DealerRefresh - Obstacles, Observations and Opinions of an Automotive Internet Sales & Marketing Manager

DealerRefresh

Obstacles, Observations and Opinions of an Automotive Internet Sales & Marketing Manager

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Future of CRM

You know the biggest players: eLead, VinSolutions, DealerSocket, and Reynolds Contact Manager, but do you know when they were originally coded? I believe the newest one of that pack came to market in 2003. Do you remember 2003? I think we, as an industry, were finally beginning to accept that the Internet was not going to be a fad and maybe we should start taking these Internet leads more seriously. And the biggest CRM innovation was to have a web-based system. It was an easier time.

Regardless of how much lipstick gets applied to the pig, or how many other technologies they acquire, there is no getting around age. Unlike people aging to become wiser, technology withers. It may get more feature-packed, but the original data model and technology backbones just get more and more stressed. Also, while aging, the original designers and engineers usually aren’t still working on the core product… if they’re even at the same company anymore. So, with age, the original design intent gets lost.

We all watched Microsoft struggle with legacy tech like Windows 98 and then Windows XP. We will probably watch Apple lag without the Steve Jobs passion. It is absolute fact that thousands of dealers are stuck in a time warp with outdated CRM technology right now. The crappy part for us in the car business is that few modern options are in the marketplace yet.

So, I want to take this opportunity to write about what I think a CRM in 2020 could be.

[Read more…]

Categories: CRM

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Car Sales Burn Out and Three Ways to Avoid It

Car sales is the greatest job in the world, I truly believe this. We sell vehicles we do not own to other people and get paid to do it.

How awesome is that?

Somewhere along my career I lost the magic. I still appreciated my job, but I forgot what a privilege it is to walk into a car dealership that I did not own, turn on the lights for which I did not pay the electric bill, sit at my desk which was purchased for me, prospect on my very nice computer and phone which belong to the owners, greet a customer who came in as a result of marketing I did not pay for, and using only my personality and the information I was trained to know, sell this person a car I don’t own – and get paid handsomely!

I was the happiest, bubbliest salesperson anyone had ever seen. Why? [Read more…]

Latest Hot Topic in Forums

Content is dead. Long live Content? (Video Content)

Matt Lasher Noob

First Name:
Matt
Company:
West Herr Automotive Group
Location:
Buffalo, NY

Hey All,

New to the DealerRefresh forum, but wanted to thank you all for your contributions.  Always entertaining and informative to read.  I was hoping to open a dialogue about custom content on FB/IG – and what ya’ll think is working (or not) for you.

Programmatic approaches aside (dynamic inventory retargeting, etc…) – I’m just discussing custom made creative content produced by your teams – including outside agencies – if that’s how you roll.

My macro view and goal for our group on social – humanize the brand.

Recently, I was discussing with my team the value (or cost) associated with custom video content and whether it’s worth the effort…we have some reoccurring content pieces we make in-house (with a little outsourced help) such as:

Some of these pieces of content are more expensive than others – both in terms of labor/attention/time resources, and actual invoiced dollars.

So focusing in on one video – from FB business metrics > audience retention, an example of engagement:

50% of audience lost by :06, only about 5% watch to the end!   :dontdoit: Pretty disappointing!  Although on it’s surface we might feel ok with ‘views’ or ‘shares’ or ‘comments’…

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Most videos we’ve made have very similar engagement patterns.  I suppose we could ignore this and high five each other with the vanity metrics but that seems silly and it feels (to me anyway) ‘expensive’ and a ‘luxury’ to produce.

So I’m wondering if anyone is having measurably different success with engagement on any video content?

Join this discussion in the dealer forums

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Do you trust your vendors?

This post refers to a fast moving thread in the forums, go there for more details and updates!

Warning:  What you read here might hurt your trust level in some of your website vendors’ solutions.

Attention Car Dealers & OEMs, technology vendors are moving at light speed and you may be getting fleeced.

We all know that Dealers spend thousands upon thousands of dollars, each month, driving traffic to their sites. Dealers, do you know some of your “trusted vendors” HARVEST your precious website traffic and sell it to advertising companies? [Read more…]

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Thank Your Customers. The Right Way.

We’re all taught the importance of “Please” and “Thank you” at an early age. Since before most of us could walk and talk, our parents were helping us develop manners. I can clearly remember drilling this concept into my daughter Harper roughly 97,340,309 times between the ages of 2.5 and 5. Generally it sounded something like “What’s the magic word?”. At some point we pick it up. At 8 yrs old, Harper nails it about 75% of the time and I’m pretty good with that.

In the business world, these manners are the foundation of customer service – “Good afternoon, this is Jody at Checkered Flag Toyota, how can I help you?” – some version of this plays out thousands of times a day across the country. It’s the right thing to do and we train our teams to cover these basics from day 1.

From our customer’s perspective – this is the cost of entry. People want to feel acknowledged, appreciated and respected. However – the “Thank you” game is changing with the advent of increased online retail activity. There are measurable benefits to any local business, car dealers included, of saying thank you the right way.

We talk a lot about keyword strategies in digital marketing. In SEO specifically, we focus on ensuring that we are using the name of our business, our products and services and geographical locations we serve on our website. This is good content for the reader and for the search engines – Google and others need to know WHO you want to come to your site.

There is a new player on the SEO block for local businesses, hidden in plain site on your Google My Business page – customer reviews. Reviews aren’t just for the next prospect to get a pulse on the business or for the current customer to praise or criticise their experience – they fuel the Google local search algorithms with the information needed to properly understand your business and direct traffic. [Read more…]

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Digital Retailing WILL Redefine Your Dealer’s People Strategy, and Here is HOW!

