I have some good news for you today. Car dealers can now respond positive and negative reviews on Google Maps! The feature that many dealers have been waiting for is finally here. If you have verified your Google Maps listing proving that you are the owner, you can now respond to any comments, positive or negative, when you are logged in to your account.

This is great news for dealers who have an Automotive Internet Reputation Management (IRM) process setup and who have been monitoring reviews on sites like Google Maps, Yelp, CitySearch, InsiderPages and Dealerrater. I also like the strategy of thanking people who place positive comments!

Here is the official notice from Google:

Whether you’re looking for a great lounge to hang out with your friends or a trusty shop to repair your bicycle, the web is a great place to discover and learn about local businesses and services. Some of the listings on Google Maps showcase reviews to help prospective customers make informed decisions and find the places that are just right for them. Reviews on Google Maps are assembled from a variety of sources on the web to give you the best possible overview of what people are saying about a specific place. We also encourage users to share their opinions by writing reviews directly on the Place Page of any place they’ve visited, be it a local business, tourist attraction or the like.

Starting today, if you’re a verified Google Places business owner, you can publicly respond to reviews written by Google Maps users on the Place Page for your business. Engaging with the people who have shared their thoughts about your business is a great way to get to know your customers and find out more. Both positive and negative feedback can be good for your business and help it grow (even though it’s sometimes hard to hear).

By responding, you can build stronger relationships with existing and prospective customers. For example, a thoughtful response acknowledging a problem and offering a solution can often turn a customer who had an initially negative experience into a raving supporter. A simple thank you or a personal message can further reinforce a positive experience. Ultimately, business owner responses give you the opportunity to learn what you do well, what you can do better, and show your customers that you’re listening.

This new feature will make some serious competition for Yelp...but for now, it's time for car dealers to take charge and come up with an review response policy and be careful how your comment on a negative review.

Example Of A Business Owner Comment

Here is an example of how it would look: 

What is your reaction to this news?

I'm very excited to see that negative comments or characterizations can be challenged by car dealers who have been unfairly judged.  This of course reminds me to say that dealers must have an IRM policy in place with guidelines on who should respond, if at all.  Responding the wrong way to an angry customer or a negative review could compound the problem.

I have some good news for you today. Car dealers can now respond positive and negative reviews on Google Maps! The feature that many dealers have been waiting for is finally here. If you have verified your Google Maps listing proving that you are the owner, you can now respond to any comments, positive or negative, when you are logged in to your account.

This is great news for dealers who have an Automotive Internet Reputation Management (IRM) process setup and who have been monitoring reviews on sites like Google Maps, Yelp, CitySearch, InsiderPages and Dealerrater. I also like the strategy of thanking people who place positive comments!

Here is the official notice from Google:

Whether you’re looking for a great lounge to hang out with your friends or a trusty shop to repair your bicycle, the web is a great place to discover and learn about local businesses and services. Some of the listings on Google Maps showcase reviews to help prospective customers make informed decisions and find the places that are just right for them. Reviews on Google Maps are assembled from a variety of sources on the web to give you the best possible overview of what people are saying about a specific place. We also encourage users to share their opinions by writing reviews directly on the Place Page of any place they’ve visited, be it a local business, tourist attraction or the like.

Starting today, if you’re a verified Google Places business owner, you can publicly respond to reviews written by Google Maps users on the Place Page for your business. Engaging with the people who have shared their thoughts about your business is a great way to get to know your customers and find out more. Both positive and negative feedback can be good for your business and help it grow (even though it’s sometimes hard to hear).

By responding, you can build stronger relationships with existing and prospective customers. For example, a thoughtful response acknowledging a problem and offering a solution can often turn a customer who had an initially negative experience into a raving supporter. A simple thank you or a personal message can further reinforce a positive experience. Ultimately, business owner responses give you the opportunity to learn what you do well, what you can do better, and show your customers that you’re listening.

This new feature will make some serious competition for Yelp...but for now, it's time for car dealers to take charge and come up with an review response policy and be careful how your comment on a negative review.

Example Of A Business Owner Comment

Here is an example of how it would look: 

What is your reaction to this news?

I'm very excited to see that negative comments or characterizations can be challenged by car dealers who have been unfairly judged.  This of course reminds me to say that dealers must have an IRM policy in place with guidelines on who should respond, if at all.  Responding the wrong way to an angry customer or a negative review could compound the problem.

It's been a while since I published some "how to" articles on link building and Automotive SEO strategies.  Many people have said that that "Content is King" and I would like to append to that adage "and links are the Queen". 

Car dealers who would like to increase the number incoming links to their primary domains can read further to see if any of my suggestions are new ideas.  If so, add them to your digital marketing strategy to increase the search authority of your digital assets.

The sites I have listed below perform two basic functions: content publishing to get additional listings on Google Page One and secondly, to build links back to your website(s).  The more organic listings that you have on Page One for popular search phrases, the higher your chances that you will get a call, a lead or a walk-in.

