DealerRefresh

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

Archives for August 2007

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While I requested quote from your dealer website, I also sent it to……

I Felt like posting this. I know we ISM’s get these emails requests all the time. I usually laugh at them and move on if I can’t get the customer on the phone (in this case).

Now and then I "might" take a stab at them but it’s rare. Keep in mind I’m not a high volume dealer, I’m located in a smaller town right out side of several big dog dealers. This is a HOT just released vehicle AND this customer is not in my market.

How do you guys handle these requests? And be real!!

Original Lead (using John Doe rather the customers actual name)

PROSPECT INFORMATION
First Name: John
Last Name: Doe
Email: [email protected]
Day Phone: XXX-XXX-XXXX
VEHICLE WANTED INFORMATION
Year: 2008
Make: Mercedes-Benz
Model: C350 Sport Sedan
CUSTOMER COMMENT INFORMATION

Comments: I am Interested in C-350:2008 Model. These are my specification. M.S.R.P.* $37,275 Exterior Color (Metallic paint is optional, resulting in an additional price of $710) Obsidian Black Metallic $710 Interior Color Black Leather1 $1,550 Wood Trims Black Birdseye Maple $0 Options Tele Aid Security and Communications System $650 Packages Multimedia Package $2,950 Gas Guzzler Tax $0 Total $43,135 Please provide me with your best price quote. No Language Preference selected. Address provided is invalid.

Their response to my auto-response

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for the prompt response. I am interested in buying the new 2008 C350 with the specification that I have requested. I am waiting for the best price quote that you can offer. Please feel free to contact me at this account, or my cell.

Thank you

My response

John Doe,

I have to ask, how much of a discount are you looking for? These are are flying off the shelves and most people are not even asking for a discount.

-Jeff

Their response

Jeff

Thank you for replying back. Just do the best you can. While I requested quote from the website, I also sent it 3 other dealers. I’m waiting for their quotes. You can exclude the security aid that I had added.

John Doe

Mine

Dear John Doe,

No thanks. I have no need to get into a bidding war with other dealers. I’m sure you understand.

Good luck with your purchase. I know you will love the new C-Class.

-Jeff

I guess the consumer feels as if they are going to get their best deal this way. Who knows, they might. I’m sure one of those dealers will whore out a car that we should be allowed to make some money on (at least for 3-4 months).

How do you guys handle these requests? Be real!!

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4 Myths of Automotive SEO – By J.D Rucker

Car dealers are usually a year or two behind the internet trends. Some companies are taking advantage of that fact.

Doing search engine optimization for auto dealers is difficult, as the market is extremely competitive. Selling search engine optimization to car dealers makes doing the SEO seem like childsplay.

Since the beginning of the world wide web, the automotive industry, car dealers in particular, have been a year or two behind the trends. Whether it is their reluctance to let go of the “glory days” in the 80’s and early 90’s or simply a lack of time to devote to understanding the technology, car dealers seem to be the last to know when it comes to the internet.

This creates problems for those selling SEO services. There are so many companies out there who are selling services that are not adequate to use against the highly-competitive world of automotive marketing. Here are some “smoke and mirrors” tactics that are currently being used to get dealers to sign on the dotted line for “snake-oil SEO”:

Myth #1: Thousand of Indexed Pages are Necessary

It has become a catch-phrase for website providers who create separate pages for each individual car.

The Pitch: “Search engines read web pages like we read books. They give more weight to websites with thousands of pages than they give to websites with dozens of pages.”

The Truth: In many industries, having thousands of pages available for “long tail searches” (covered later) for individual items is a good thing. People look for “round blue widgets in ireland” and having a page for that is good. People do not search for individual cars, which leads to the next myth…

Myth #2: People search for individual cars or by VIN

The Pitch: “Pick a car from one of our dealers. If you type in the VIN (vehicle identification number) you will see a ton of listings to the website. Competitors don’t list their vehicles like this.”

The Truth: In the automotive industry, people wanting a new or used car will search for “minneapolis toyota” or “used cars oklahoma city”. They do not search for “used toyota camry in minneapolis”. According to Overture, here are the searches from January:

“used toyota camry minneapolis” – 28
“toyota minneapolis” – 32,430

Real humans search for dealers. They do not search for individual cars. They do not search by VIN. They do not search by model year unless they are looking for reviews. The search for dealers when they are ready to buy a car.

