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A mistake that many make on social media is that they post things in batches. Rather than spread out the posts throughout the day, they load everything up at once. This poses a challenge for both businesses and individuals because doing so will (a) annoy your fans and followers as you "flood" their feeds with posts, (b) limit the potential audience since only a portion of your fans and followers are monitoring social media at any particular time during the day, and (c) reduce the overall exposure as you make EdgeRank and other algorithms "mad" with your batches of posts.

One way to avoid this is to use scheduling tools such as Buffer, Hootsuite, and, of course, KPA Local Engage.

As humans, we often operate in batches. When we surf the web, we usually do so in longer stretches rather than in bits and pieces throughout the day. Unfortunately, that means that our engagement on social media is similarly batched.

Here's how to fix it:

Images

We all come across images that we want to share on social media. For sites like Facebook, you really don't want to post more than one an hour and probably no more than 4 or 5 a day. You have a couple of options to build your library of images to post.

I save the images in folders. Call me old school but I like housing the images locally (as well as through Dropbox) and sifting through them when I'm ready to post.

Another way to do it is to create an images folder in your bookmarks. Just save the link that contains the image and you can go through and post it later. Either way, you'll probably want to purge the images once they're posted - nobody likes seeing the same image twice. I do keep some of the best "timeless" images in an archive folder and include the date that I posted it in the file name. One such image that I posted in the past is the one shown above - Smokey and the Bandit is as timeless as it gets.

Thoughts

I'm a terrible mobile typist. Blame it on the fat fingers. As a result, I hate posting long status updates through mobile devices. If it's not an "in the moment" post, I use the voice recorder on my phone to save thoughts as they come to me. A couple of times a week I go through and transcribe these posts into my scheduling tools and spread them out throughout the day.

IMPORTANT NOTE: I'm not a big fan of post dropping. On all of the networks other than Twitter, I schedule posts during times when I'm going to be online whenever possible. I like to be able to respond to people who comment on the posts, so just because it's scheduled doesn't mean I'm not watching.

Some posts are too timely for this method, of course, in which case I'll go ahead and struggle through my fat-finger syndrome to get them posted immediately.

Links

For the most part, I find my links early in the morning and schedule them throughout the day. Again, the timely rule applies; you don't want to schedule breaking news.

Occasionally, there are links that come along that are important enough to save and post in the future. These are usually resource links. For example, if you find a video that describes several tips and tricks on SYNC, you wouldn't necessarily just want to post it once. With a link like that, I would save it and post it again and again for as long as it was still valid. I've actually scheduled something weeks ahead of time knowing that it's valuable today and will still be relevant in 2 months.

* * *

As I've said in the past, I'm not a fan of using tools to completely automate your social media engagement, but if you use them properly you can maximize your exposure by posting the right content at the right times.

Hat Tip to Adam Ross for inspiring this post.

If you've watched my other video's, we have discussed the following:

→ What role gratitude plays in your success
→ What is the definition of success
→ Developing a 99.9% WHY statement

Now we move on to the recipe. With so many people wondering how to be successful, I suggest that success comes from following a process. It's no different than baking a chocolate cake. If you want to end up with the proven result of chocolate cake, you'd better follow the proven recipe that will get you there.

In my career, I've had the privalege of being mentored by many very successful people and you know what? They all say the same thing. When asked, "How did you become so successful?", the response is, "By doing what other successful people do".

That validates what is written in such books as Dale Carnegies, "How to Win Friends and Influence People" or Napoleon Hills, "Think and Grow Rich".

If you'd like to achieve your own personal definition of success and you want to know how to become successful in life, you MUST follow the recipe.

Stay tuned for my next video where I'll introduce you to the 1st ingredient in the recipe for success.

Your success starts here.

