Dealerfire Blog

Overlooking the Easy Ones...

I'm often asked by clients to eternal question, "How do I drive more traffic to my website?". Now as a Internet Services vendor you might think my first response would be "Spend more money on you Internet marketing, I'll fax over a contract for you ASAP." but it is not, that's the second answer. The first one is that they not forget their traditional TV/Radio/Print advertising and how it affects consumers. Make sure that your website address is prominently displayed in your print/TV ads and is well mentioned in your radio. Most people are NOT going to see/hear these ads and go directly to your showroom in person. That was the old way, 80% of new car shoppers and almost as many used car shoppers start their search for a vehicle on the Internet. Your traditional advertising gives you the opportunity to "plant" in the consumers mind the information they need to find your website. Visiting your website could be the call to action of your traditional ads, "Visit dealerwebsite.com now and search all our inventory from the comfort of your home. You can request quotes, schedule test drives and research price, all at dealerwebsite.com Etc....". It's what Auto Trader, Car Soup and the like do. Once you've got that in place, then we'll fax over the contract for more Internet marketing to scoop all the extra traffic.

Is 2008 a Leap Year?

Not the kind of leap year that adds more days but the kind of where dealers leap over their 2 year lag in technology. Does Internet marketing in all is forms finally get some R-E-S-P-E-C-T from dealers in 2008?  Will they finally let Internet marketing have a seat at the table with TV/Print/Radio and not a small chair that makes it seem shorter than everyone but a real "big boy" chair. "Model Year Close-out" and "Summer Sales Drive" should be more than a small image that the dealer requests be added to their website two days before the event is over. Lets hope that this is the year they catch up, because you now what's just around the corner? Mobile, that's what...

Updates

It has been quite some time since the last post, sorry about that...We have been extremely busy with some new stuff that has kept us very busy. One of my New Year's resolutions will be to get back on track with regular post to this blog.

Some of the things we've been working on:

• SEO updates for our sites, this includes dynamic and customizable text, title tags, Meta's(for MSN) and alt text tags based on page content.For example: Model X now has Model X specific text and tags which are generated on the fly and can be edited for customization. This allows for SEO optimization down to the vehicles details pages and some very, very good keyword density.
• We added Social Marketing via Facebook.com's new Socialads platform, you can find out more on this service here --> Dealerfire Social Marketing . MySpace is launching a similar service early next year and as soon as it launches we are going to add it as well.

We are almost finished with the our Google Base integration software. The final version should be ready literally any day now but you know how things tend to ssslllloooowwww down around the holiday's. This will automate the feed from dealers inventory to Google Base with XML.  When the backend to this is finished it will open up a whole new area of possibilities, the main one being the ability to put dealer inventory directly on the customer's PC desktop.

Thats a few of the things we've been working here, the rest is still top secret....Happy Holidays.

You Spend How Much on Newspaper ads?

Consider this.....80% of automotive consumers start their search for a new vehicle on the internet. Now check out this graph from a 2007 NADA data sheet, specifically the percentages for newspaper & Internet.

Talk about things that make you go hmmm....27.3% on newspaper and 11.5% on internet. Do 80% of new car buyers search for vehicle info and local dealers through which medium? Now consider this fact published by Media Life Magazine concerning research data from Jupiter Research...

    "It found that on average online users are now spending about 14 hours a week surfing the internet, which is equal to the amount of time that they spend watching TV.

By comparison, on average each week they spend one hour reading magazines, two hours perusing newspapers and five hours tuning into the radio. In fact, they spend more time online than they do with all those other media combined." (you can read the full article here)

The time has come for dealerships seriously reconsider their overall marketing budget is allocated, especially when it comes to newspapers. The ability of online media and advertising outlets to target users by location is outstanding. It's to the point that if a dealership has the vision and guts, Yahoo can put your ads on the front page of Yahoo!. That is your dealership or auto groups ad, right here, targeted to people from your area. I know this because I've spoken with Yahoo and seen some sample dealership ad programs. Now it's not cheap but then again neither is newspaper advertising....Stayed tuned to this blog for more info....

Score!!!

Asbury Auto will switch it's 124 new vehicle dealerships to Dealertracks Arkona DMS.

Update for "I have returned bearing gifts..."

My gift/tip on updating your business directory via one location has been slightly spoiled by an "internal server configuration" error at InfoUSA's website, thanks Michael for pointing it out. I chatted with InfoUSA's live help on the site and they were actually helpful. They gave me a number for the Data compilation Dept which I promptly called to see what could be done to remedy the error. I talked to a gentleman named Larry who couldn't help with the server issue but did give me an email address that you can use to update/change your business listing. Just send them an email with a blank subject line containing the information you would like changed/updated and they'll take care of it. The email address is contentfeedback-at-infousa.com. The server error hopefully should be fixed shortly so bookmark the link for future reference and add the email address to your contacts as a backup. Hmmm....maybe it was the 100's of thousands of my blog readers trying to use the link at once that caused the problem.

Recycle...your old internet leads that is

Do you have some fairly recent internet leads that haven't panned out?  Update the information you have by running it through a data company. I would suggest W3 Data, the company that also does whitepages.com. Whitepages.com is a great to tool for verify phone/address info or getting an address if all you have is a phone or doing reverse phone & address lookups. Now for the recycling part..If your have a name and home address it is a one step process to get income, median home value, owner/renter and other demographic information appended that can help you zero in on the right vehicle/price point for that lead. If you have only a name and home phone number it is a two step process. First you update the name/phone list with with the address, then update the demographic data. Going through these steps allows you to get better info on a lead and turn an internet lead into a direct mail prospect as well. You can give it a look yourself at W3's website under their update customer list and profile customer lists.

I have returned bearing gifts...

I apologize for my absence and many thanks to those who emailed me about when I would post to the blog again. I have been busy with some new clients and had a mild case of writers block. The new client has been setup and is now running smoothly. The writers block has been overcome with a stronger flavor of coffee, and the rumors floating around the office/internet that it also contains Tanqueray Gin are completely false.
Now down to business...As mentioned in the title of this post, I have a gift or more to the point a tip.
A quick and fairly easy way to make sure your dealership is showing up in online business directories and to make sure that the information is correct. Instead of tracking down every possible online business directory and filling out numerous forms, you can follow the link I'll paste below and fill out one form. I found this link while digging through Yahoo's Yellopages verifying business info for our clients. The link is to InfoUSA, who provide the bulk of data and listings for online directories. They also provide business data for in-car navigation systems as well. So follow this link and update your information in one spot, http://dbupdate.infousa.com/dbupdate/index.html

Points of Interest from JD Powers Automotive Study

Automotivedigest.com has published some info from the latest JD Powers Automotive study. It covers emerging technologies in the automotive industry for the US. Some of the findings; $100 is the price point for a USB interface and $150 for an IPOD interface. See the rest here at automotivedigest.com.

Is that a Mini in your Pocket or are you Just Glad to See Me

Here is some YouTube video of the new Mini Clubman, a slightly larger version of a Mini Cooper. The purists will and have been bashing it as "too big",  but I say this could be the Mini for the rest of us. My wife drives a Mini Cooper Convertible which we recently drove from Wisconsin to North Carlina to see the in-laws. The ride is smooth and power at highway speeds is quick but loading/unloading can be serious exercise in patience building. The back seat is only suitable for imaginary friends and/or a few bags of groceries. Don't get me wrong....the Mini Cooper is a blast to drive but at least now you don't have to choose between buying a Mini and having children.