Myth #3: SEM Certification Means Better SEO

When I first heard of this, I was appalled. Some providers use their Google Certified Reseller and their Yahoo! Ambassador badges as indications of their search engine optimization prowess. This couldn’t be seen as anything other than a lie.

These certifications are nice, as they mean that someone at the company took the time to learn what Google and Yahoo! wanted to teach about their Pay-Per-Click, sponsored results programs. They have no SEO benefits. There was a company that promoted their “inside track” to search engine optimization using these badges in a press release.

Yahoo! certification costs $50. Google requires a certain spend on Adwords. They both have eBooks and tests that are required. They have NOTHING to do with search engine optimization for natural listings. Sadly, most dealers do not research what the programs are really about.

Myth #4: Flash Websites cannot be optimized

The Pitch: “Our templates are completely HTML. They don’t look as good, but the search engines prefer no flash.”

The Truth: There are ways to allow the search engines to read flash. Even more importantly, most automotive websites that are built with flash technology are built with enough HTML content to give the search engines all that they need.

* * *

There are so many more tactics used on car dealers, but this is a good start. In today’s ultra-competitive automotive marketplace, it is so important for dealers to look at examples and to check more websites than the few that the SEO companies provide.

A company with 5,000 websites is bound to have a few that were optimized. It’s in checking some of the other 4,995 that car dealers can keep from falling for the smoke and mirrors.

Guest Posting by J.D. Rucker
J.D. is an automotive search engine optimization specialist
Original Post on PromotionWorld

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5 Steps to better customer service!

Customer_wanting_service_2 Why is it so hard to come by good customer service in the automotive vendor industry?

Let’s start of with what I consider to be good customer service from a vendor in the B2B sector of the automotive dealer industry.

  1. Don’t over promise and under deliver.
    I find this to be a huge problem in this industry. From dealer website providers to CRM/ILM companies, they all say “YES, we can do that”, only to find out when you have the system installed and running, nothing works the way they promised. Once they have your money and a signed contract you just a number.
  2. Answer your phone.
    There’s nothing more irritating then having a quick question or a minor issue for tech support and having to wait on hold forever. Then after waiting forever, you receive a voicemail that tells you to leave a message and your contact information and someone from support will contact you back. Then you never hear back from them.
  3. Have skilled tech support highly trained and familiar with your product.
    I get so sick and tired of dealing with tech support representatives that know nothing about their own product. It’s even worse when I know more then they do. Don’t get me wrong, some issues are deep rooted and I would never expect a level 1 tech support to fix a major issue but if you have to get with a manager for every little issue and to ask simple questions then this representative needs to go back into training before answering the phone as a tech support representative.
  4. Call me BACK!!
    If I call in an issue and you can’t fix it right away, provide me with a ticket number and CALL ME BACK when you have it fixed. Matter of fact, call me back even if you don’t have it fixed and keep me in the loop with the progress.
  5. Check in and see how I’m coming along and what kind of progress I’m making.
    Here is where just about every vendor I have ever dealt with over the last 8 years in this business FAILS. I can’t recall ever having a vendor call me at least once a month to review performance, issues, or just talk about the product and how I’m getting along with it.
  6. Be open!
    Especially if you’re a CRM or Desking software vendor, why would you not have tech support open on Saturdays? It’s the busiest day of the week usually and when an issue occurs, it’s imperative to have it corrected right away.

This has to be the only industry that allows below average customer support to exist. I don’t get it really, why do dealer continue to sign these long term contracts for sub par products and poor customer service? If a dealer would show the same lack of support to their customers that most vendors do to the dealer, we would sell a lot less cars.

Those are my 6 steps for better customer service. If you have others and would like to share, please do so (lets keep this posting clear of vendors and allow only dealers to comment. Thanks!).

