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People often ask me how I'm able to stay up on the millions of things that are happening in the world of automotive internet marketing on a daily basis. There are tons of blogs, social networks, and industry websites with enough posts to fill a full day if you plugged them all into an RSS reader. How does an automotive professional with limited time during the day stay ahead and not miss out on the important things?

#AutoMarketing

It's one of the keys to success.

There are content producers galore in the industry. Everyone has an opinion on what to do with search, social, websites, analytics, CRM, classifieds, PPC, banner ads, and every other aspect of internet sales. Throw in the best practices and tips on how to actually work with customers and you have a huge mess. It's not that it's bad. It's that it needs to be curated.

The Twitter hashtag #automarketing is the easiest way to do it. Sure, there's going to be poor content that makes its way into the hashtag. That's inevitable. Many use it as a marketing tool to get their message out regardless of quality. However, the majority of what gets into the hashtag and stays at the top is high-quality.

Here's how it works. People read the blogs, social networks, and industry websites. They find content they like. They share this content on social networks like Twitter. Those who are very active on the internet side of the industry realize that certain hashtags like #AutoMarketing and #CarDealers get fed into Twitter chatter monitor widgets everywhere on the web. Thus, they put in the hashtag whenever they find something of interest.

The more that people curate and share the best content, the more powerful the hashtag becomes. It's not just the industry sites that get posted. Marketing sites that have content pertinent to car dealers often find their content shared with the hashtag as well.

If you want to stay ahead of the curve, this is one of the easiest ways to do it. Just do a search in Twitter for "#AutoMarketing" and you'll find content that curators have enjoyed. You can become a curator yourself by adding it to tweets of important industry posts. The more people that do it, the better the hashtag can become.

We need curation. You can save time by taking advantage of it. You can help by participating.

Source - http://www.automotivedigitalmarketing.com/profiles/blog/show?id=1970539%3ABlogPost%3A422371&xgs=1&xg_source=msg_share_post

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The 7 Secrets to Ford's Social Media Marketing Success 

Last year I noticed articles and videos appearing online and on Social Media such as YouTube about the Ford Fiesta. So I decided to dig a little deeper to find out about what Ford were doing in Social Media to market their products.
Scott Monty is the Head of Social Media at Ford and has only been there since 2008 and put in place a Social Media strategy including multiple Social Media channels.

Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
Flickr

Scott said that his “Jewel in the Crown” is the Ford Fiesta Movement that involved selecting 100 socially vibrant individuals who were provided with the European version of the Ford Fiesta 18 months prior to it being manufactured and released in the USA. These socially media aware fanatics were encouraged to share their experience with the Ford Fiesta over the 6 months on their Blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube channels.
What were the strategies that Ford implemented to create viral awareness without one dollar of traditional marketing spend?

The 7 secrets to Fords Social Media Marketing Success
People trust corporations less so with the rise of social media you need to allow other people through word of mouth create trust for you through Social Media (it amplifies your message)
Reached out to those who are listening and let them do the talking for you and to connect with people like themselves
Let them know that you are real people just like them and are passionate about what they do and the Ford Brand
Run a competition involving Social Media eg.. To be selected to drive a Ford Fiesta for six months – select 100 of those who are “socially vibrant” such as Michelle McCormack ..view her application on YouTube.
Aggregated the content on Fords Fiesta movement website (crowd sourcing content) without editing it!
Implemented multiple Social Media channels such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to create digital buzz
“Get On Board” the executive team and the board of directors

The Results
11 million Social Networking impressions
5 million engagements on social networks (people sharing and receiving)
11,000 videos posted
15,000 tweets.. not including retweets
13,000 photos
50,000 hand raisers who have seen the product in person or on a video who said that they want to know more about it when it comes out and 97% of those don’t currently drive a Ford vehicle
38% awareness by Gen Y about the product, without spending a dollar on traditional advertising ( Fords model “Fusion” doesn’t have that awareness after 2 years of being out in production and yet it has received hundreds of millions of dollars in traditional marketing spend).
Following the Ford Fiesta movement the launch of the Fiesta Ford did run a traditional marketing campaign including TV, Print and and Outdoor advertising.

According to J.D. Power, about 9% of spending this year by automakers will be digital (Ford’s share spend is 25%.. and they were the only company not bailed out by the Federal Government), but that will rise to about 12% by 2012 as more companies embrace social networking, online gaming and rich media ads in place of traditional TV and print.
Scott Monty’s advice on whether Social Media Marketing is right for your company,
“If your customers are there you need to be there too” he also went on to say “You need to listen.. see how they behave and act similiarly”

Source - http://www.jeffbullas.com/2010/02/18/the-7-secrets-to-fords-social-media-marketing-success/

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Who is the BEST Automotive Dealership Website Company? And Why...???

Automotive Internet Sales is creating its TOP 10 LISTS! And the first section is Dealership Website Companies...

So, Please give me your feedback. Remember that is what this site is about... INFORMATION, IDEAS and FEEDBACK.

I look forward to all of your posts and thoughts.

SVB-

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