It's very possible that I'm beating a dead horse on this one, but I'd rather beat a dead one than a live one.

If you hear me speak or read my writing, you'll know that I've been pushing this concept for a long time. This is the last plea I'll be making. It's the eleventh hour, so everything I post going forward on the subject will be tips for those who have decided to do it the right way. No more heartfelt pleas - either you get it or you don't.

Social media is embracing search as a primary missing piece to the time-domination puzzle. Sites like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest - they all realize that being integrated properly with external search while allowing for robust search features of their own is the key to taking the tremendous amounts of personal data they have on us all and turning it into something useful for both users as well as the all-important advertisers and data-collection services.

Google and Bing are acutely aware that they have all of the outside data that they need. The only part that's been missing to some degree for a decade has been true human sentiment on a personal level that is not tainted by artificial inflation techniques. Finding that balance between understanding what the people really feel versus being manipulated by blackhat techniques is the last victory they need to make their search engines nearly perfect which is why both have been trying for three years now to properly integrate social signals into their search ranking algorithms.

Content is the binding force in all of this. It's very similar to the food that a restaurant serves. From a search perspective, understanding the way that food at a restaurant makes them feel is a key to getting a true understanding of consumer sentiment surrounding that restaurant. In other words, the things that people are saying about the food helps the search engines know which restaurants to recommend. From a social perspective, they need to be able to gather all of the data about the restaurants themselves. They know individual sentiment. Now they need to combine it to form conclusions.

This is the bare essence of the merging of search and social around the hub of content. Businesses that are creating high-quality content and using the right strategies to get this content out there from a search and social perspective are the ones that will win in the long run. Before anyone starts saying that they need strategies that work today, it should be noted that marketing is often like driving a car (warning - it's another analogy so brace yourself). You don't look at the road directly in front of the bumper on your vehicle to steer the car. You look down the road. You see what's happening beside you, behind you, and in the distance in front of you. When you're barreling down the highway and you see brake lights ahead, you put your foot on your own brakes.

The same holds true for internet marketing. Knowing that search and social are hovering around content as the key to both disciplines and uniting all three around a unified strategy is what we're seeing on the highway ahead. As a result, we're able to drive the road that we're on more efficiently, at a higher rate of speed, and with the knowledge that we're going to be able to make turns or hit the brakes before getting into an accident. This is the strategy that helped us be preparing for the Google Penguin update years before it was ever introduced. It is the strategy that helped us avoid the pitfalls of artificial page like inflation on Facebook well before it became more of a detriment than a benefit.

This is what's coming. Are your eyes on the road ahead or are you peering over your bumper to look at the road conditions right now?

Here's an infographic by Marketing Adept that gives a decent breakdown of what's happening now. Knowing that can help you look to the future.

This is a topic that has been covered so many times that one might wonder how it keeps popping up. The reality (from a content perspective) is that Facebook posting best practices is the gift that keeps on giving. It’s frustrating to dealers and annoying to bloggers, but at the end of the day there’s one simple truth: whatever worked yesterday may not work today but may work again tomorrow.

That’s Facebook. It’s social media in general from a dealership perspective. There are three dynamics at work and they rarely do more than lightly influence the other two:

• Facebook and other social media sites are constantly changing. As a result of changes to their algorithms, posting rules, and layout/design/UI, the game is continuously changing for dealers who want to be successful on social media.
• Users are changing. It’s not just that more people are getting onto social media. The trends of what they like to post, how often they post, and the platforms through which they post are all in constant flux.
• The world is moving. This is one of the factors that few really take into account but that has a dramatic effect on social media posting strategies. Political sentiment, breaking news, natural disasters, new gadgets, more websites… this list could go on indefinitely. Anything that’s not directly associated with the social media platform or its users can fall into this category.

With so much “posting turmoil” in the strategy tsunami of social media marketing, it’s no wonder that there are major points of confusion. There was a time, for example, when businesses were told not to post on weekends. Today, depending on which study you read and whose advice you take, there is evidence that the weekends are exactly when businesses should be posting more. Go figure.

There have been numerous studies and infographics on the topic, but the one below by Pagemodo does a nice job of giving “JD-Approved” advice on posting times, styles, and frequency. One major point of contention, though, is that the advice to post 2-3 times a day should not be considered a general rule. It all depends on your goals, of course, and unless your goal is strictly branding, this is not the appropriate frequency. Otherwise, the data is sound.