Setting correct goals is key to achieving success. It is good to set small, short term goals. This allows you to feel a sense of accomplishment when you reach them. It is even more pivotal to set larger, long term goals. This gives our lives direction. It gives purpose. Without setting the proper goals, the tasks and challenges we face on a daily basis seem meaningless.

http://youtu.be/XsfGE5Z1zxQ

We are now accepting applications for Speakers, Panelist & Sponsors For The Upcoming Internet Sales 20 Group

Today, take a moment for a little self assessment. How much passion do you feel about the things you do? How often do you express that passion? If you come to the conclusion that you no longer have the passion you once did, try to find one small thing to ignite that passion again. When others see the passion in you, it may just ignite passion in them and inspire wonderful achievement. 

HOW TO ADVISE SOMEONE TO INVEST IN THEMSELVES...

TAKE THE COINS OUT OF YOUR POCKETS AND PUT THEM INTO YOUR MIND AND YOUR MIND WILL FILL YOUR POCKETS WITH GOLD!

There are plenty of articles out there telling you when to post. This is designed to point out the times when not to post.

The goals of most businesses on social media normally fall into two categories: marketing and communication. Many use social media strictly as a marketing tool to get their message out and to encourage others to help them do the same. Others use it for outreach, as a way to talk directly to their customers and prospects, and to collaborate on needs. Most do a little of both.

These types of activities are fine the majority of the time, but there are instances when it's best to let the messages fall to the side and focus on what's happening in the world.

The recent elections were a perfect example. Social media was flooded as results started coming in. People were Tweeting their opinions or taking pictures of their "I Voted" stickers. They were debating about who would win what, how the country was heading in this direction or that direction, and even discussing how there was too much being posted about politics on the social media channels.

This was a bad time to try to put out a marketing message or a to communicate with the audience.

The best post that an American company could have made yesterday was something to encourage people to vote. It's neutral; normally I encourage businesses to be opinionated but this was one election to stay out of altogether. It was not the time to launch a product or discuss a coming event.

There are other times like this. When there are national or worldwide crises, some companies try idiotically to latch on to the trend. This works out badly the vast majority of the time. Again, opinions, thoughts, and prayers can be expressed but the moments when Sandy was hitting the northeast was an inappropriate time to push product messages.

Be mindful of what's going on. Participate. The one thing that these events allow a company to do is to express empathy, to be a resource that shows people how they can participate or help, and to add a touch of humanity to the business entity. When you have posts talking about your products or services that are hitting social media when everyone's attention is on something else, it's not only futile. It can be damaging as well.

Rational Versus Organic Approach to Problem Solving

Rational

A person with this preference often prefers using a comprehensive and logical approach similar to the guidelines in the above section. For example, the rational approach, described below, is often used when addressing large, complex matters in strategic planning.

Define the problem.
Examine all potential causes for the problem.
Identify all alternatives to resolve the problem.
Carefully select an alternative.
Develop an orderly implementation plan to implement that best alternative.
Carefully monitor implementation of the plan.
Verify if the problem has been resolved or not.
A major advantage of this approach is that it gives a strong sense of order in an otherwise chaotic situation and provides a common frame of reference from which people can communicate in the situation. A major disadvantage of this approach is that it can take a long time to finish. Some people might argue, too, that the world is much too chaotic for the rational approach to be useful.

Organic

Some people assert that the dynamics of organizations and people are not nearly so mechanistic as to be improved by solving one problem after another. Often, the quality of an organization or life comes from how one handles being “on the road” itself, rather than the “arriving at the destination.” The quality comes from the ongoing process of trying, rather than from having fixed a lot of problems. For many people it is an approach to organizational consulting. The following quote is often used when explaining the organic (or holistic) approach to problem solving.

