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Why Aren't Car Dealerships Selling Cars? - Automotive Sales - Car Sales

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Why Should Car Dealerships Train? - Automotive Sales - Car Sales

Topic:

Top 20 Things You Can Do To Fix Your BDC

Description:

Tom Stuker may be the most famous person you’ve never heard of — unless, of course, you’re in auto sales. Stuker is to car dealerships as Tabatha Coffey is to hair salons: a highly sought-after consultant with the plainspoken, proven power to get stalled businesses moving again.

Now, Stuker may be giving Coffey a run for her money in her adopted milieu of reality television: Spike TV has commissioned six episodes of Car Lot Rescue, a reality show centered around Stuker, who is billed as “the greatest car salesman of our time”. Though Stuker’s website offers online training, we assume that the bulk of the action on Car Lot Rescue will involve Stuker’s nearly nonstop travel to right wrongs at dealerships around the globe.

• Work towards success with other non-competing dealerships
• Learn what works and what doesn’t work
• Compare and share information with Internet Sales Professionals and experts
• Receive guidance on everything and anything Internet Sales related.
• Learn to sell MORE CARS, MORE OFTEN, MORE PROFITABLY

Internet Sales 20 Group Dallas Texas

March 19, 20, 21, 2013 Dallas, TX

• Work towards success with other non-competing dealerships
• Learn what works and what doesn’t work
• Compare and share information with Internet Sales Professionals and experts
• Receive guidance on everything and anything Internet Sales related.
• Learn to sell MORE CARS, MORE OFTEN, MORE PROFITABLY

Click Here To REGISTER NOW!

I’m sure some car buyers have the same skepticism trusting a dealers websites reviews like I do the Mayan Calendar. If I did then we both know the world is toast on December 21st.

I’ve heard some ORM vendors advise that the first step to increasing positive reviews is to capture your own customer reviews in a “testimonial spotlight” page on the dealership website. I’m pleased to see the wave of dealers requesting feedback in tandem with CSI requests and yet perplexed by the notion of a first step, directing them to the dealers testimony review page in the buying moment or after the purchase. I’m all for requesting reviews from the customers I.P after they leave the dealership, but posting on the dealerships site as the first step? Forget the first step logic for a moment and lets resonate in reality that customers will be suspect of any company’s site testimonials in the coming days to measure credibility. They already are.

For the dealers who spend all day everyday pushing customers to post reviews on the dealerships site, what happens when Google starts the slap claiming the reviews are not valid. The dealers are not a 3rd party review authority. Isn’t it Google’s power to make sure your found as the authority based on you being a more credible, honest, and candid source for both customers and search engines?

Yelp and Google are far more credible than a dealerships website.

Consumers know you can control the content on your site. The overall consumer sentiment senses that the dealer website does not have bulletproof credibility like peer-to-peer reviews do on 3rd party review sites.

Some dealerships are only populating positive reviews with 0 negative. This is hardly believable, and not aligned with what consumers will start demanding of dealerships in the future. The public demands and respects what their peers say about a dealer on highly ranked review sites much more than what is being said about the dealership on a dealer’s website.

My Uncle John’s opinion and review is be much more believable than any article I can read in the Wall Street Journal or a dealerships testimonial page on the dealer website. In a world where small is big, authority review sites, bloggers, relatives and friends are more influential than the American institution or media establishment or for the sake of this example, the dealership.

I also think most of us want less overlap between CSI requests and requests for reviews on 3rd party sites. I see firsthand how customers get befuddled considering which customer feedback mechanism to use and dealers thwarted by which ones we push.

Validated content is genuine, without manipulation

There’s no perfect answer to any of this, however, our statistics show customers are more likely to post the most authentic, honest, natural sounding review, once they get home or back to work. Bottom line is search engine algorithms are running bots and give higher ranking for validated content. Validated content is genuine, without manipulation and soon enough the public and Google will deem a review as valid when the review positions (filtered/unfiltered) cannot be bought to hide the bad and lift the good, that they are unchangeable from the inception and post live in real time.