Before we address those strategies, do you know how many links point to your website?  Let me make sure that everyone knows how to get their inbound link counts before we go any further. 

One of the best ways is to go to your Google Webmaster Tools control panel and see the links to your website but since few people have access to that data, Yahoo is second best.  If you visit Yahoo.com and do a search using the "link:" command, you can see how many links point to your website.

How To Get Your  Inbound Link Counts

Type in the Yahoo search box the words: link:http://www.yourdomain.com with "yourdomain.com" replaced with your website.  When you click on the search box, the Yahoo Site Explorer will come up and show and initial screen.  The link counts that are displayed on the initial screen are misleading because they include internal links.  Internet links are pages on your website pointing to other pages on your website.

The screenshot above shows 2,344 inbound links in box B.  However, we want to find just the inbound links from other websites.  To do that we need to click on the dropdown box in box C and select "Except from this domain".  Bring up your own domain name now and follow along.

When you select this in box C, the true number of inbound links will show, which in the case for Brickell Honda in Miami, 1,180 links.  This is the number you want to write down and check each month as you start a link building campaign.

Linking Building Ideas

Since I have written about using press releases and WordPress blogs as sources for content publishing and link building, we will assume that everyone is using these powerful link building strategies by now.  Here are a few other ideas that may add some value to your Automotive SEO campaigns by helping you with Google Page One Management, traffic building and of course link building:

1. Create a free listing in www.aboutus.org.  Take the time to fill out all the information that you are asked.  To create a new listing just search for your domain name (www.yourdomain.com) in the search box in the upper right hand corner. If they don't have your website in their directory, they will create a page on the fly.  Your content descriptions can also have links back to your website and you can also add related links to your microsites.

2. Create a Wiki page for your dealership website or microsite.  There are a number of Wiki sites that provide links that are picked up by the search engines.  Take a peek at www.openwiki.com and create Wiki's for your dealership name and primary search keywords like "Miami Honda Dealers" or "Dallas Ford Dealers".

3. Create a www.merchantcircle.com  free business account and use their publishing tools for blogs, images and videos.  A blog post on Merchant Circle will get indexed very quickly and you can include a number of links in your posts.  If you publish content on a regular basis you will be pleased to see the inbound links the site produces.  You don't have to pay to get the benefits of Merchant Circle for SEO.  An example is: http://www.merchantcircle.com/business/PCG.Digital.Marketing.732-450-8200 and you can click on the Blog tab to see example posts.

4. Create accounts on free micro-blogging sites like www.multiply.com, www.posterous.com, www.gather.com or www.biznik.com which will get picked up in search results and can help you with Google Page One Management.  Post articles on a regular basis and you will be rewarded. Here are some examples: http://brianpasch.multiply.com and http://biznik.com/members/brian-pasch . 

5. Create a www.Squidoo.com  lens for the top 10 keyword phrases that you want to target.  Make the lens with good content and use a few different modules like RSS feed, Video Module, and of course a few content modules.  The content modules can have links back to your website(s).  An example of a Squidoo Lens is http://www.squidoo.com/fort-worth-chevrolet-dealers.

6. Create a www.pligg.com site for your specific industry, market or brand.  The Pligg site is your own targeted "Digg" site that you can use to re-post links to your blogs, press releases, news releases, and content pages on your website.  Think of it as your personal news consolidation website and if you pick a good domain and setup the publishing correctly, you will be surprised at the benefits.  An example of an automotive Pligg site is www.carsalenews.com .

7. Create a www.ning.com social networking website.  Depending on the size of your dealership and how many cooperative employees you have, a NING site can reach search authority rather quickly with good content and frequent postings.  Examples of NING sites include www.internetsalesmanager.org, www.automotivedigitalmarketing.com and www.automotive-advertisingagencies.com.  The NING platform allow you to create a blogroll sidebar link tool that appears on all pages which has the potential to create hundreds of links to your website as the site grows.

8. Consider purchasing paid links in www.yahoo.com and www.business.com business directory.  There are some benefits of being associated with these two paid directories that I believe are worth the investment.  Yahoo charges $299 a year and Business.com has the same charge but readers can email me to get a $50 discount code, which changes each month.

9. Place your website in www.dmoz.org which is the most authoritative website directory in the world.  Getting your site listed in the directory takes some careful investigation.  One word of advice is to look where your competitors are listed and choose that page to submit your site.  This is because the editor of that page has already "approved" car dealer websites and thus your chances of being added are greater.

10. Have your service manager or brand enthusiasts participate in automotive forums like www.vwvortex.com , www.bimmerfest, www.nicoclub.com  and others that represent your OEM brand.  After active participation get your staff established in the community, their responses can often link back to your dealer website as long as the links are going to pages that provide answers to questions. 

Forums have a high PageRank and if your website has color brochures, specification sheets, warranty manuals, etc you can often link to these assets to help forum members.    As long as the links provide value you will be golden.

