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During a discussion with a potential client, something came up that surprised me. It shouldn’t have considering the types of information that are floating around the internet and being spread by “gurus,” but it did.

“I post pictures to Facebook and links to Twitter,” she told me.

That was the sum of their strategy. In a way it sort of made sense – rather, I can see how someone can make sense of it – but it’s not a proper strategy and definitely isn’t the way to take full advantage of these networks.

Yes, Facebook likes images and Twitter likes links. That much is clear. The challenges are many, but the most important ones can all be summed up in one word: fatigue. People get sick of seeing variations of the same themes over and over again from a page or profile they follow. It’s easy to see that a picture of a hot classic car can get a ton of engagement and it’s even easier to fall into the trap of constantly posting hot classic car pictures from that day forward. Unfortunately, it doesn’t leave room for business-relevant posts and it turns your fans and followers off.

There are four primary Facebook post types (not including special post types like Offers):

1. Pictures
2. Text
3. Links
4. Videos

Now, there are variations that go along with some of them. For example, pictures can be broken down into albums and each album plays differently with the algorithm based upon posting source, success of previous posts in that album, posting frequency, etc, but those are the four basic types.

Twitter has even more distinct options:

1. Pictures
2. Text
3. Links
4. @Replies
5. Pure Retweets
6. Quote Retweets
7. Vines/Videos

Dealers must mix it up on both networks to find the highest level of success.

On Twitter…

A Twitter account that posts nothing but links will be the most unfollowed account type out there. When you mix it up on Twitter, you’ll reach more people. Many don’t even look at any posts with links in them, preferring conversations. In fact, text posts (particularly those that properly use hashtags) are by far the most engaging.

Pure Retweets give your Twitter profile itself a look of diversity, as do @Replies. When people visit your dealership Twitter page and see that you have Retweeted others and that you’re talking to other users, they’ll be much more inclined to follow you and engage with you.

Pictures and videos go inline, so posting them directly to Twitter (or through tools that allow native embedding – Buffer does, Hootsuite does not) allows people to see the content without clicking away from their stream. This gives the content more exposure than simply posting a link to it hosted elsewhere.

On Facebook…

There was a time not too long ago when images ruled completely on Facebook. They’re still the most prominent today, but not in how the algorithm treats them. They run a close second to text posts, the content that gets presented the most to people in their news feed.

Does that mean you shouldn’t post links or videos? Of course not. You just have to use those types sparingly. I do not believe in posting formulas or generalizations, but if I were forced to give a baseline frequency of post types, I’d recommend 50% images, 30% text, and 10% each for links and videos. Again, this isn’t a standard or even a best practice. It’s a starting point from which you’ll be able to find the formula that works best for your dealership.

Everyone has different strengths, different fans, and different personalities. Finding the right mix is about testing, retesting, and then re-retesting. The key is to have a mix. Don’t go stagnant. Go bold. Do it right. Find success.

* * *

Article originally appeared on AutomotiveSocialMedia.com.

My GM sent me this video about Credit Yes. Seems too good to be true and it probably is. So is anyone using it? Click on the link below to see presentation.

www.credityes.com/presentation.mp4

We all get our oil change. It’s a relatively constant thing. Most people are comfortable with getting their oil changed regularly. Some cars tell you when it’s time. Most people have a sticker on their windshield that tells them when it’s time. Heck, our internal clock often reminds us.

Now, imagine that you don’t know when it’s time to change. Instead of the 3000-5000 miles, your car doesn’t have a set time. It just decides that it needs to be changed. Imagine that your car doesn’t tell you, that you have to check it every now and then.

What if the type of oil changed regularly. You might need 5W-30 this time. Next time, your car requires 15W-40. Then, you hear that your car actually wanted the 5W-30 this time and the 14W-40 needs to be drained immediate – that doesn’t start working until next month.

For those mechanically minded, imagine that the configuration of your engine itself moves between oil changes. This time, you have to do it like normal but next time you may have to put it on a lift and change it from the bottom, or your car spontaneously develops a way for you to change the oil from the cabin of the car, but it must be moving at over 30 miles per hour at the time for it to work right.

