If you own a car dealership, you probably see other business owners using digital media to reach new and existing customers. But have you considered that online marketing methods might be right for growing your automotive business as well?
We at Pepper Gang conducted a mini survey that asked 101 people about their automotive shopping habits. Their answers revealed trends in the purchasing habits of today’s car shopper that dealers need to understand if they’re going to continue to grow.
Download our report for the full survey results.
Based on survey results, here are three hot digital media topics you should use if it’s your goal to reach more customers and earn more repeat business this year.
Get Street Cred with Reputation Management
The most important factor that impacted our survey participants’ decisions on which dealership they would buy from is third party review sites, like Yelp or Yellow Pages.
- 64.36% of participants said they check online review sites before buying a car.
Do you know how to manage your online reputation? If not, you could be missing opportunities to win new customers. Not only that, but you could also be missing negative reviews and other messages online that might turn away potential buyers.
Read what to do when someone leaves a negative review, and more about brand reputation management, in our article.
Reputation management is about more than just checking review sites and making sure no one is saying anything negative about your dealership. It’s about creating a positive online presence that welcomes consumers who are researching their next auto purchase and provides them with the experience and answers they’re looking for.
Not Just for Kids: Social Media as Marketing Tool
You know large brands like Coca-Cola and Oreo use social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook to reach their fans. But it’s not just big brands like these—70% of Fortune 500 companies use Facebook and 77% of them use Twitter, and you should, too.
- 53% of survey respondents are influenced by a dealership that uses social media to provide useful content
- 32.67% use social media to ask friends about a dealership
Making the jump into social media marketing can be overwhelming, and it can be tempting to push the task onto a secretary without putting much strategy into it, but be warned—having a poorly maintained social media presence without a carefully planned strategy can be worse than having no online presence at all.
When choosing which social media platforms you’ll use in your marketing efforts, make sure you understand your target market, and where they spend their time online. It won’t do you any good spending time on Twitter, for example, if your typical customers don’t use it—and you could be missing opportunities with sites more popular with your customers.
Once you know where your people hang out online, you need to know how to post, when to post, and how often.
Download our white paper on becoming a Twitter Master.
Most importantly, remember that social media isn’t where you make a sale. Your website or dealership serves that function. Social media builds a relationship with potential buyers, making you the dealer they naturally turn to when it’s time to buy.
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Advertising in the Digital Space
Take a look at your current advertising plans. Have you been using the same outdated outlets for a while? To market your business effectively, you need to focus on advertising that gets in front of as many eyeballs as possible while remaining cost effective.
55.45% of survey respondents say dealer ads and offers affect their purchase decision.
Pay per click advertising—or PPC—is a great way to get your ads, featuring the deals and offers that will win you customers, in front of more faces than traditional ads.
The two places you need to focus your PPC efforts are:
- Mobile advertising
- Paid search
More people use mobile devices now than ever before, and they’re using them to figure out where to buy their next car. Make sure you show up on mobile devices with advertising specially targeted for mobile.
88% of Mobile Search Ad Clicks are Incremental to Organic Clicks (Google)
Paid search ads are more important than ever before, thanks to the proliferation of mobile devices. The Google statistic above means that 88% of people who visited your website as a result of your paid search listing showing up in search results would not have ended up at your site otherwise.
- 81% of consumers say the internet is the most useful source of information while shopping.
- 90% of smartphone users took action after performing a local search.
- 53% of searchers purchase as a result of a smartphone search in the U.S.
If you don’t utilize today’s digital techniques for your auto marketing, you won’t show up in local search results when consumers look for you. Isn’t it time you looked at digital marketing for your business?