“All the greatest and most important problems in life are fundamentally insoluble … They can never be solved, but only outgrown. This “outgrowing” proves on further investigation to require a new level of consciousness. Some higher or wider interest appeared on the horizon and through this broadening of outlook, the insoluble lost its urgency. It was not solved logically in its own terms, but faded when confronted with a new and stronger life urge.”
From Jung, Carl, Psychological Types (Pantheon Books

The most destructive habit......................Worry
The greatest Joy...............................Giving
The greatest loss................Loss of self-respect
The most satisfying work...............Helping others

November 5, 2012 – Right Now
"'Now' is the operative word. Everything you put in your way is just a method of putting off the hour when you could actually be doing your dream. You don't need endless time and perfect conditions. Do it now. Do it today. Do it for twenty minutes and watch your heart start beating."~Barbara Sher~

"The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing."~Albert Einstein~

"Some of us need to discover that we will not begin to live more fully until we have the courage to do and see and taste and experience much less than usual ... And for a man who has let himself be drawn completely out of himself by his activity, nothing is more difficult than to sit still and rest, doing nothing at all. The very act of resting is the hardest and most courageous act he can perform." ~Thomas Merton~

APPOINTMENTS Today: 17+
Minimum Phone Calls Per ISC/hr: 15+

Minimum Emails Per ISC/hr: 15+

APPOINTMENTS PER ISC: 4

Hint of the Day: What are you doing right now to be more effective than you were yesterday? Don’t Settle.

For years, marketers and search engine optimization gurus have been preaching something. They've been telling the world that "content is king" and that if you put the right content on your website, that it will rank well. After all, who would deny the king, right?

The reality was different. Up until April 24th, 2012, content was not king. It was a queen, maybe even a jack - a face card to be sure. However, it wasn't king. Inbound links were king. Other factors such as exact-match domains, site age, and offsite attribution were aces.

Things have changed all the way around. Thanks to the Penguin update, links are now more challenging to come by. Don't misunderstand this - links have not been devalued. If anything, they are more powerful now than they were before the update. Low-quality, automated, spammy links have been completely devalued to the point that they can actually do harm to your domain. For this reason, inbound linking strategies have been forced to clean up their act. Only the highest level of pure links work the magic now. More on that in a moment, but first, let's talk social...

One of the "hidden" changes that happened on or around the same time as the Penguin update was the increased value given to social signals. Google has been considering social signals in the ranking algorithm since December, 2010 (publicly, at least), but they really started pumping up their significance this year. It's very likely that the timing of the change was intended to coincide with Penguin; making two major changes at the same time - one public, one behind the scenes - is the perfect way to keep people like me on my toes.

This brings us to the content. As I mentioned, links of the highest caliber are still powerful, possibly more powerful than ever before. Social signals are equally powerful. The inaccurate but easy math behind it is that links, social, and onsite content account for 30% of the ranking algorithm with the other 10% going to outside or uncontrollable forces such as domain age. If all three major components are equal, how can content now be king?

Today and going forward, there are three types of content for dealer websites. There's the "money content" - the pages that are there to generate leads such as inventory pages. There's the SEO content - the pages designed to target specific keywords and drive traffic to your site from various search terms. Lastly, there's "sharable content" - the pages that are of general interest to visitors that come to your website for reasons other than to do business with the dealership.

Many will avoid the third type as "cool content pages" such as a picture gallery of modified Honda Civics or a video of your dealership's participation in the March of Dimes walkathon do not directly generate leads. This is their biggest mistake and an opportunity for you to shine.

You see, these are the pages that can generate organic links. These are the pages that can be shared on social media to generate the social signals. These are the pages that will allow people to interact with your site even if they're not buying a car. The effects of links and social signals do not just hit the page itself. They help the domain. If you're posting content on your site that is bringing in links and social signals, the other pages (including the "money content" pages) will rank better in search and gain more exposure through social.

