge market for buying vehicles online. Anything is at your fingertips now with online shopping. Some of the top digital channels car shoppers visit to start their search are:

• • Dealership Websites
  • OEM Websites
  • Search Engine
  • Professional Vehicle Evaluation Review Sites
  • Customer Review Sites

Your dealership should be taking advantage of utilizing your presence online to generate more buyers!

Optimize Your Dealership Website

Your website is the home of your brand and the go-to for potential customers. It should have interactive features to keep a customer engaged. Having a user-friendly website with easy access to inventory, the search bar, scheduling, and a digital retailing tool is key. Having a digital retailing tool is very important because potential buyers can input their budget and see exactly what their payments will be. You also want to make sure that your dealership location and directions are accessible. Display your phone numbers and contact forms or information in a prominent location so customers can easily speak with you.

• • Is your website up to date with current promotions and specials?
  • Can a user easily find your inventory or use the search bar?
  • Do your form fills and contact information work correctly?
  • Is your service scheduler easy to use?
  • Is your contact information and location displayed on your homepage?
  • Have you set up a digital retailing tool like WebBuy on your dealership website?

Many customers are viewing your website on mobile. It is crucial to ensure that it is mobile optimized. When it comes to mobile users, there are more distractions. If your website and landing pages are not loading quick enough, you can potentially lose that visitor. A few questions to ask yourself:

• • Is everything working properly on mobile?
  • Can users find what they need at a quick speed?
  • Is your mobile website user-friendly with clear information?
  • Do the images on mobile load quick enough?
  • Can they call you directly from your mobile site or find you on maps?

Utilize SEO Strategies

The most important way for your website to bring in new customers is to optimize search engines. You want your dealership populating on the search engine results pages. Many users are clicking the first few results they see. When a dealership is running a proper SEO campaign, it drives better quality buyers to your website. There are a few factors that go into running a successful SEO campaign – a well-designed, user-friendly website, keyword research, and quality social media content and presence. Choosing keywords that have a high search volume but low competition will benefit your website traffic.

Use Data To Your Benefit

Tracking your online traffic is very important to know what is working online and what is not. Google Analytics is a very powerful tool to help analyze the data coming to your website. The main goals to start with are – Leads, Phone Calls, Chats and Texts. Reviewing the data and becoming familiar with it will help you decide what to invest into which will help your campaigns bring in better data.

Promote Your Customer Reviews

Reviews are extremely powerful when it comes to buyers making decisions. It can make or break your brand. Building up your reviews gives you that backbone of trust. It will help buyers feel more comfortable purchasing from you. There are many different websites that help track reviews:

• • Google Reviews
  • Yelp Reviews
  • Facebook Reviews
  • DealerRater.com
  • KBB.com
  • And more!

Having solid, trust-worthy reviews will benefit your dealership. You can also implement reviews straight to your website to have everything all in one spot.

Create Current Content and Use Video Marketing

Staying up to date with content on your website, blog, social media channels will help reach today’s digital users. You want to stay consistent with current promotions, vehicle launches, and any dealership events. Personalized ads can build a more personal relationship with a potential buyer as well.

Video marketing is a huge way to bring in buyers. Users are more likely to visit a dealership and search their inventory after watching a video used in an advertisement, or on social media. Utilize your social media channels by producing quality videos. Videos can be incorporated into Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and Instagram. Content can include special deals going on during the month, vehicle walk-around videos, service department tips, and more. These videos don’t have to be long, just a minute to keep users engaged. Another way to really boost your video marketing is to reach buyers through Cable TV and OTT. This will get your video shown out to users who are in the market.

As an automotive digital marketing company, our primary goal is to drive quality, relevant shoppers to your website. The next and most important piece of that is setting up the website to convert to a shopper or buyer. For more information or help with your website, contact us today!

Auto OEMs or “Original Equipment Manufacturers” are the official and genuine parts created directly by the vehicle’s maker; however, some in the automotive industry have taken to referring to car companies themselves as OEMs. Like any company, each OEM has their own guidelines they must follow from start to finish. Sometimes following these requirements will make or break your dealership when looking to receive co-op funds from your OEM. Read on to learn more about some of the most common OEM requirements.

 Websites

The first place you will usually find information about a dealer is on their website. Did you know that many OEMs require their dealers to use a particular website or a short list of websites for their digital storefront? From here, OEMs can link in and automatically update manufacture information seamlessly and your advertising agency can then update your dealership’s individual campaigns. One of the most common websites used by OEMs is dealer.com. Users can customize their websites based on templates, upload their inventory and more. These OEM selected websites ensure that brands stay within their digital storefront requirements.