Furthermore, one of the largest missed opportunities is the complaint. From my analytics, dealerships who welcome complaints from follow up communication are amazed at the uptick of unsatisfied customers and welcome the opportunity to understand underlying issues and then resolve. High class problem, right? The good news with follow up emails after the customer visit is you avert some of the most visceral slander that once online pretty much damages the dealers bottom-line.

It's a great time to look at partial automation of reputation building. Send a video email after the car sale or R.O. with what I call “organic drip” reputation review requests. This means a natural, day-by-day follow-up program with your customer after they make a purchase. Automating the process pulling from your DMS nightly, building reviews on review sites can work in tandem with your CSI survey requests whether you present a customer survey during or after the purchase.

Jerry Hart
President
Schedule a 5 minute
Demo of eReputationBUILDER

Ask a Question: jerry(at)erepbuilder(dot)com
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/jerryhart67
For more information, visit http://www.eReputationBUILDER.com

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25 Ways to Use QR Codes - Automotive Internet Sales - Digital Marketing - Car Dealerships

http://www.kpaonline.com http://www.automotiveinternetsales20group.com

I had the opportunity to go to Irvine California yesterday to the KPA / TK Carsites Headquarters. First of all the facility is loced in Beautiful California. It was great to meet the executive team of KPA / TK Carsites....

I spent a couple hours getting updated on what KPA is currently enveloped in and I got a glimpse of upcoming AWESOME products / services.

Here is a quick update from Ricard Valeta, the founder of TK Carsites-

Richard Valenta, VP of Internet Marketing Products of TK Carsites / KPA Interview

Now that we have a full month under our belt with our new E-Commerce Dept I wanted to give everyone a update on how great things are going!!  We have been meeting expectations and what's even better we have exceeded the expectations that the owner had for our dept.  I truly must say that the Dealer Synergy 10 step process works.  Now, I know that you're asking yourself "J.R. how can you verify that the process really does work?"  Well great question and guess what I have a answer for you; not only do we have the numbers to prove that the process works but even better we have mystery shopped the competition here in Kansas and I'll be the first to say that 99% failed with flying colors!! 

The SWOT analysis that we have conducted proves as follows:

• the automotive internet sales in our market doesn't have trained phone ninjas
• the opportunity for us to steal business from competitors is open
• 99% of the stores that we mystery shopped had NO PROCESS in place for inbound and outbound phone calls
• we truly can say that we don't forsee any threats from other dealers (but we'll continue to train just in case)
• our strengths are not only do we have the best automotive brands but we will continue to be trained phone ninjas AND we have a process in place

We're really excited about what the future holds for us here at Dick Edwarsd Auto and we fully plan on maximizing every opportunity that is presented to us.   

Meanwhile, nearly every business is represented on Facebook, including the automotive industry which has also parked their cars on Facebook. But once convinced, many people build loyalty with a car brand, sometimes for a lifetime. Cars are emotion and social media is also emotion-driven. Car manufacturers are only too well aware of the emotional appeal and cleverly pitch their marketing at the niche markets they know will be interested in their products. Social media offers many possibilities for interactive communications with fans, loyalists and potential customers. Cars on Facebook seem to be a perfect fit and we try to investigate this.

Cars On Facebook – The Brands In Our Comparison Group

As usual, we need to limit the amount of pages we take into a comparison. We use the number of Facebook fans to form a comparison group in this case. We know that this way of selecting the pages does not satisfy all needs, but we think it is a good starting point for a discussion.

