2017 MARKETING STRATEGY GUIDE:

Transcription

1 2017 MARKETING STRATEGY GUIDE: 4 COMPONENTS TO SUCCESS

2 Automotive marketing and the consumer s path to purchase continue to constantly evolve. Using the strategy you started 2016 with is not going to cut it come January or even next month. Consumers are changing the way they search, act, and buy in all aspects of the process, and Google s micro-moments show us that businesses who work to adapt to these changes continue to thrive, while those who neglect to do so have begun to fall behind. There are plenty of tips and tricks to support any business in creating Google s micro-moments. The first one is Be There. This covers everything, which may seem overwhelming. Your business must be there in every way possible advertising to generate awareness, ranking for searches, posting on social media to create engagement, and providing content for when your recipients reach your site. Additionally, each one of these components also has to be easily available on mobile. [1] To succeed, you need to think like your customers and understand what searches are driving them to you. More importantly, you need to determine what searches you are not ranking for that you should be and leverage those queries to drive more traffic to you. Another tip is to segment your strategy: Be Useful. You have to rank for customers wanting more information, customers who want DIY options, customers who want to come visit you, and customers who are ready to buy. There has to be a strategy to reach each of these customers because these stages now embody the evolving path to purchase. Because there are so many areas to cover, it can become burdensome, but these actions can be broken down to a manageable level. Website Your dealership website is an extension of your showroom with the ability to make or break your month. Every page has to drive clicks throughout the site; your homepage should provide content for all the profit centers of the dealership; and everything should be structured in a way that is intuitive and responsive. 2

3 The homepage of any successful dealership site should display the merchandising for the month. Just having a slideshow on the homepage is no longer acceptable. High traffic makes your homepage a great place to leverage why buy here and why buy now messages. The homepage should also drive people into the rest of the website. Conversions don t happen from the homepage, so the site s layout should allow customers to find what they are looking for simply. Plus, with mobile traffic overtaking the desktop, ensuring usability for mobile views is key for continued success. Do this by building buttons, graphics, and other elements of your website from a mobile perspective. Here s an example: Did you know that if you have your inventory page display cars pointing to the right, the angle of the car naturally draws the eye toward the form submission options? If the vehicle is pointed to the left, the eye naturally draws to the lower left hand corner where nothing resides. Don t let visitors to your second most visited page have their eyes drawn somewhere that isn t a conversion opportunity. Research has shown the best pricing structure is MSRP with a strikethrough, discount, and then sale price followed by an eprice button. However, there are limitations with some manufacturers, and in that case we have found that leads can be increased by setting up the inventory with an MSRP value with a strikethrough followed by a Get Your Eprice option. Finally for inventory, less is more. Yes, you want customers to submit a lead, but are there so many options available that they leave rather than making a decision? If the listings and details pages are set up with too many form submissions, it creates a cluttered experience that causes customers to leave the site without submitting their information. Think about it as a consumer: if you were shopping for lawn mowers and the website you were on had 500 lawn mowers, and each lawn mower gave you 10 different options to act upon, it would be overwhelming. You d walk away. Just like at a restaurant with a large menu, it can take forever to decide. You should be providing the opportunity for consumers to submit, but not so many options that they walk away. 3

4 Content Content is king, and it has been for years. As a matter of fact, this old saying rings true more and more each day. The common misconception these days is that content only pertains to the words on a page. Today, consumers absorb content in every aspect of what they do. Content includes words on a page, yes, but it also includes images, social posts, videos and even logos. A key focus for every dealership should include building content around all areas of the dealership, rather than just the inventory. Very few dealerships are focusing on finance and insurance content like GAP insurance or even leasing versus buying. Just slightly ahead of these examples is service, but parts content still lacks attention, as well. There are a lot of DIY searches being made and people who want content to learn how to become a DIYer, as well as a place to purchase the parts to do so. If you provide DIY content, it s likely that your readers will come to you for their supplies. Interestingly, 51% of smartphone users have bought from a brand other than their intended one because useful information was provided. [1] Content no longer revolves around telling your customers what you want them to know. Now, it should reflect the needs consumers are looking to meet through search engine queries: important facts, how-to s and explanations. A consumer sees value in a brand that s committed to educating as much as selling. Think about the lawn mower example again. If there were a business that sold lawn mowers, told you about the differences between them, how to buy one, how to service one and what the average life cycle of parts is, would you find that business more helpful? Providing information like this shows that you care for the customer before, during, and after the sale, and they notice. Content also includes social media. Regardless of demographic, there is a social channel to reach your audience. Facebook alone can generate sales and engagement through customers not actively searching. Your social posts are best used to drive engagement when providing not only sales offers, but information as well. Fun facts about the cars you retail, information about technology they offer, or stories about 4 That amounts to 20% of all time spent on mobile being funneled into these two platforms. [3]

