Gamification is an interesting topic and one that has gained momentum in many business categories, including automotive. The reason for this level of interest in this area of automated marketing solutions is simple; there are connections between how habits are formed from a neuroscience perspective to how gamification works in driving customer engagement and behavior change. Now, gaming can be hard-core and even competitive or it can be purely casual and done just for fun and entertainment. Either is fine depending on your goals, but gamification in a Dealership environment is not about fun or even engagement, it’s about driving tangible business results.

Most Dealerships that currently use gamificiation are using it primarily as a sales strategy to motivate their sales teams. Having people compete on targets to win a bonus or other prize. The reality is that gamification in a dealership environment should compliment their marketing strategy and build on the existing promotions that the Dealership already offers their customers naturally each month.

By gamifying the promotion to consumers in a fun and engaging manner, you increase their likelihood to buy from you. This approach can also be used to provide valuable insights into consumer behavior and their purchase intent by tracking their online behavior. What models are they looking at in their research and how do they answer any questions at the redemption stage of the game for prizing. This produces better business results by creating a favorable impression from that consumer and gives real information to the dealership that your sales teams can use to create a more positive buying experience. Rather than having sales teams competing through gamification to hit targets internally, consumers provide tangible information relevant for your sales team to understand and interact with consumers in a compelling manner.

This type of gamification is casual, but still retains great value for everyone. The result for consumers is a better experience during their research and the added incentive of the promotional offer after the game. For the dealership, the sales teams can use this to demonstrate a better dealer experience and differentiate themselves from the competition while using the data around web behaviour to meet the consumers’ needs and expectations. When the consumer plays a game and wins $500 off a new car above factory offers and the sales team has a better understanding of the prospective consumer and their needs, everybody wins.

One may ask why do it, when everyone has gaming apps already available on their phones and likely has a gaming console at home? Competing against all of the dealerships in your DMA and fighting off all of the marketing communication to gain your consumer’s attention and interest is a hard thing to accomplish. By bringing gaming into a routine search for a vehicle provides a needed break in their research and a gives you a competitive edge to bring your existing promotion and offers to life. Gamification can let your dealership stand apart from the clutter and help you establish a stronger and better relationship with your customer from the moment they first hit your website.

Think about the last time you did a promotion in your dealership with a real spin to win wheel. Consumers were asked to physically spin that wheel and win something. What was their reaction? Did it create added excitement and buzz for the consumer and the dealership staff? Likely it did. That same excitement on your website provides the same distraction and engagement to motivate the consumer to buy from your dealership.

We all know that our world today of multi-channel, instantly accessible information is very different than it was 20 years ago. As a car dealer, staying ahead of these changes can be a difficult and frustrating task. Today’s consumers seem to be increasingly harder to engage and understand than ever before. Nothing seems to work today. That ad in the newspaper didn’t get a single phone call. That radio spot sounded great, but it didn’t sell a car. More and more the marketing reality for dealers is that money goes out, but sales don’t come in.

In the early 90’s, advertising and marketing appeared to be much simpler then it is today. We had television (actual network television), radio, newspaper, magazine, billboards and direct mail. There may have been other media opportunities available, but you had a core toolkit at your hands that was proven, and you even knew how to use it. But as we moved past the Millennia, everything changed. Today, mass media is anything but mass, unless the word is followed immediately by extinction.

A known media toolkit has now been replaced by automated marketing solutions and intelligent context based advertising. Great. But few people seem to know what these things are or how they work, let alone the hundreds of other marketing buzz words that seem to be promoted as the next, next thing. The reality is there are no silver bullets, in spite of what the next vendor may try to sell you.

As a result, many dealerships are struggling. Struggling to remain relevant in a digital world where consumers are moving away from the traditional car buying process. Struggling to break through. Struggling to engage the consumer. Struggling to find budgets to manage the tools, media and events that seem to be required to stay competitive. This struggle to find the consumer has come to feel like a game of find the needle in the haystack, at a time when technology and media should be working like a metal detector aiding in your search. Finding exactly who is out there and who is ready to buy. Yes, there are lots of tools out there, but most of them are complicated, hard to implement and lacking true ROI.

Here at Octane, we believe the answer for dealers who want to deliver a more engaging experience through their dealership promotions and events, while spending less time on marketing tasks, is automated marketing solutions such as online apps, games, and marketing theme packs. Also called “gamification,” these are plug-and-play solutions that integrate game mechanics into your website. They use game techniques – like offering rewards or highlighting status – to generate more leads from your existing website traffic and to convert those leads into more sales. Most importantly, they are simple to launch and use. Some can even be customized and launched on your website in as little as 5 minutes. These types of marketing solutions deliver a powerful competitive edge that is fun, exciting and impactful.

The world today isn’t about impressions. It is about leads and it is about sales. A dealership needs to convert minds and win loyalty. It does this with great customer experiences that start with your advertising and your website. You need to provide something more than an offer, and it must tell your customer that you are different from everyone else. So, give automated marketing solutions such as games a try.  These solutions are your key to stop struggling, and start hitting your targets by bringing your own highly-qualified leads into your own dealership.