Name	Logo	Fans
BMW		10,58m
Ferrari		8,88m
Mercedes-Benz		7,80m
Audi USA		5,48m
Porsche		4,31m
Ford Mustang		4,22m
Lamborghini		3,66m
MINI		3,07m
Chevy Camaro		2,93m
Jeep		2,73m

You can see a mix of big brands such as Audi, Mercedes-Benz and BMW, next to dream car manufacturers such as Ferrari and Lamborghini, in addition to target group-specific popular brands such as Jeep and MINI.

Ford and Chevrolet are even represented by the, of course historically and emotionally models Camaro and Mustang.

But of course fan count is just the beginning and not the right metric to make statements about the success. For more insights we need to check the engagement of the fan base.

People Talking About Cars On Facebook

The People Talking About This – Rate displays the absolute number of people talking about this divided by the number of fans. In the following chart we chose a data range from 1/1/12 till today to create a better and more meaningful overview and exclude some kind of dilutions through special weekly campaign peaks.

Apparently Lamborghini was talking point number one for cars on Facebook for the first quarter of this year. The highest peak for the supercar manufacturer was on the 9th of February with a PTAT – Rate of 17.09%. During the year change the iconic American car, the Ford Mustang, was on everyone’s lips. Lately, it seems to be Audi USA, that fans are talking about.

In this post introduction, we wrote about the interactive communication between brands and fans, it’s now time to measure these interactions.

Interaction Rate Of The Top Car Manufacturers

The following chart shows the average number of interactions (likes, comments and shares) per own post normalized per fan for a specific time interval. Since a daily summary of the intercation rate is somewhat cluttered, we measured the rate in a monthly interval since the beginning of the year 2012. But for the daily time interval, we can at least constitute the highest interaction – rate peak for Audi USA on the 30th of June. So, in order to protect your eyes, here is the monthly evaluation:

Not surprising, we can see in this chart similar results as in the PTAT-Rate chart before. Lamborghini, Ford Mustang and Audi USA are again on the podium. So these three brands have a relative high amount of active fans, one of the most important factors for effective Facebook marketing.

But what type of content is catching the fans interest?

The Interaction Rate By Post Type

Cars on Facebook – an image driven business. Like already mentioned, photos and videos are attracting the most likes, shares and comments. Once again Lamborghini plays the dream car card and leads in case of most photo interactions. Ford Mustang beats Mercedes-Benz for video content. A rarity is certainly the music content of Mercedes-Benz and Ferrari.

Naturally you need to check the interaction rate by post type chart in connection with the post type distribution of the car brands on Facebook.

Post Type Distribution Of The Car Brands

In this chart you can clearly see the content type preferences of the brands. While photos are the leading source for Audi USA – Porsche and Mercedes-Benz have the highest amount of video content, Ferrari prefers the posting of links and Chevy Camaro likes to use status updates to talk with the fans.

Please note: You can click on every chart and then hover over the data to check any of the numbers.

Facebook Key Metrics For The Automotive Industry

Now to the hard facts for cars on Facebook – the key metrics from 1/1/2012 up to today:

In this table you can easily see the leader in every relevant Facebook metric. Therefore BMW gains the largest fan growth and also the highest number of absolute people talking about since the beginning of this year. Ferrari published so far 594 own posts, a really impressive number and therefore got the most likes and comments. But the most shares were grabbed by Mercedes-Benz. The maximum number of user posts was generated on the Facebook page of Jeep. At least, the highest average interaction rate was created by Lamborghini. And this brand with the famous raging bull logo, which belongs to Audi since 1998, also seems to pull the the emotions of the most Facebook users.

Hopefully, our analysis gave you a deeper look into the world of cars on Facebook and what marketing strategies the automotive industry uses to attract the attention of potential customers.

Are you missing a relevant metric or do you have a question? Just drop us a line in the comments.