It's not an easy process without the appropriate understanding, but once you get the hang of it, there are few things that come more naturally to us. We're all "car people". We got into this business to make money and be around vehicles (at least that's the hope). If you generate the type of content that should come naturally to you and expose that content through the proper channels, you'll have an advantage over your competitors. Despite the ease in which this can be accomplished, few will attempt it. Even fewer will do it right. You have an opportunity to get way ahead of the competition in internet marketing with a little knowledge, a little practice, and a little help.

http://www.internetsales20group.com

Best Idea On How To Get More Factory Demos For Your Dealership - From A Toyota General Manager, Mike Udell

I LOVE THIS IDEA!!! Mike Udell is a longtime Member of the Internet Sales 20 Group and shared this creative way to get more executive demos from the factory... He actually sends this to his OEM

In hindsight, it’s easy to see that it was only a matter of time. Facebook has been such an amazing marketing tool for businesses for a couple of years now, allowing effort and proper strategy to circumvent spending money on the platform. If a business worked hard and applied the proper techniques, they could perpetuate a formidable marketing strategy that helped with branding, drove traffic, and sparked engagement.

Facebook fixed that last month. Page administrators started noticing their statistics fading. In some reports, the drops were dramatic, chopped down to a third or less exposure of what was happening before. I almost wrote about it then but decided to wait to see one of Facebook’s infamous corrections. Surely, there would be outrage over them forcing businesses to pay in order to get exposure.

There was, to some extent. Many sites took notice. However, the “outrage” was limited as there was no real sympathy from users. It didn’t noticeably affect them. If anything, it helped to clean up their Facebook news feed to allow fewer business posts to appear. More images of nephew Timmy sliding into third base wasn’t such a bad thing, so Facebook is continuing with the current EdgeRank settings. Moreover, there have been suggestions and recommendations on various blogs that say users should start spending more money on it.

I was one of them.

This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Facebook definitely needs to right-size their pricing; pages with a low number of fans can be promoted inexpensively, but once you start getting into the tens and hundreds of thousands of fans, the promotion costs go up tremendously. If they can make adjustments to their pricing, it’s only fair that they should make money for being a marketing platform.

Still, it’s annoying. It’s a bait and switch, regardless of whether that was the original intention or not. They hooked a lot of businesses into relying on engagement, activity, and quality content. They then pulled the rug out from under then and are holding the eyeballs of fans hostage. If you want to be seen, you have to pay up.

I cannot fault them for doing what they have to do to make their many investors happy. This is a business. They’ve provided a tremendous service that has struggled to make the money to justify both the size and price. Still, it changes the way that those of us in the social media marketing industry must calculate for Facebook. Strategies that are strictly organic have been devalued.

We’ll see how it’s working out during next quarter’s reports, but it’s a safe bet that this is the direction they’re heading. Businesses got snookered a bit, but not too badly. It’s just time to adjust.

The worlds of public relations and marketing have gone through two major changes in the last decade. The first one came with the mass adoption of the internet as our primary source of information about businesses. The second came a few of years ago when social media became a mainstream method of letting your friends, family, and often the rest of the world know how you feel about a business. Today, there is no shortage of ways that people can voice their pleasure and displeasure with the various companies with which they do business.

Let’s start by making the distinction between the two disciplines. Everyone has an understanding about marketing. It’s simple. You do what you can to get your business and brand in front of as many people as possible and you get your message (in the form of products, services, differentiators, etc) out so that people will consider you when they’re ready for what you have to offer. Public relations often gets lumped in as a form of marketing because the basic concepts are the same, but it’s very different. Modern public relations in the social world is now a way to preserve your positive messages and diffuse the negative ones, particularly when they come from consumers.

This distinction is important because many still lump the two together when in reality they need to attack from completely different angles. At times, such as with online reviews, the goals are only loosely related. From a marketing perspective, negative reviews can be a major hindrance (at least in the eyes of the business). From a PR perspective, negative reviews are your opportunity to shine. I learned a lot about this during a discussion at the last Internet Sales 20 Group conference from Ralph Paglia.

People Hunt Down the Negative Reviews

Think about your own actions. When you look up a restaurant, a movie, or a home repair contractor, you may or may not be the type that checks out reviews. More and more people are relying on reviews every day (not in small part due to the way that Google is highlighting them in search). Some read them. Most will scan down on the page until they get to the negative ones. They aren’t checking reviews to see the positive ones. They want dirt. They want to know about the worse-case scenarios they might be walking into if they do business with you.