This is the world of social media. I’m not trying to scare anybody. It’s just a statement of the way things are. What worked yesterday may not work today but may work again tomorrow. Today, text posts work best on Facebook. Two months ago, it was images. There are those who say that they’re seeing an increase in the engagement on images again and a decline in text post engagement.

Pinterest was nowhere to be seen a year ago in automotive social media. Today, it’s a big thing. Tomorrow, it could be dead again, replaced by Scoop.it or Overblog or any of the up-and-comers in social media. It could be replaced by something we haven’t even seen yet.

Instagram was a neat app a year ago. Once Facebook bought them, they became more of a thing. Facebook, Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, and even Apple are constantly in the market for social products of some sort (though Apple hasn’t pulled the trigger just yet). When they buy them, what happens? Do they improve? Become more relevant? Get ruined?

Techniques, strategies, best practices – they all change constantly in social media. Again, I’m definitely not trying to use fear tactics to tell can’t do it on their own. You can. It doesn’t take a lot of time or energy to come up with the right strategies, to track the changes, and to play with the various dynamics involved in a strong automotive social media presence. I’m simply saying this: if you’re going to do social media for your dealership, be sure to stay on top of things. Make it a priority to read, study, and test.

I was asked by a peer why I hadn’t written an automotive social media book yet. I told him that by the time I made it to chapter 6, chapter 2 and 3 would be obsolete. Social is moving. It always has and it always will. Keep that in mind when pursuing your own strategy. If the scariest part about social media is change, the worst thing that you can do is get complacent.

The internet provides vast education options, especially for people who’re eager to enlighten themselves on any subject of their choice. There are a group of people who continuous like to develop themselves by acquiring more knowledge. Therefore, if you’re planning to sharpen your knowledge on automotive sales, then internet is the right place to find the required information related to it. You can expand your knowledge on internet through Web-based training programs. It is not difficult to search for auto sales online training program. In case you’re interested in this program, then you can read on to acquire more information.

Are you aware of the online programs for auto salesperson?
You may find many online programs on auto sales training. If you’re interested to work as an auto salesperson, then you can check the list of the online programs. For enrolling in this program, you need to spend as the starting price ranges from free to about $60. You may get training on best path to make an auto sale and answer commonly asked questions aspiring auto salespeople may have.

What you need to consider about this program?
You need to consider how this online training course can be beneficial for you. Remember, education doesn’t have a negative effect on a person’s life. If you acquire more knowledge, then you can be well place than the other person. When you’re looking for a job if you’ve more degree, you can get an extra edge over the other people in the interview. If you acquire more knowledge, then it may help to open a wide range of options in terms of job. Make sure you give enough time to yourself when you’re getting an online training course. You need to get accustomed with the course material and put in hard labor to complete it. One of the best parts of the online education is that it can be done according to your own schedule. Therefore, you need to spend some extra time to understand what works best for you to further your knowledge base.

What are the other options?
If you’re interested to work as an auto salesperson, then plan out an internship or take a part time job of salesperson to see what the job is like on a daily basis. When you’re doing an internship, you can effortlessly understand the requirements to accomplish the job. Guidance of an experienced salesperson allows you to understand your part of job better.
 
Therefore, ask yourself necessary questions when you plan to enroll in an online auto sales training program.

http://www.dealersynergy.com

Welcome Richard Browne! Dealer Synergy's New General Manager (21+ Years Automotive Experience)

There are thirteen steps to happiness and it all begins with a process. From recruiting to advertising, watch this week's Think Tank Tuesday to determine which processes you need to focus on in order to be successful.

http://www.internetsales20group.com

Make Money Mondays With Sean V. Bradley - How to Use Automotive Internet Sales.com