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The Weekly Refresh – Text advertising and the YouTube Generation

Daily_refresh_icon

  • GenY says no to text message advertisements – A recent poll conducted my Maritz Research revealed that almost two out of three GenX respondents (65%) said they were “unlikely to or would definitely not subscribe” to offers solicited via cell phone text messaging.
  • Lillie Guyer over at WardsAuto.com wrote and article “Calling All Customers” while giving DealerRefresh a nice little plug. Thanks Lillie!!

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Should I kill Cars.com and use that money to enhance our AutoTrader package?

The dealer was going to shut down their autotrader and cars.com accounts.

The best part of running DealerRefresh is that I hear from and get to met so many interesting people. From newbie ISM’s to veterans getting back into the business and taking over a dealers Internet Department. Sometimes keeping up with all the emails is like a part-time job!

Last week I received an email from Paul Rushing. He has returned to the car business after a 9 year absence and was given to the opportunity to take over an internet marketing for a Chrysler Dodge and Hyundai dealer.

He had a question for DealerRefresh readers..

“Paul Rushing here in Brunswick, GA.  I have returned to the car business after a nine year absence.  I was given to the opportunity to take over the internet marketing for this store.

The dealer was going to shut down their autotrader and cars.com accounts and rely on the poorly designed Reynolds sites. The dealer was very negative about internet marketing and had a manager that was sharing a dual responsibility of internet marketing and as the Hyundai manager.

I took over the role of ISM and receive all leads from our sites and AT and Cars.com as well as the number on the sites are forwarded to my cell. I am paid as a salesperson.

I am an experienced online marketer selling affiliate products and generating leads for merchants. Applying those skill sets to marketing cars online is not an issue.  However generating support for new ideas is. The dealer principal is a die hard old used car guy. The answer I receive from his maximize what you have then we can open up further negotiations.

We have the minimal AT package however the most leads are generated from them. My suggestion is to kill cars.com and use that money to enhance our AT package. Is this advisable?

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Have you been “Flogged” ??

What do you do when a customer blogs about their bad experience at your dealer?

Well, it happened again.  Another panicked general manager called me to report that a disgruntled customer had blogged their story about a mishandled service experience. The extremely negative post had been indexed in Google, scoring in the top 5 position of page 1 of a search on the dealership’s own name as the searched keyword phrase.

It isn’t the first time I’ve been called to the phone to hear appeals for help; "fix it fast" to "get it off of there" and "what could I do to get rid of this?" I’ve been building dealership websites for 11 years, so my clients usually make the call to me when they are on the receiving end of customer complaint blog posting. For a better term, let’s coin a name for this experience – "Flogging".

What can a dealer do if they have been flogged by a customer?

It’s hard to quantify the actual damages to your dealers business, but there definitely has to be a negative impact. In every single dealership site that we manage, the searches made using the dealership’s name are consistently the highest percentage searched keyword.  So the exposure is certainly there and a dealer’s discomfort is justified.

Whether justified or not, true or an outright fabrication, negative blogging or "flogging" by customers is a powerful way for an unhappy customer to do some real damage to your dealers online and offline business. I’ve seen customers published negative blogging stemming from experiences ranging from a used car sale where the tires were supposed to have been switched prior to delivery, to a new car price that was quoted one way as a phone up, and wasn’t available for that price when the customer arrived, to a press releases from Consumer Affairs about a dealer groups indictment and fine.

My advice to our clients has generally been the same.  First evaluate whether or not elements in the post are utterly false in which case an attorney’s letter might be in order.  More commonly though I advise dealers to swallow their pride and actively do whatever it takes to resolve the issue with the customer while asking for a retraction or positive update in the blog.

At one such dealership, on our advice, the dealer principal gave the customer his cell phone number and personally resolved the issue to the customer’s satisfaction and asked the customer/blogger to post how the dealer rectified the problem. This turned the negative blog posting into a positive testimonial for the dealer.

What if the customers’ issues are not solvable?  In those instances I think a viable tactic would be to participate on the blog and report what preventative measures and changes in policy and procedure resulted from the experience. This can show that you the dealer are sincerely concerned about the consumer and have taken the measures to prevent this from happening in the future.

In any case, shouldn’t a dealer try any means possible to participate and have a voice in the situation?  To me, silence or non-recognition is the most damaging tactic. I think the dealer should do their best to participate so that both sides of the story is viewed.