Some estimate that 40% of online reviews are fake. I know that in the automotive industry, the majority of dealers who have more than 50 likely solicited many of the reviews from happy customers. It’s a best practice. After all, it’s great for marketing. In essence, it’s a defensive marketing posture that shows customers seeing just the stars and number of reviews on Google that you’re respected in the community.

The PR opportunity lies in the negative reviews. Those who are really interested in doing business with you will scroll down until they find the bad reviews. They will read them and then look to see how you responded to the review. Were you defensive? Were you a pushover? Did you fix the problem if it could be fixed? Did you empathize?

How you respond to negative reviews is a tremendous opportunity to tell those interested in doing business with you what kind of company you really are.

Show Your Stuff

The moment a negative review is posted, you should respond quickly. Notice that I did not say “immediately”. Speed is important, but it’s not as important as posting the exact right message.

Investigate the concerns that were voiced in the review. As A.J. Maida posted on ADM, there’s a great chance that whichever employee worked with the cusotmer will remember the experience once they read it. Get your side of the story ready, then be prepared to not tell it. This is the hardest part about responding to negative reviews. We want to tell people that they were at fault as well. We want to make sure the rest of the world knows that the person posting the negative review was unreasonable, on drugs, or absolutely insane. This is, of course, the wrong course of action, but it’s important to know your side of the story so you can craft your response properly.

Once you know what happened, it’s time to empathize. This is challenging as well because we have instantly negative feelings towards anyone bashing us, but take yourself out of business mode and into the shoes of the reviewer. They wouldn’t have written a review unless they felt they were wronged in some way (yes, occasionally there are those who want to try to con something out of you, but these are much more rare than most businesses are willing to admit). Right or wrong, you must empathize with them to help correct the situation. Even if the situation in uncorrectable, it’s important to make a public effort to fix things, apologize, educate (humbly), or otherwise step up and accept responsibility even if you don’t think it was your fault.

Here are some keys to crafting the response:

• This is important. There are times when accepting responsibility is hard. They may have been completely at fault, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t your responsibility to help them not be at fault.
• Try to rectify the situation whenever possible from up top. Get the highest-level person available to talk to the reviewer in person or on the phone and offer to discuss it further. It could be the owner, the general manager, or someone else with a strong title, but make sure it’s someone with a title that demands respect. Even if it’s the owner who says, “I’ve instructed the service manager, Shelly, to take personal care of you when you come in,” that’s better than getting a reply from Shelly (no offense, Shelly).
• Use the opportunity to express something positive about your business. “It isn’t often that we get complaints about recall work. Our technicians carry the highest customer service ratings of any Chevy dealership in the tri-state area.”
• Don’t give stuff away. This is a big, big no-no. Gift Certificates, free oil changes, etc – keep those off of your review responses. You can offer it to them when you talk to them in person or on thephone, but the last thing you want is to make yourself a target by posting it in the response. “Oh, if you complain, Bob’s Deli will give you a free sandwich!”
• Keep on the high ground, even if the reviews are insulting. Stay classy.
• Don’t sound too sophisticated. It comes across as insincere if you use big words to try to seem superior to the reviewer. Speak naturally as if you were talking to them in person.
• Run the response passed a couple of people before posting. Get some input and make sure that what you’re trying to say and how you’re trying to say it is coming across properly.
• Post a follow-up response if you’re able to come to a positive outcome with the customer. Talk is cheap. If you can post something like, “Thank you, Bob, for coming by the dealership today. I’m so glad we were able to sort through the initial misunderstanding – enjoy your new Camry!”
• Read responses from everywhere whenever possible. Check your competitors. Check other industries. Get a feel for what’s working and what’s not working by seeing what others are doing right and what they’re doing wrong. You can learn more from real-life experiences than you’ll ever learn from blog post.