So what does all this mean??? Crazy post title. Double standard. Well, in internet sales I learned both. When you get a lead, if you are not the first to answer it and connect, you're last. By the time you call minutes or even hours later, your lead is most likely on their was to you another lot who took the time to realize one important factor of lead management: Speed Sells. Be the first and you will never be last. So, why am I first if I'm last? I think my biggest problem is I never know when to quit. When do you stop interacting.???? emails? calls? Remember the 11-14% response rate?? Well, you never really know, but hang in there. At some point, your competition will give up. And there you will be...I had a customer I had interaction with on  a used car with specific requests...It took me 2 weeks to talk to him, a week trying to work a deal on a car we had, then finally after almost a month, we worked a deal over the phone ( he is over 100 miles away) and were still a little apart. He would not commit or even let me bring it to him. He told me he had a friend (in Arizona, I'm in Indiana and so is he) who could sell the same car cheaper delivered to him. He said if we could not make a deal, there was no need to email back and forth. I told him I would follow up with him until he bought a car. A few weeks went by and I send a few emails to him with words like Arizona and ??? asking kindly if he purchased one in Arizona if he would let me know. I even challenged him politely to find a better deal than the one I worked. Today, he showed up. As if nothing ever happened with "Arizona". In the same car he still owned coming to look at a new car and meet with me. Clearly, I was the last person still following up with him. I never got an email from him telling me to hit the road. He was passing though today and made a point to come and see me. Even though we didn't close, I know as soon I have the one that meets his needs we will be doing business. I had a similar instance last month where I had an appt set and the customer no showed and after 3 weeks, he finally called. He told me he read every email I sent. He said "We fell off the face of the earth". I delivered them May 1st after almost 2 months of the unknown. You never know what a customer is thinking!!  I learned today again, to stay in the fight to the very end, don't believe the hype, and stay on course. This is why I love what I do. And you should too!! Be the last.....take the checkered flag....all the way to the bank!

http://www.carjobsonline.com

Automotive Recruiting - HR - Hiring - Staffing Your Dealership BEST Practices, Advice, Tips & Secrets

I’ve often advocated in my blogs the benefits of quoting a price to customers who submit leads with a price inquiry. If the customer is submitting leads to more than one dealership, not providing the price will likely eliminate you from consideration.

Yet, according to CNW Marketing Research, 70.5% of people finance their cars. That means the vast majority of Internet leads will take the price quoted to them and then try to determine what their monthly payment will be. As we all know, monthly payments can vary based on the consumer’s credit score, the dealership’s finance programs and the specific vehicle the customer wants to buy. So the customer searching for the lowest priced vehicle today may still not end up with a vehicle that fits within their monthly budget for the next 60, 72 or even 96 months!

If we can move the conversation from price to payments, we can identify the right vehicle earlier in the process, saving the customer time and aggravation, and saving the dealership gross. One way to shift the conversation to monthly payments is to offer and promote payment—and shop-by-payment—marketing tool on your dealership’s website. A shop-by-payment tool allows consumers to search your inventory based on what their ideal monthly payment is and displays inventory based on real, credit-qualified payment quotes. An estimated or teaser quote can set the wrong expectation, but one based on the customer’s actual credit and the dealership’s finance programs sets both the customer and the dealer up for success.

Allowing consumers to shop-by-payments on your website offers the following benefits:

1)    Keeps Customers on the Dealership’s Website. Customers come to your site to find answers, not more questions. If you are asking the customer to provide all their information, such as what their credit score is or what interest rate they may qualify for, they may have to go off of your website and find the information on another site. A shop-by-payment tool allows the customer to see all the inventory on your website that they qualify for, without having to look for the information somewhere else. The tool is also interactive, enabling the customer to adjust payment ranges, down payments and other information so that it engages the customer, keeps them on the website longer and results in higher conversion rates.

2)    Protects Customers’ Privacy. Real payments can be quoted to customers without requiring them to enter in personal information, such as date of birth or Social Security Number, and without having a negative impact on their credit score. This is appealing to customers and allows them to play around with various terms and different vehicles, further engaging them and bringing them that much closer to the sale. Since most good-credit customers don’t want to affect their credit score until absolutely necessary, the result is often more leads from customers with higher average credit ratings.

3)    Credit-Analyzed Leads Close at a Higher Rate. The ability to analyze a consumer’s credit online brings them one step closer to the sale. Closing rates for these leads are typically much higher than for unqualified leads, often exceeding 20%.

4)    Streamlines the Sales Process. Providing real payment quotes on VIN-specific vehicles sets the customers’ expectation on what they can actually afford to buy, versus what they would like to buy. This eliminates unnecessary time that salespeople spend trying to sell a car that the person can’t afford, while also eliminating the “embarrassment” factor for the customer if they can’t afford the car they really want.