Source - http://blog.allfacebookstats.com/2012/07/cars-on-facebook-an-analysis/

Top 10 Trends in Wheel and Tire Accessories You Need to Know

If you are a dealership selling wheel and tire accessories you know they are the driving force of the personalization business.  Just like the fashion industry, car and truck personalization trends change fast and often. It’s the best way for a customer to get a look different from every other factory model. Accordy to USAtoday.com, Ryan Friedlinghaus, founder of West Coast Customs, a Corona, Calif., customizing operation  says, "wheels is always the first question" for customers looking to personalize vehicles, even if they lack the cash for a complete rebuild.

OFF ROAD WHEEL TRENDS

1. Steel Wheels: They are strong but light weight (17 in) lighter wheels are more budget friendly and steel wheels are strong enough to carry speed off-road.
2. Carbon Fiber: These tend to be strong and light weight for better fuel efficiency.

PASSENGER CAR AND TRUCK WHEEL ACCESSORY TRENDS

     3.  Painted Wheels with window designs: Customers can get creative with their favorite colors.
     4. Flat and mono Black machined faced Wheels: For customers that desire a cleaner sleeker look.
     5. Forged rotary and Forged Spin Wheels: extremely strong but lightweight alloy.  Fits well with Hondas, Chevrolet Camaros, Ford Mustangs and more.
    6. PVD Wheels: Physical vapor deposit or vacuum chrome are favorites among customers who endure salty winters because they hold up better than chrome under those conditions.
    7. Hellaflush Wheels: These are popular among the street racing fans.

TIRE ACCESSORY TRENDS

    8. Eco Tires:The cost of all natural rubber has decreased. And orange oil tires have increased grip and reduced roll resistance. This is a great option for those looking to reduce their carbon footprint.
    9. LRR tires: Low roll resistance tires are great for better fuel efficiency. They also fit well on the smaller SUVs and CUVs that more people are purchasing.
   10. Wheel / Tire Packages: More retailers are offering the wheel/tire kits as a convenience to customers. When a customer chooses the wheel accessory the proper tire is automatically selected to come with it.  

Insignia Group, the leading provider of accessories sales systems and training has helped dealers maximize profits for over 10 years. Supporting 20+ brands and dealerships nationwide, we help our customers establish and grow their Accessories Profit Center. Call 888-579-4458 to learn more or schedule a demo.

Automotive Internet Sales and Google’s ZMOT for Car Dealerships

By now, nearly everyone has heard of ZMOT and how it might possibly be relevant for the automotive industry. In case you haven’t, ZMOT stands for “Zero Moment of Truth,” a concept developed by Google. It states that today, decisions on brand selection are happening before a consumer arrives at a store to make a purchasing decision. This also applies to how consumers shop for a car. This might not sound like anything new; we have all heard from NADA, JD Power & Associates, Cobalt, Autotrader and the OEMs that almost everyone goes online before they step into the dealership.


Personally, I’ve been immersed in Automotive Internet Sales for more than 13 years. So, the fact that people are going online first isn’t a huge revelation — it is what it is. However, what has evolved is what is happening and why. People are finding out about a product or business (whether they know the URL or not). To be specific, more than 72 percent of all transactions start online, from one-dollar transactions to jet engines. The first place people go to is search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.), or they may something on TV, radio, see something on a billboard or in a newspaper, magazine or hear about a product from a friend. In any event, they wind up on search engines relatively quickly. People believe that they will get the “real deal” on what they are looking for. “If it is on Google, it must be real,” they think.

So, the consumer will do the initial research on the product or service online. That doesn’t necessarily mean they are accessing the Internet from a home computer or laptop. They can be accessing the information through their mobile device like an iPhone or Android. The next logical step for the prospect is to validate that information even further. Prospects can (and do) go to a myriad of review sites such as Google Places, Dealer Online Reputation, Yelp, Merchant Circle, Edmunds Dealer Reviews and Cars.com Reviews, just to name a few. The consumer wants to make sure that they do not waste their time with bad choices. They have access to too much information for them to have to deal with headaches. Take for example a couple choosing where to go eat out for their once a week “date night.” If you only had one time a week you were going out with your spouse because you have three kids, a puppy, a career, etc., try to imagine how someone will feel when they are spending $20,000, $30,000, $40,000 or more. That is why 80 percent of consumers say that peer reviews influence their buying decisions. An automotive purchase is usually the second most expensive thing the average human being will ever buy in their lifetime, next to a home. But there is another variable: social media. Consumers will also go to their social networks and ask their “friends and followers” thoughts, opinions on products or services before they ever go to the store or the dealership.