Reiterating the Importance

There aren’t enough words in my fingers to stress how important this is. Responding to negative reviews is an art and a science, but it can have a dramatic impact on your business whether you do it right or do it wrong. What type of impact will your negative review responses have?

As I said before, this is your opportunity to shine. A great response to a negative review will reach more eyeballs than a dozen positive reviews.

Hootsuite has been on a tear over the last year. They’ve picked up a bunch of agreements with the various social media sites. They have a hip interface and a good reputation for quality of service, uptime, and ease of use. I like Hootsuite and use it for many of our accounts, but it’s not my primary social post scheduling tool.

I like Buffer. It’s lighter and has certain things that make it superior to Hootsuite. Yes, there are drawbacks, but the advantages surpass the shortcomings.

The first thing heavy users will notice is the price: yes, the premium plan is $99 a month versus Hootsuite Pro which is $10 a month. Quite a jump. Quite worth it. Whenever you consider an investment into tools, services, or anything, you should ask yourself how much time can it save you and how much is your time worth. Buffer has proven itself to me to be worth the extra dozens of dollars.

Here are the time-savers that make me use Buffer more:

• Instant Link Shortening – Hootsuite adds a step. It’s a very annoying step if you’re posting often. To shorten a link, you have to paste it into their link shortener and then push the button. It doesn’t sound like a big deal, but when you’re doing a lot of posts it can become a major hassle. Buffer can be set to automatically shorten the link once it’s pasted in the post box.
• Set Scheduled Times – With Hootsuite, you have two options: autoschedule or manually schedule. This option must be chosen for each individual post. The problem with autoscheduling is that the logic behind it seems a bit wonky and cannot be adjusted. As you can see to the right, some of the posts are scheduled close together (one was scheduled for 5 minutes after the previous posts – I had to manually adjust) while others are spread out more. It’s very random. I don’t like random. With Buffer, you set the times and the days that you want to post. One could make a very complex posting matrix if they wanted to, splitting up the posts at different times on different days.
• Continued Selection of Account – This one might seem like nitpicking, but again if you’re posting often and managing multiple accounts it can be a pain. With every new posts, you must re-select the accounts on which you want to post. This is particularly annoying if you are posting batches.
• Mixing Up The Times Between Accounts – You can select up to 5 accounts on which to post through Hootsuite. Whether you schedule them manually or autoschedule them, they will be set to go at the exact same time. With Buffer, your posts go into the next available slot. If you select 15 accounts on Buffer to post something, they will all go in at different times depending on how you have the scheduling set up.
• Five-Minute Intervals – Some would say that it’s an advantage to have limited choices with posting times on Hootsuite. You can post only in 5-minute intervals. On Buffer, you pick the exact time you want it posted. This gives your posts a little more time in most feeds since several programs work with 5-minute intervals; posting off the interval means fewer posts to compete with during “posting time” on Hootsuite and other services. A minor distinction, but worth noting.
• Images Posted On Twitter Are Actually Posted On Twitter – Buffer uploads images directly to Twitter, while Hootsuite loads them to Ow.ly. People have to click the link on Hootsuite posts to see the image, while on Buffer posts they can see the images inline on Twitter itself. An example of each is below.

A Quick Note About Tools

One of the biggest advantages for Hootsuite is that it’s a great overall management tool. Buffer is just a posting tool. You cannot manage your followers, respond to interactions, or monitor your feeds from Buffer.

As with any tool, I wholeheartedly argue against the automation concept. Buffer is great to make sure that your posts are ever-flowing at an appropriate rate. It allows you to schedule messages that you feel will be better posted at a different time. It allows you to spread out your posts so that you aren’t flooding the feeds during times of exceptional creativity or discovery.

It does notreplace engagement.

