Dean Evans & Web Marketing

Today dealers are experiencing the most competitive landscape in the last 30 years. A few years ago, if you were spending over $500 to attract a customer to your store for a new car, it was o.k. - your margins and bottom line were still robust, and business was good - especially if you were a luxury or import volume franchised dealers. In the past, when dealers’ floor traffic went down, they would simply notify their manufacturer, who would then launch mass advertising and incentives to drive people to the showroom and service departments. Today, incentives are still going strong, but fewer customers are coming in the door. Why?

1. Because there are fewer consumers and many more vehicle choices.
2. Because consumers are starting dialogs with Internet savvy dealers via email and phone well before they are walking into the showroom.
3. And most recently, the credit crunch from the hom

Because of this Retail Perfect Storm a changing landscape of more competition, lower margins, and the opportunity of the Internet - this blog will focus on helping dealers who want to be on the winning side of this Perfect Storm not one of the ones who fall by the wayside because they were in their own world, not paying attention. And I’ll discuss the web opportunity that is right now not what was happening two years ago.

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Internet Marketing Is Dead

When I say “

Technorati Tags: automotive retail, more competition, the perfect storm, web 2.0

Dealers’Marketing Budgets: Re-Calibration Needed

Dealers as a whole are still behind the curve. I know this is old data, but not much has changed: in an article in the April ‘06 issue of the Dealix Newsletter called “Latest Data on Consumer Media Usage,” there a chart with some demoralizing statistics on people’s weekly media consumption vs. where dealers are spending their money. Here are just a (more…)

Technorati Tags: budget re-calibration, consumer media usage, dealership budgets