I am going to focus on online reputation for the rest of this article, and the next article I will dive deeper into the other parts of automotive ZMOT strategy.

Dealerships need to make it mandatory to collect client reviews and testimonials from both sales and service. It is not enough to simply “suggest” to your team to try to get a review or testimonial. You need to make it part of the standard operating procedure. You might want to create incentives for your team, for example:

• Whoever gets the most reviews wins a reward (gift card or cash, etc.)

• Whoever gets the most video testimonials wins a reward

You can create a mini-survey (maybe three to four questions) at delivery (mandatory). For example:

1. How would you rate your experience at the dealership from 1 to 5 (5 being the highest)?

2. Did I (sales consultant) exceed your expectations? If so, how?

3. What did you like (or appreciate) the most in this experience in purchasing this vehicle?

4. Would you recommend me and this dealership to everyone / anyone?

You should then have at the bottom of the survey a legal disclaimer (have an attorney draw up a simple disclaimer) that says that they (the customer) give you full permission to post (or use) this (review/testimonial) anyway and anywhere you want. By doing this, you can repost or repurpose all of these reviews to all of the relevant reputation sites like:

• Google places

* Local Business Rater

* Dealer Online Reputation

• Merchant circle

• Yelp

• Edmunds reviews

• City Search

• Yellow Pages

• A review blog you’ve created yourself

It is TRUE that some review sites are IP Address specific and do NOT allow a client to post a review at the dealership, Here is the reality... there are a LOT of ways around that. 

*** Please understand what I am saying here... I am NOT advocating using fake reviews or irrelevant reviews. I am saying ONLY to use REAL reviews that REAL clients give you and give you permission to use. 

Try to image if every salesperson and service writer made 100-percent attempts to collect testimonials both in text as well as video, and you posted (syndicated) them to all of the relevant places online. In a short matter of time, you will be able to dominate the search engines with a ton of positive reviews.

I want to show you a quick example of a highline dealership that has bad online reputation. I happen to think they are an awesome store (and they are not a client). I serviced my brand-new vehicle there and I was so impressed with their service that I felt bad for their bad online reputation. On my own, as simply a customer, I shot a quick positive video review and posted it to YouTube and did the proper video optimization. Now, when you Google them, my video shows up prominently on the first page of Google (just Google “Cherry Hill Porsche”). That is just me as a client — can you image if this dealership did what I did? Their online reputation will turn around very quickly!

Here is another screen shot:

If you have any questions about this article, Google’s concept of “Zero Moment of Truth” / automotive ZMOT or how you can better equip your dealership (or individual sales consultant) to dominate with a positive online reputation, please feel free to call or e-mail me.

Sean V. Bradley is the founder and CEO of Dealer Synergy, a nationally recognized training and consulting company in the automotive industry. He can be contacted at 856-264-0564, or by e-mail at Sean@dealersynergy.com.

4 consumer points to consider when selling car accessories

Since the release of the popular film “The Fast and the Furious”, car accessorizing has shifted from being a secret of car gear enthusiast to a main stream phenomenon. Two sequels later and the aftermarket accessory market continues to average 8% growth annually. Car dealerships would be wise to keep up. The demand for car accessories is high. And, just like fashion accessories there are hundreds of options. And, trends change rapidly. Here are four reasons why people love certain car accessories.