By now, if you've been reading what I've been posting the last few months, you know that content marketing is the key to current and future search and social success. Businesses who really want to do what sites like Google and Facebook really want them to do will be using high-quality content on their websites as the hub through which they can make their marketing blossom.

This should by no means be interpreted that activities such as link-earning and social signals are not useful. In fact, the core of true content marketing to drive higher search results and stronger social interactions is still based around earning links and generating social engagement. It's for this reason that guest posting is a practice that should be considered if you want to get into more advanced techniques.

First, you have to be able to put high-quality content on your website and/or blog. Guest posting does not replace this. If you are having trouble finding the time to keep your own site active and growing, guest posting is something that you should consider. If you're doing well with your website and/or blog, then guest posting can generate exposure, earn links, and even send direct traffic to your website. As with all things in 2013, it all comes down to quality. I say it a lot, but it cannot be overstated.

Write What You Know

The biggest challenge is that we're often so immersed in "what we know" that we have a hard time identifying what can be interesting enough to get picked up by other blogs or websites. Sometimes the easiest way to fix this issue is to be mindful of what you learn about your industry. Fresh knowledge to you in your industry is likely brand new to others, so identifying "on the fly" can make it easier to find topics.

The second biggest challenge is that we tend to write in some pitching or marketing into our guest posts. At no point should you try to work in your credentials, products, or services into guest posts. You won't be accepted as easily if you do. The value that you receive from guest posting is in the links and the establishment of authority within the industry. Teach and/or entertain with your post, then link to your website either in context (we'll discuss that further later) or at the very least within the author's bio box.

Use Content on Your Website as a Resource

In the above example, you might have somewhere in the body of your guest post a paragraph like this:

One of the most common times when we go on longer trips is for summer vacations. There are [summer maintenance activities](link) that you can do prior to the trip that can handle much of the preparation you'll need to do before heading to the beach.

Find the Right Venues

You may think that the only place you'll be able to post is something that is hyper-targeted to your industry. This isn't true. In fact, it's sometimes easier to get a guest post in related industries rather than your specific industry because they likely already have experts in your industry. In other words, a car blog has plenty of car bloggers, so they might not need your car content, but a tech blog who has a bunch of tech bloggers might be interested in seeing interesting technology posts about cars. I know, as I accepted a guest post at our tech blog that was about automotive technology just the other day.

Local news publications are also good targets. They like local writers and with a strong series of content you can even get a regular posting spot. This is good, especially for branding in the local area, but don't get stuck on one site. The more places you can guest post, the better.

* * *

Again, this is not a replacement for putting quality content on your own site. It's an enhancement if you're already putting the content there. Your goal in modern marketing is to use high-quality content to get exposure, links, social shares, and traffic. Guest posting is a tool that should be in your arsenal. Here's a video from last year from Google's Matt Cutts. Notice the importance of quality. Like I said, it can't be stated enough.

Honda fights TrueCar's prices

Below-invoice online discounts frustrate some dealers and automakers

Honda, leery of brand-eroding discounts, has warned its dealers to stop offering prices below invoice on TrueCar.com and other Internet shopping sites.

The discounts jeopardize payments that Honda sends to dealers for local marketing, the automaker told dealers in October. Industrywide, the payments range from $300 to $600 for a $30,000 vehicle, one dealer said.

TrueCar is a leading player in the growing online retail industry that channels Internet leads to dealers. TrueCar CEO Scott Painter last week criticized Honda's position.

"They're trying to say Hondas are worth more than invoice, but if everybody's paying less than invoice, that's not true," Painter said.

The dispute highlights frustration among some dealers and automakers who say third-party Web sites such as TrueCar are eroding their power to set transaction prices.

TrueCar publishes recent transaction prices on its Web site and offers what it calls guaranteed low prices to shoppers. Dealers who sign up with TrueCar agree to pay the company $299 for each new vehicle sold from a TrueCar lead and $399 for each used vehicle sold.

Honda spokesman Chris Martin said that the automaker considers TrueCar an advertising medium. And Honda does not permit dealers to advertise prices below invoice, in part because it erodes Honda's brand equity. Dealers who do so jeopardize per-car payments from the factory under Honda's dealer marketing allowance.

But Painter said Honda is ignoring the realities of the marketplace, in which dealers compete aggressively on price.

In response to Honda's actions, TrueCar last week began warning Honda shoppers with a banner on its Web site that they might not get TrueCar's low price.