5 your dealership s staff members can all play a part in this effort. Creating a personality for your brand through social media helps customers identify with you and engage. Did you know that 75% of shoppers say they find it helpful to watch videos to learn more about a business, and 61% of them consider businesses with video content more trustworthy? [1] Social media are also great platforms for sharing video. This type of content is not limited to just YouTube anymore. Video can be absorbed through Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, your website, YouTube, and more. It s also a way to stand out, since so many businesses fail to focus on it. Think about your content. What shows a bigger impact? A paragraph about a car s features or a video that displays them and explains how they work so the consumer can actually see them in action, rather than having to picture it in their minds? Content includes all communication from your dealership to the masses. Those that are willing to push the envelope and strive to create new and different types and executions of content are going to win attention and engagement, ultimately leading to more customers. Budgets and Advertising Many still debate the best execution of traditional advertising and digital advertising. What is the ideal balance? Well, unfortunately, it s not a one-size-fits-all situation. If your market is still driven by TV, you will have to devote some dollars there. We generally see a good balance ranging from to ratios. [4] With more and more consumers joining the second device movement, watching TV, and using a phone, 5

6 laptop or tablet simultaneously is now common practice. What you present through your TV spots must reflect what s on your website and other digital platforms. The last thing you want is a customer who sees something on TV, searches for it and can t find it or worse finds something entirely different. With this evolved path to purchase, there has to be consistency between your TV, radio, billboards, showroom and your social media, website, and digitally based advertising. Digital advertising no longer means just Google. So, how do you break out your budget to make sure you are hitting all the right channels? Just follow our budget formula. First, 50% of the budget should go to search engines, i.e. Google/Bing/ Yahoo. How much goes to each search engine? That s up to you. However, paying attention to your traffic sources within Google Analytics is generally a great KPI for determining your digital marketing mix. If 10% of your website traffic comes from Bing, then put 10% of your search engine budget into Bing. By keeping ad dollars parallel to current traffic, you ll get an indicator of performance that also helps limit unnecessary spending. Also, make sure there is an adoption plan for new and emerging trends. Since these trends might not be readily available, a plan of action to accommodate change easily will set you up for success. For example, are you using near me or nearby keywords? Near me searches have doubled in the past year and are worth your consideration. [2] So, what do you do with the other 50% of your budget? 15% - Display Advertising This advertising will provide branding consistency off-site and keep your brand at the forefront of customers minds. Keep in mind that you should design for mobile and then backtrack to desktop. The average index finger is around 2 centimeters wide about 45 to 57 pixels. What size are the buttons on your ads? Are you driving too 45-57pixels The average index finger width 6