Car Dealers: Want Digital Retailing? Start by Redefining your People Strategy

Digital retailing has officially arrived. The perfect storm of change is upon us. Technology advancements, customer demand and OEM programs are pushing retail automotive down a new path.

The early adopters of this technology have figured out what the rest of the industry is going to uncover. This isn’t a simple plug and play application that allows us to engage with our customers online, nor is it just a new and improved lead generation tool. If done correctly, digital retailing will impact every facet of your dealer business. Pricing, compensation, sales process, branding and communication all have to be evaluated and revolutionized.

If you are not sure if your business can handle all this at once you are probably right. Here’s where to start… [Read more…]

Latest Hot Topic in Forums

What is this Google – Project Beacon

Jeff Kershner Founder

First Name:
Jeff
Company:
DealerRefresh & Mercedes-Benz of Hagerstown
Location:
Maryland

Received this in the mail today…

Google Beacon Project

It’s a beacon, from Google. So I googled it….

About Project Beacon by Google

Google is piloting a program where we send beacons to businesses with physical locations to make their venues more visible to customers with mobile devices. The program is currently free. Here is how it works…

Benefits

Beacons help mobile devices determine a user’s location more accurately. When a user’s smartphone has a better understanding of their location, you can unlock a wide range of new features, and set up your business to use location-related features across Google:

  • Help your business show up on personal maps or saved places, where users have opted in to Location History.
  • Gather photos, reviews, and other user-generated content for your business from people who’ve actually visited.
  • Provide features like Popular times and typical visit duration to help customers plan their visit to your business.
  • Help provide Location Insights about how customers engage with your store. Visit your Google My Business Insights Page to learn more.
  • Access more features as they become available.

Keep in mind

The features available to your business depend on the number of users that visit your venue, visit durations, size of venue, and other factors. We can’t guarantee any particular feature will be available to your store.

Requirements

The Project Beacon pilot is available to selected businesses in the US and UK. In order to take part in the trial, you must receive a beacon from Google. If you’re interested in receiving a beacon, fill out this interest form. If you’ve already received a beacon, you can set it up by following the instructions enclosed in the box it came in, and completing this form.

How it works

The beacon transmits a one-way code that’s unique to your venue. When a user visits your venue with location services on their device turned on, their phone can use the beacon signal in order to understand that it’s visiting your store. The beacon itself does not collect or store any information. It only provides a helpful signal to your customers’ phones.

We may ask users who’ve visited your venue to contribute reviews, such as star ratings, answers to quick questions, photos, and more. Once enough of your visitors’ phones have detected visits to your store, we’re able to turn on aggregated features such as Popular times for your venue’s Place Page.

The data shown in these products is based on anonymous, aggregated visit statistics. It’s not possible to tie a particular visit back to a particular individual. We use industry best practices to ensure the privacy of individual users.

Of course, you can choose not to participate after receiving a beacon. This won’t affect your business or change how it currently shows up on Google. But by setting up your beacon, you’ll be able to take advantage of a wide range of location-enabled features like real-time Popular times and visitor reviews.

Anyone else receive one of these?

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Digital Marketing: It’s Time for OEMs to Rethink Their Co-Op Programs

Digital Marketing: It’s Time for OEMs to Rethink Their Co-Op Programs

This article was not written to be cute or semi-controversial. It was also not written for dealers to read, nod their heads and then do nothing. It was written for dealers and OEM executives to get beyond the bullshit being fed to them by their digital marketing partners (and sometimes even by their own marketing teams) and stop the digital marketing waste and fraud that’s costing the average OEM and their dealers hundreds of millions a year.

Digital marketing is likely the biggest waste and fraud ever perpetrated on OEMs and dealers; and it needs to stop. OEMs are (unwittingly) facilitating so much of this that the initiative to stop it has to come from their ranks. In fact, for many OEMs, it may have to come from the CEO herself/himself.

If you take a deep dive into the average dealer’s digital marketing spend from last month, you’ll likely see their OEM helped them pay for (via digital marketing co-op) some or all of the following: [Read more…]

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3rd Party Classifieds Battle to Win-the-Click

One of the questions I receive most often from dealers is whether or not they are overpaying for their third-party classifieds. The dealers overall agree that third-party classified sites (*TPCs) are a foundational element in a successful digital marketing strategy, however they are concerned as the pricing has continued to climb over the years. It seems to be a love/hate relationship.

The TPC space is currently experiencing a significant disruption, as CarGurus is capturing market share from the other two established players, or at the very least applying significant downward price pressure. Cars.com and Autotrader have responded with innovations and changes designed to combat the new CarGurus pressure, but as I advise dealers, let the numbers and results speak for themselves… [Read more…]

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Does Your Automotive Marketplace Pass the Friction Test?

Let’s talk about friction.

Friction doesn’t just play a critical role in physics. Removing friction from the automotive shopper’s journey is the key to automotive dealerships prospering in an industry fraught with challenge of running a modern dealership.

Twenty years ago, an automotive retailer needed to be proficient with one-to-three traditional media outlets to promote its value while investing the majority of its time on hiring, training, developing people and honing and executing on processes to win with the consumer. Digital introduced some interesting wrinkles – on the one hand delivering more informed and purchase-ready consumers but also complicating the dealership’s life. The challenge of managing myriad digital advertising platforms and software alone actually began to compete with a dealership’s ability to develop its people. As a result, while the consumer is more empowered than ever, the dealership team members have struggled to master the very tools designed to empower dealerships.

It’s time for third-party marketplaces — [Read more…]