Upfront price guarantees are a key part of TrueCar's pitch to shoppers. And the prices listed for vehicles on TrueCar's Web site often are below invoice.

For example, a TrueCar search near Ann Arbor, Mich., for a 2012 Toyota Camry SE with automatic transmission and four-cylinder engine returned three guaranteed prices from local dealers, two of which were for less than the car's $22,075 invoice price. One dealer was offering the car for $21,875, another for $21,025 and a third dealer listed a car at the invoice price.

In TrueCar's terminology, the invoice is several hundred dollars above the cost of the vehicle to the dealer because the price does not include such factory payments to dealers as the holdback allowance.

Painter said Honda sales via TrueCar have declined since October because of Honda's warning.

He said the 278 Honda dealers under contract with TrueCar sold 2,389 vehicles in November. TrueCar's Honda dealers sell an average 8.6 new Hondas per store per month, and leads from the Web site generate 12.2 percent of the total sales volume of TrueCar's Honda dealers, he said.

"They could be doing twice as many sales through our platform than they are right now," if Honda revoked this policy, Painter said.

Painter was careful to add, though, that he was not picking a fight with Honda.

More clout

Painter: The stats don't lie.   On Jan. 1, TrueCar's role in auto retailing will grow. That's when TrueCar becomes the exclusive online vehicle shopping partner for Yahoo.com. Traffic to TrueCar's Web site is expected to jump from a couple of million unique visitors per month to 20 million per month as a result of the deal, Painter said. Now, though, TrueCar leads account for a small slice of U.S. auto sales. TrueCar-participating dealers are expected to sell about 250,000 vehicles from TrueCar leads in 2011 either from shoppers on the TrueCar Web site or through agreements with more than 100 large associations, such as USAA and AAA. Painter said he wants to almost double the number of dealership franchises that participate with TrueCar to 10,000 next year and facilitate the sale of about 500,000 vehicles. USAA, a financial services association for military families, has asked Honda to reconsider its TrueCar action on behalf of its 8 million members who did 500,000 searches for Honda and Acura vehicles this year, according to a recent letter from David Bohne, president of USAA federal Savings Bank, to John Mendel, executive vice president of American Honda Motor Co.

Protecting profit

The Toyota Camry SE: In Michigan offers of $1050 below the invoice price. Mike Warwick, director of digital marketing for the seven-store Kelly Automotive Group in suburban Boston, agrees with Honda's policy toward TrueCar. "Honda's trying to protect the gross profit in selling a car and trying to protect the salespeople who are the backbone of the industry," Warwick said. Kelly, with a Honda store and two Nissan stores among its holdings, dropped out of its TrueCar contract this month after just three months as a participating dealer, Warwick said. In November alone, the group was inundated with 700 leads from TrueCar customers who took a guaranteed vehicle price that Kelly offered, he said. But the stores closed on just 20 of those deals and only three were profitable given the discounts negotiated, Warwick said. The vast majority of customers went elsewhere, using the deals negotiated on TrueCar to get lower prices for vehicles at other non-TrueCar dealers, he said. Meanwhile, Kelly had to follow up with all 700 customers, Warwick said. Few Honda dealers, he said, would be willing to risk their dealer marketing allowance for the additional volume that TrueCar can bring. Industrywide, that type of quarterly allowance is 1 to 2 percent of the sticker price for every vehicle sold, Warwick said. On a $30,000 vehicle, that would be $300 to $600. Other dealers, though, like TrueCar. Taylor Chevrolet in suburban Detroit is eager for TrueCar's tie-up with Yahoo to begin, said Jeff Kotlarek, Taylor Chevrolet's Internet sales manager. He gets about 15 new-car sales per month from TrueCar. He said Taylor Chevrolet offers vehicles to TrueCar shoppers at $100 below invoice and still makes money on the vehicles by upselling on warranties, accessories or additional options. The store sells about 175 new vehicles total per month. In a recent speech, AutoNation CEO Mike Jackson said of TrueCar: "The good deal that they're pitching to the consumer is lower than average. So to the extent that everyone goes with the TrueCar price, it moves the average down. "It's a death spiral, and the question is whether they are powerful enough to unleash that dynamic in the U.S. marketplace." AutoNation's COO, Mike Maroone, sits on TrueCar's board of directors, but neither he nor AutoNation has financial ties to TrueCar. Amy Wilson contributed to this report