7 many fat finger clicks? By controlling design elements, you can minimize fat finger clicks that are driving up cost and driving down performance. 15% - Social Advertising Facebook and Instagram advertising continues to rise thanks to targeting capabilities that allow you to serve the right message to the right customer at the right time. A great aspect to Facebook advertising is the ability to target customers throughout the buying cycle. If you develop a holistic approach, you can build a sales and service cycle and serve content ads to drive engagement. Ad types are no longer just boosted posts. Facebook released offer ads, which are perfect for fixed operations ads that can drive up engagement for your service department. Carousel ads are a great way to showcase new products and features, or you can use them to leverage your dealership branding and why buy here messages. Of course, video ads are always a great option for any step in the purchase cycle. Finally, while these ad types might be built on Facebook, they can transfer to Instagram, allowing you to reach a whole new set of customers. 10% - Remarketing Remarketing is a powerful tool that targets people who visited your website, surfed around, and then left without submitting a lead. Being able to target this group with one message that is different from all others provides you with the opportunity for higher rates of engagement, more returning visitors, and lead increases. Remarketing can be powerful through search or display advertising. These ads require having a message that drives customers back to your site and shows them why they should engage with your dealership. 10% - YouTube and Other Video Outlets Pre-roll or video is now a necessity for advertising. Video cuts through the clutter, takes no effort to consume, and resonates with customers. Keep in mind that with a video ad, the message needs to be compelling and engaging within the first few seconds, so the ad will not be skipped. This requires developing a message just for your online audience, not repurposing your monthly local TV spot. If done in conjunction with your traditional advertising, social content, and website development, you ll be able to reach far more people with a powerful message. 7

8 Site Speed It would be an oversight not to pay attention to how your website is performing on a technical level. Did you know that 40% of shoppers will wait no more than three seconds for a page to load before abandoning a retail or travel site? [1] Thankfully, there are several tools out there that help. The Google Page Speed Insight Tool is one of them. This tool explains your speed score, provides elements to help improve your score and lays out opportunities for continued improvement. The great thing about this tool is that it covers both desktop and mobile experiences separately, so you can focus on each platform s performance independently. [5] There are many factors that slow down page speed. Some factors are simply discovered and easily fixed like image files with that are too large and slow server speeds. Just go through your agency or website provider to get started on solutions for problems like these. Other factors to consider, though, are third party plug-ins like chat, texting, tag managers, and Google Translate. Each of these offers some sort of functionality to drive consumer interaction on your site but can also slow down your site speed. The key is to identify which of these are important to you and vital to your presence and then focus on improving other factors you see as negotiable. Strike a balance between robust content and a clean experience, and you ll be well on your way. 100-Point Inspection Knowing which salesperson has the highest closing rate in the showroom is just as important as discovering which button drives the most leads from your website. By conducting a 100-point inspection on their physical location and web presence, GM s can set up their advertising for success. If a customer comes in with a coupon for an oil change, but the advisors and service manager know nothing about it, advertising is not being utilized correctly. You must make sure to provide a seamless experience 8

9 for the customer from platform to platform, as well as in house. In doing so, you ll drive more customers onto your lot, thanks to your well-oiled marketing experience. Not sure how to define your marketing mix? Leverage the tools at your fingertips that you are already utilizing. Conduct a SWOT analysis on your dealership. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Strengths and weaknesses comprise an internal view of all operations. From the showroom to social, take a snapshot of what that looks like. Opportunities and threats are external factors. What is the competition doing? Take that snapshot and then compare it against yourself. Once all of the information is compiled, you ll be able to see what consumers in your market see. It s important to note that most agencies do this for you. Check with yours before doing this yourself. If you haven t paired your SWOT analysis with Urban Science data, start there. Identifying inefficiencies and understanding the factors that are limiting your results provides insights on how to change direction through creative content and messaging for added success. It can be challenging to monitor all outlets, whether a sales event is running or it s a normal month. The map below breaks down where you should be checking to make sure your dealership s messaging gets pushed to all outlets being utilized. By doing this, you ll be creating a seamless and comprehensive experience for all consumers across all platforms. 9

10 Annual Plan With so many moving pieces, an annual plan is the best way to lay out the year and know what s coming. Planning ahead for holidays, thrust months, and even external factors can save time and money. Thrust month budgets get vamped up to handle the additional search volume, and holidays either drive more sales for a dealership or no sales if it decides to close. Additionally, external factors need to be on the radar, especially during a year like this one where the election has had an impact on sales. An annual plan provides you with the opportunity to analyze Urban Science data, sales reports and performance results so you can constantly update your messaging strategy. By doing this, you ll have the flexibility to focus on what s happening in real time because the general plan for each month has already been completed. Even a simple plan can help free you up to drive focus that will deliver the returns that ensure a successful year. Download our annual plan for free here, DOM360.com/annual. Sources [1] [2] [3] US ComScore data, Media Metrix June 2015 [4] [5] 10