You must, whether through Hootsuite, other tools, or through the native sites themselves, check what’s happening and interact. Just because you have a cool posting tool that allows you to be “active” while you’re doing other things does not mean that you don’t have to monitor them. In business, social media is much more of a communication tool than a broadcasting tool. The majority of my time spent on social media is listening. In fact, Buffer simply makes it easier for me to listen so I’m not always worried about whether or not my accounts are staying active.

Engage through social media tools (such as Hootsuite) or on the sites themselves. Schedule through Buffer.

This past week, I made the risky move of upgrading to the newly released Windows 8 operating system; Microsoft’s bold attempt at upgrading their OS which has kept the same fundamental functionality for more than a decade. While slightly hesitant to upgrade before a service pack was available, I ultimately chose to take advantage of Microsoft’s limited time $39.99 upgrade offer. Talk about utilizing the "urgency" close right?

As I’ve played around with the new OS for the past few days, I’ve made some observations that may turn out to be a prediction of a new technological frontier for dealers who are looking to kick things into high gear... or I may just be out to lunch. Whatever your opinion may be, just go with me on this for a minute.

New Windows 8 Features

The most noticeable of all the new features for Windows 8, is the shiny new start screen which really acts as a dashboard to your most visited apps. Though some critics complain that Windows 8 is optimized for tablets, I haven’t had any problems finding my way around with a mouse.

Microsoft has redesigned the UI for many of their apps and have included some new apps, all of which come with a very streamlined and integrated experience. Among my favorites are the new music player app which comes loaded with the ability to stream full length music and a new “smart dj” tool that automatically creates a playlist based on an artist genre of your choosing.

How Dealers Could Benefit From Windows 8

Thanks for listening to me ‘nerd out’ for a second. Let me get to how car dealers could actually use Windows 8 to leverage new business and reach larger groups of car shoppers in their own home.

What got me me thinking was the newly added “Store” app which allows users to browse from a variety of both paid and free applications. Simply select the category of app you wish to download and you have the ability to select from hundreds if not thousands of apps to have installed on your PC. If you know your way around the app store or play market, this will be quite easy for you.

Imagine what would happen if you created a Windows 8 app that was compatible on both desktop PCs and Windows tablets? There has been a lot of talk around whether or not Dealers should develop iPhone and Android apps vs. keeping with dealership mobile websites, but think about the doors you could unlock by tapping into an even larger traffic source!

Let’s talk numbers. By 2008 (according to Forrester), there were 1,000,000,000 (Billion) PCs in use with a forecast of 2 billion in use by the end of 2015. It took 27 years to reach the 1 billion mark and will only take 7 years (from 2008) to reach 2 billion. If that’s not simply incredible to you consider that the average number of PCs needing to be sold year after year since 2008 is 142,857,142 in order to reach the forecasted target by 2015.

Now, have you purchased a new PC lately? Don’t they come pre-loaded with a Windows operating system? According to Amazon, every new PC sold between June 2, 2012 and January 31, 2013 will receive a special upgrade offer of only $14.99, thus placing Windows 8 well within the reach of hundreds of millions of people.

Just To Get The Juices Flowing

Consider how many of the 142,857,142 PC buyers this year are also in the market to purchase a vehicle or are at least conducting some level of vehicle research. I’ll tell you what - that new Microsoft ‘Store App’ is pretty fun to navigate and somehow sucks you in just like Apple’s famed App store and Android’s Play Market, so imagine what competitive advantage you’d have by placing your dealership and your brand in front of the masses.

I envision a personalized shopping experience filled with user reviews, dealership videos, blogs and news. Since the app is installed on the personal computer, (and I’m just thinking out loud here), imagine if there was a way to have your app send notifications to your potential customer's calendar, email, social networks and more. I think this is just the tip of the iceberg and if done strategically, dealers could tap into a massive market of vehicle shoppers.