Getting flogged by a customer can have a powerful negative impact to your dealership.  It certainly should be a topic of discussion among dealership management teams and should be covered in personnel training.  In this recent Internet phenomenon your customers are empowered by the capability to flog you.

All dealership employees should understand that their customer service performance, or lack thereof, could become the catalyst for a powerful negative blog post. Instead of factoring into a CSI from an individual bad questionnaire, a single angry customer can now compound their opinion to thousands of your customers who have searched your most common search – your name.

Guest Post by Jeff Bonnell | Principal of MJM Internet, LLC

I want to thank Mr. Jeff Bonnell for his participation and for writing about such a concerning subject.

There is something that I personally do to help monitor what consumers could be writing or “Flogging” about our dealer. I put together a short step by step video on how you too can monitor possible flogging by setting up an RSS import using Google Blog Search and Google Reader.

Online Dealer Reputation Management How To Video

Online Dealer Reputation Management
 

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Do videos really help sell cars?

Hotswap_screenshot_2

Is Video an effective tool for your dealers online marketing?

Video seems to be all the hype, BUT for selling vehicles, I’m not sure where and if fits into the landscape for dealers. With sites like HotSwap.com and others on the horizon, maybe we’ll find out soon enough.

Until then, will dealers be willing to spend the extra effort and money it takes to produce videos of their inventory (I’m not referring to the cheesy photo stitched videos)? Most dealers are still struggling to get decent photos of your inventory and now we’re throwing videos in the equation!

How can a video walk around of a car be any better then several pictures? Photos are usually less grainy, larger in size and load faster. I can merchandise a vehicle with the right photos with a detailed description as well if not BETTER then using video and do it in ¼ the time it takes to shoot a video. I have dabbled into inventory videos and still do with particular vehicles. The time it takes to do it right is consuming.

Someone had commented on a TechCrunch posting..

“Do videos help sell cars? Maybe if your car is not a commodity, like a highly modified 800 hp Z06 Corvette that I saw listed on ebay a couple of months ago. Yes that you might want to watch the video to see how the car pulls etc. But I won’t be going to a site like that to watch a 10 min video grainy video of a regular civic”.

I’m going to agree with this commenter. When I do video a car, it’s usually a premium high-line or performance vehicle. Not only do I record a full walk-around but I have gone as far to include motor and exhaust sound bytes as well. This brings some interesting and positive feedback from the eBay community and shoppers.

Can videos of your inventory increase conversion on your dealer website?

During a Cars.com webinare interview with Mike Lavezzi of Pacific Honda, Mike tracked an adverse effect in conversion.

“I tried the videos, and I tried expanding the amount of information online, and I didn’t notice much of a difference. In fact, I actually found video to have an adverse effect at times. Customers would notice something that tuned them off about the vehicle. We stopped doing videos, and things started turning back around.”

Now that’s an interesting statement and one that I personally have a few questions about.

  1. Were you using actual video footage or photo stitched videos?
  2. Did you have a 10 second intro commercial before each video?
  3. How was the quality of your videos and were you using a text to speech voice over?
  4. What amount of information were you “expanding” with your videos?

Mike..if you happen to read this, we would love to hear from you!

Another avenue to consider with video is your major search engines allowing videos to show up in keyword search results (mostly in Beta at the moment). This could be a huge factor to consider as search engines continue to have an impact on your automotive dealer online marketing efforts.

Sean Bradley of Dealer Synergy really pushed the envelope with his article in Digital Dealer and is a huge advocate of Video Search, stating..

“The latest multi-media/video trend is video Internet marketing or Internet 2.0. Video search is the foundation for the next Internet evolution.”

Uploading your inventory videos and dealer commercials to YouTube, Google Video and other online video hosting websites could benefit in terms of branding, local market awareness and driving traffic to your dealer website. You can also make use of these videos on you dealer blog, Myspace page or other micro sites as well.

With all of this evident, it still comes down to time and money it takes to produce your dealer and inventory videos. Will or does the ROI makes sense?

How many of you are currently using video for showcasing their inventory?

Do you think video will have a huge impact on how we market our inventory online in the near future?

We would love to hear your feedback!