Creative

Like any big-named company, OEMs are particular about sticking to their manufacturers’ style guides to ensure consistency within their brand, while strengthening brand image. The most important areas for OEMs usually include the use of logos, fonts, color pallets, and like you just read about – websites. To help ensure advertising is compliant within requirements, many OEMs have a pre-approval process which enables dealers to submit before they run any creative or campaigns. If what is submitted meets the OEM requires, the dealership then receives their co-op funds. Brands like Cadillac even provide website audit questionnaires to ensure a Cadillac dealer’s website meets all the requirements they look for on the dealer’s website to be compliant.

Campaigns

You’ve seen the Summer or Holiday sales event campaigns that run throughout the year, while these campaigns change often, some OEMs, like Nissan, require you to use their manufacturer campaign in order to receive co-op funds. While other brands, like Chevrolet and GMC, will release campaigns, but not require you to use them. You also come upon situations with OEMs, like Stellantis, that will develop an umbrella campaign combined for all their brands in addition to individual brand campaigns. When this happens, they usually only require you to use one or the other, but rarely both. To find if your OEM is requiring a particular event each month, you can visit the manufacture’s asset website and download assets from there.

 Vehicle Pricing Programs

A dealership is ultimately a business that has the right to sell a company’s product while also using the company’s name. Somewhere along the buying process, OEMs must find a way to ensure dealers don’t take advantage of customers and eliminate unfair vehicle pricing. Many OEMs have developed programs that require dealerships to submit pricing before they’re allowed to advertise a vehicle. Nissan has their “Minimum Advertised Price (MAP) Guidelines” to create consistency in pricing their vehicles. If these guidelines are not followed, dealers will receive strikes against them and risk the loss of funds or even be subject to chargebacks.

While it’s no surprise that OEMs have requirements when it comes to advertising, the level of severity varies from one manufacturer to another. The areas we discussed above are the most common areas you’ll find requirements for, but always check with your OEM beforehand. Not sure where to start? Digital to Dealer Direct has years of experience with OEMs across the board. If you have any questions about what you read or are looking for more assistance in your advertising, contact us today!

From May 9^th – 11^th dealers from around the country gathered at the Tampa Convention Center to network, learn, and grow at the Digital Dealer Conference. From keynote speakers, breakout sessions and meetings with exhibitors, there is a wide spectrum of knowledge to break down. A variety of topics from previous Digital Dealer and NADA shows were discussed, including first party data, electric vehicles and so much more! So, what information should you share with your team? Keep reading to see our biggest takeaways.

COVID Lessons

In many parts of the country, life seems to be going back to “normal;” however, the past couple years were anything but normal! As a result of dealerships being forced to close, a new concern for cleanliness arose. Of course, the chip shortage also placed a major hurdle throughout the industry. Those obstacles were not overcome without alterations in processes and adaptation of new strategies.

When we were all home during the pandemic, much of our professional and personal lives were online. From Zoom calls to shopping, we seemed to be moving deeper into the digital world. We see new technologies emerge (as you will find out if you keep reading), but also see a major focus on understanding that traditional media is not dead. Companies like Carvana disrupted the automotive industry and did so with simple, clean billboards, relatable television commercials and even radio ads. Although it feels like all eyes are on smartphones, if we look up, we can still see how present traditional media is in our everyday lives.

Another major lesson learned was the importance of used car acquisition. Focusing on buying cars off the street led many dealerships to develop a separate department entirely devoted to acquiring used vehicles. Once new car inventory comes back up to pre-COVID levels, it is important not to forget how significant used car acquisition was to dealerships’ inventory and sales during the pandemic.

Dealership Processes

Automotive processes have become automated using digital retailing tools. Digital retailing tools were slowly emerging before COVID but were in high demand during the pandemic. After implementation of digital retailing tools, dealerships had to retrain employees to coexist with their website’s new functionality. For many, this proved beneficial and has become a crucial part of everyday business. The ability for users to shop from home, initially due to safety, and now due to comfort and convenience are the way of the future.

It is more important now, than ever before, to provide an easy online user experience on your dealership’s website to compete with Carvana and CarMax. These industry giants make buying and selling a very competitive game by offering at home delivery and pick up, 100% online buying experience, and one clean website that provides all needed information. Dealerships must adapt to meet the customer’s where they are, both in their buying experience and physically, with customer satisfaction placed in a high priority.