To take it one step further, though Windows 7 and 8 tablets don’t contribute much to tablet sales as of current, Windows 8 tablets are forecasted to help tablet sales increase by 4% according to Gartner. Apple still remains king of the mobile arena with roughly 60% market share, however,with an estimated 117,000,000 tablet shipments in 2012 alone, 4% works out to 4,680,000 (4.68 million) Windows 8 Tablet shipments and that is more than enough users to inject your dealership with some serious prospects.

In closing, let me say that there are many, many avenues to help drum up new business. I had the pleasure of attending Lon Safko’s keynote at AutoCon in which he enlightened us on the various social media marketing opportunities from Facebook to Second Life. I swear - by the end of his presentation there were multiple silent explosions in people’s heads, followed by smoke trailing out of their ears.

The point is that there are sooooo many ways to prospect for new business and technology, whether revamped or emerging provides you with more ways to reach out to potential buyers than ever before. Windows 8 is just another example of something you could use to leverage new business for your dealership.

What do you think? Kindly leave your comments below. Happy developing.

http://wwwinternetsales20group.com

Internet Sales 20 Group - Dallas, Texas - March 19th - 21st 2013

http://www.internetsales20group.com

I am BEYOND proud of John Hinderer Honda and their AWESOME Business Development Center!!

And ESPECIALLY Rob Stewart. Rob is a new employee at the dealership (less than 4 months). He had no prior automotive sales experience. This man made almost 3,000 phone calls himself, he followed the Dealer Synergy process EXACTLY and POOF! He is responsible for almost 80 units getting delivered LAST MONTH!
I have been in Automotive Internet Sales for almost 14 years and have to say, that Rob has one of the BEST performances and success that I have EVER seen.

As you can see in the gotomeeting interview, he is simple... he works his plan, he works his pay plan. He does NOT make excuses, he does not take short cuts. On the contrary, he works hard, he works consistently and he works strategically.

The result is:

• 2,892 phone calls made
• 640 connections
• 201 appointments
• 134 appointments showed
• 76 units delivered

October 2012, was the BEST month ever for the John Hinderer Honda BDC...

They delivered 142 units out of the Internet Sales Department and MORE than 50% came from 1 BDC Rep!

Any question...?

Please feel free to comment, email or call me.

Lets sell some cars!

For a while now we've been discussing the concept of posting "sharable" content on your website to support your "money pages" and "SEO pages". Here's a quick breakdown of the three to act as a refresher:

• Money Pages - These are the pages that are designed to generate leads. Inventory details pages, specials, landing pages, contact pages - the places where leads are formed.
• SEO Pages - An SEO page is one that is designed specifically to target specific keywords. You may make a page called "Chevy Camaro Milwaukee", for example. They usually have content of some sort to help them rank but are rarely sharable.
• Sharable Pages - These are the "fun" pages that very few dealers or vendors ever build. They are designed to draw traffic from sources other than search such as social media. The goal is to create content that people will enjoy and that they're willing to share.

We've discussed why these sharable pages are important, but in a nutshell the goal of a sharable page is to support money pages and SEO pages by driving social signals and organic links to your domain. The sharable pages help by linking internally to important pages but they also increase the domain's overall rankings through these social signals and links.

It's all well and good, but people have asked me for an example of the content that a sharable page might have, so here it is. Below is content that was posted on a Dodge dealer's website. It is about classic Dodge Chargers. Most dealers would think that it's useless since they don't have a lineup of 1969 Chargers on their front line, but because of the potential popularity and sharability of such a post, it could help to drive inbound links and social signals in ways that standard dealer website content cannot.

As you look at the content notice a few things:

1. Big images. People love to share large images.
2. Universal appeal. Even non-Dodge people can admire the beauty of this beast.
3. Unique, relevant, but not-too-much content. It doesn't have to be a novel. This is the bare-minimum text content that you would want to post, but it works.
4. Social buttons at the bottom. You want to use the native buttons. Share tools are often ineffective and are not read as easily by the search engines as the native buttons.
5. Embed code. This allows people to quickly and easily share the content on their own site.

Please feel free to ask questions about this content example.