1.       Making a Personal Statement

Crisp leather jacket, “I’m a rebel”, Eco-friendly seat covers “I care about the planet”. Just like fashion accessories, car accessories help your buyer make a statement about who they are.  A car is an extension of its owner, and we all want to present a certain “self” to the world. So, whether it’s a bike rack on a rugged Jeep Wrangler or a spoiler on a sporty Mazda 3, accessories gives buyers another way to express themselves through their car.

2.       Affordable Luxury

It’s inevitable. There is always going to be a prospect that’s eyeballing a Mercedes-Benz but their budget lines up more with a Toyota Corolla.   The right accessories can make that Corolla feel like a Benz. With today’s economy more and more people are learning to live within their means. That doesn’t mean buyers don’t still desire luxury.  But, in terms of cost efficiency it’s harder to justify. Rather than stretching their budgets almost $20,000 more on a luxurious brand consumers will invest $5,000 more in alloy wheels and seat heaters giving an economical brand a very similar look and feel.

3.       Protects the Value

A new car loses 11% of its value as soon as it leaves the lot. So unless they plan to ride until the wheels fall off, it’s not an ideal investment. People are aware of this and are more concerned than ever about protecting the value. Accessories like bed and trunk liners, covers, and deflectors can protect the resale/ trade-in value of a new car. This makes your buyer more confident about shelling out so much of their hard earned cash.

4.       More Convenience

 We as Americans are always on the go, we love to multitask, and prefer to be able to do things in our car just as we would if we were in our homes. Certain accessories were designed to offer a level of convenience that many buyers are looking for. The iPod adapters are one of the hottest selling accessories right now. It offers buyers the convenience of listening to their favorite music without needing CD changers.  Navigation systems and Bluetooth are other accessory options that appeal to a buyer looking for convenience.

Insignia Group, the leading provider of accessories sales systems and training has helped dealers maximize profits for over 10 years. Supporting 20+ brands and dealerships nationwide, we help our customers establish and grow their Accessories Profit Center. Call 888-579-4458 to learn more or schedule a demo.

I don't think it's a secret that millions of Americans own a smartphones. See here: There Will Be More Smartphones than Humans & here: Afraid of Losing Your Phone, You Might Have Nomophobia

To affirm this even further, the brilliant folks over at Nielsenwire conducted a study: "New U.S. Smartphone Growth by Age and Income." While their study has produced a plethora of paramount statistics, there are just a few I'd like to touch on and examine their importance in regards to your dealership's mobile marketing strategy.

• In the 25-34 age group, Neilsenwire found that 66% own a smartphone. 
• • 8 out of 10 who purchased a new device in the last three months chose a smartphone over a traditional mobile phone.
• Of the people who purchased a new device, more than half under sixty-five years of age specifically chose a smartphone. In other words, they're adapting to a new world. 

Neilsenwire also examined the relationship between income and age as it pertains to smartphone ownership.

• Those aged 55-64, with an income over 100k/yr, are just as likely to own a smartphone as those in the 35-44 age bracket with a substantially lower income.

What does this mean?

It simply means that people in the age bracket 35-44 view a smartphone as a necessity even if they're making only 35k/yr, while older folks view a smartphone as luxury. If I can afford it, then I'll buy it.

What does this mean for YOUR dealership?

Believe it or not, it all falls back to ZMOT and winning that Zero Moment of Truth. Seems like everything leads back to ZMOT these days, huh? In all seriousness, given these statistics, now you know your demographic in regards to smartphone users. It's time to utilize this information to inform your marketing strategy in the coming year. Several dealerships have already adapted by creating their own mobile app or a mobile program. For instance:

• "TEXT 12345" TO ABC MOTORS to receive specials to your smartphone"

Additionally, more and more people are purchasing smartphones, regardless of income. This is opening up a new avenue for you to reach your customers. If you're not adapting to this new, tech savvy world just like the 55-64 age group is, then you're going to be left in the dust.

Is your dealership implementing the proper strategy geared towards more mobile customers?