As we move forward, dealerships need to continue to modify strategies to stay up to date with the latest tools and processes. As technology continues to evolve, keeping structure in how your dealership operates will be crucial.

New Technology

In addition to dealership processes, we need to understand the world of Google is ever changing. With Universal Analytics sunsetting next summer, GA4 is on the horizon. Additionally, Google has launched new products, such as vehicle ads linked to your specific VPDs and business messaging which allows you to add a widget on products such as GMB and Google Maps.

In addition to Google, the Metaverse is making a splash in the automotive industry with OEMs like Hyundai already appearing in this space. Having virtual test drives and walk arounds of a car, that is not in your show room, is the future of sales. Start educating yourself now because before we know it the technology of our dreams will be our reality.

These highlights just scratch the surface of the wealth of knowledge obtained at Digital Dealer this year. To learn more about how to implement these and other digital marketing strategies, contact us today. Our team stays up to date with the latest industry trends so that you can focus on your dealership’s success!

Social media has taken the front seat in the marketing world for most businesses and has a large impact on how others view said company. When it comes to social media, not only do you want to increase the size of your following, but you also want to increase engagement as well. Building engagement is a great way to turn followers into customers and that’s every company’s goal, right? Have I mentioned that you can also do this for FREE? Continue reading for 5 ways to increase your social media engagement.

1. Post Engaging Content

In order to increase engagement on your social media you need to start with content that is worthy of engaging in. Topics that allow you to take a poll, ask the audience questions or even something that people can relate to. You want to select content that would have a positive reaction from followers. Think about topics that you enjoy engaging in and use that as inspiration. For your dealership it could be taking a poll on your follower’s favorite vehicle, their favorite place to road trip or even a fun video or photo of a dog in a car. Who doesn’t love dogs? Just remember to avoid sensitive or controversial topics as you don’t want to turn anyone away.

2. Respond to All Comments

When it comes to social media, it’s always good to show that someone is actively on the page reading and engaging with their followers. If you want more engagement on your page, that does mean you need to engage as well. When someone sends a message or leaves a comment, this is the perfect opportunity to open the conversation. The more you engage the more people will engage back. When it comes to responding, you want to be sure to engage whether its positive or negative. This is a great chance to show appreciation if someone is left something positive or the perfect time to solve an issue if it’s negative. Responding to a negative comment, although we hope no one has a negative experience, can be a great way to show you care about your customers and that you want to make everyone’s experience at your dealership, the best experience. 

3. Share Content That’s Relevant to Your Audience

When you’re deciding on post topics, you want to start with figuring out who your audience is. What are they interested in? What might they want to read about? This may take some experimenting at first to see what your followers engage with most, but this is an important factor in your dealership’s social engagement. A good start might be posting positive reviews from happy customers, hot topics about new vehicles or new features in a vehicle or even how your dealership is involved with the community. Try out graphics vs videos. It’s always good to put a little bit of variety in there.

4. Post Consistently and Often

This is a big one! To increase your dealership’s social media engagement, you’ll need to make sure that you post regularly and often. The suggested rate would be 2-3 times a day, per platform, to help you build an engaged audience. You want to be sure to avoid posting too often where it annoys your followers but enough where it’s something your followers come to expect. Your two posts could be a daily happy customer review then a daily topic. You could do “Meet the Team Mondays.” “Throwback Thursdays.,” or even “What’s New Wednesday’s.” Have fun with it and see what works best for your audience. If you don’t have anyone on staff who has the time it takes to post consistently, consider hiring an automotive marketing agency like D2D to handle your social media!

5. Use an Image in Every Post

“A picture is worth a thousand words” and isn’t that the truth! While scrolling through social media your image will be the first thing that stops someone from scrolling to read what you have to say. Make sure you include engaging and eye-catching photos to go along with your post. This will be the first chance you get to pull them in and hopefully engage with your page. It’s important to make sure that your photos are clear and crisp. There’s nothing worse than scrolling and seeing a blurry image. Some programs that can help with this would be Canva, an online software that allows you to develop images for all your social media.

What steps has your dealership taken to increase your social media engagement? If you’re just starting out, we hope these 5 tips help point you in the right direction to get started. If you’ve already been plugging away at this, we hope these tips can help spark some new ideas to get those followers engaged! Looking for more help? Let our Digital to Dealer Automotive Reputation Management team help you! For more information, contact us today!