5)    Keeps Dealers in Control of Financing. Providing real payment quotes shifts the customer’s focus from what the bottom-line price is to what they can afford to pay every month. This allows dealers to set their own prices and financing terms and gives them more flexibility in negotiations, unlike lead services that force dealers into price wars in order to deliver the lowest price for the consumer. Ultimately, this results in higher gross profit margins for the dealers.

Providing a shop-by-payment tool helps to engage customers, keep them online and bring them closer to the sale. Today’s payment marketing technology delivers real benefits to both dealers and consumers, resulting in high-quality, credit-analyzed leads that close at rates much higher than traditional Internet leads. To see a demo, visit www.anywheremotors.com

http://www.internetsales20group.com

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

Often times when I chat with dealers I ask dealers what is keeping them, from getting to the next level of super success I hear responses like:

We need more quality leads.
Or... Cars are bringing brain damage at the sale.
Or... It's hard to find real salespeople anymore man, they just don't breed them like us, you know what I mean?

My answer to these issues are yes, yes and yes...so what. You have to control the controllable and you can control all of these issues so why aren't you.

More quality leads needed? Dump the lead providers that suck and invest in the stuff that is quality...heck, just train your people to prospect the right way and build repeat and referral business since they are the best quality leads. Change your way of thinking.

Cars too expensive? So what! That means they are too expensive for everyone and now your aged inventory just became a better deal. Change your way of thinking.

Sales team weaker than circus lemonade? This is a great! you now have an opportunity for you to step up as a leader and shape them into the rock star that you once were! They are going to love you even more once you help them learn what they need to know so they can make more money. You just have to change you way of thinking.

Often times we are holding everyone else accountable...scratch that, we are shifting blame to everyone and everything else for our lack of success but we have a toolbox full of success resources right between our ears and its more powerful than any technology we can buy.

Make a change in how you see the situation and you'll start to craft ideas for creating the success that you desire. As He-man said "I have the power!" (80's cartoon for the gang to young to remember)

As Steve Jobs said: "My job isn't to be easy on people, it's to make them better."

Helping the best get better,
Mat Koenig
CEO
KonigCo // AutoOption
www.konig.co/autooption

Penguin 2.0 landed on May 23rd. So far I'm not impressed with what I am seeing. Dealer sites are dropping off the rankings. Most are blissfully unaware. They see their dealership in the map results and assume everything is OK. But the actual search results had entirely different people in them than a week ago. In some cases the dealership is still in the results but with their mobile site. One I was keeping an eye on dropped 65 spots, that's a 7 page drop from the #1 position. Luckily they are relaunching their site this week and should settle back at the top with their less spammy site.

There’s just no excuse for car dealers to not be on Pinterest. Some would say it’s worthless. Some would say it’s hard to understand. Some might even say that it’s a fad. They might all be valid arguments under normal circumstances, but there’s on thing that trumps them all.

It takes no time, almost literally. You can maintain a very strong, daily-updated Pinterest presence in less time a day than it takes to get a fresh cup of coffee.

With the “Pin It” bookmarklet on your browser, you can pick out an interesting inventory item and have it Pinned in seconds. That’s all it takes. If you set it up to where you’re following the right boards, you can repin interesting automotive content in even less time just by clicking a couple of buttons. There’s also a “Cars and Motorcycles” category that makes finding the best automotive content super simple.

The video below is under 3 minutes, including the intro and outro. In it, I add two pins to my board. Done right, it’s such a small investment of time that you should be doing it on a daily basis. Surely there’s two minutes every day when you’re not so busy you can’t plug in a little effort, right? If not, it’s time to get an assistant.

Here’s the video:

This article originally appeared on automotivesocialmedia.com.

There are seven ways you are wasting your marketing dollars. Watch this week's Think Tank Tuesday to learn what you're doing to throw away your advertising money.

http://www.internetsales20group.com

Make Money Mondays With Sean V. Bradley - Branding - Emailing - "Special Edition with Peter Martin"

http://www.internetsales20group.com

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