Here To Help DrivingSales.com Members

I hope that of the 10 strategies suggested, some of them were new. When implemented, these tasks will enhance your automotive digital marketing campaigns.  If you have any questions, just ask or you can email me at brian@pcgdigitalmarketing.com

It's been a while since I published some "how to" articles on link building and Automotive SEO strategies.  Many people have said that that "Content is King" and I would like to append to that adage "and links are the Queen". 

Car dealers who would like to increase the number incoming links to their primary domains can read further to see if any of my suggestions are new ideas.  If so, add them to your digital marketing strategy to increase the search authority of your digital assets.

The sites I have listed below perform two basic functions: content publishing to get additional listings on Google Page One and secondly, to build links back to your website(s).  The more organic listings that you have on Page One for popular search phrases, the higher your chances that you will get a call, a lead or a walk-in.

Before we address those strategies, do you know how many links point to your website?  Let me make sure that everyone knows how to get their inbound link counts before we go any further. 

One of the best ways is to go to your Google Webmaster Tools control panel and see the links to your website but since few people have access to that data, Yahoo is second best.  If you visit Yahoo.com and do a search using the "link:" command, you can see how many links point to your website.

How To Get Your  Inbound Link Counts

Type in the Yahoo search box the words: link:http://www.yourdomain.com with "yourdomain.com" replaced with your website.  When you click on the search box, the Yahoo Site Explorer will come up and show and initial screen.  The link counts that are displayed on the initial screen are misleading because they include internal links.  Internet links are pages on your website pointing to other pages on your website.

The screenshot above shows 2,344 inbound links in box B.  However, we want to find just the inbound links from other websites.  To do that we need to click on the dropdown box in box C and select "Except from this domain".  Bring up your own domain name now and follow along.

When you select this in box C, the true number of inbound links will show, which in the case for Brickell Honda in Miami, 1,180 links.  This is the number you want to write down and check each month as you start a link building campaign.

Linking Building Ideas

Since I have written about using press releases and WordPress blogs as sources for content publishing and link building, we will assume that everyone is using these powerful link building strategies by now.  Here are a few other ideas that may add some value to your Automotive SEO campaigns by helping you with Google Page One Management, traffic building and of course link building:

1. Create a free listing in www.aboutus.org.  Take the time to fill out all the information that you are asked.  To create a new listing just search for your domain name (www.yourdomain.com) in the search box in the upper right hand corner. If they don't have your website in their directory, they will create a page on the fly.  Your content descriptions can also have links back to your website and you can also add related links to your microsites.

2. Create a Wiki page for your dealership website or microsite.  There are a number of Wiki sites that provide links that are picked up by the search engines.  Take a peek at www.openwiki.com and create Wiki's for your dealership name and primary search keywords like "Miami Honda Dealers" or "Dallas Ford Dealers".

3. Create a www.merchantcircle.com  free business account and use their publishing tools for blogs, images and videos.  A blog post on Merchant Circle will get indexed very quickly and you can include a number of links in your posts.  If you publish content on a regular basis you will be pleased to see the inbound links the site produces.  You don't have to pay to get the benefits of Merchant Circle for SEO.  An example is: http://www.merchantcircle.com/business/PCG.Digital.Marketing.732-450-8200 and you can click on the Blog tab to see example posts.

4. Create accounts on free micro-blogging sites like www.multiply.com, www.posterous.com, www.gather.com or www.biznik.com which will get picked up in search results and can help you with Google Page One Management.  Post articles on a regular basis and you will be rewarded. Here are some examples: http://brianpasch.multiply.com and http://biznik.com/members/brian-pasch . 

5. Create a www.Squidoo.com  lens for the top 10 keyword phrases that you want to target.  Make the lens with good content and use a few different modules like RSS feed, Video Module, and of course a few content modules.  The content modules can have links back to your website(s).  An example of a Squidoo Lens is http://www.squidoo.com/fort-worth-chevrolet-dealers.

6. Create a www.pligg.com site for your specific industry, market or brand.  The Pligg site is your own targeted "Digg" site that you can use to re-post links to your blogs, press releases, news releases, and content pages on your website.  Think of it as your personal news consolidation website and if you pick a good domain and setup the publishing correctly, you will be surprised at the benefits.  An example of an automotive Pligg site is www.carsalenews.com .

7. Create a www.ning.com social networking website.  Depending on the size of your dealership and how many cooperative employees you have, a NING site can reach search authority rather quickly with good content and frequent postings.  Examples of NING sites include www.internetsalesmanager.org, www.automotivedigitalmarketing.com and www.automotive-advertisingagencies.com.  The NING platform allow you to create a blogroll sidebar link tool that appears on all pages which has the potential to create hundreds of links to your website as the site grows.

8. Consider purchasing paid links in www.yahoo.com and www.business.com business directory.  There are some benefits of being associated with these two paid directories that I believe are worth the investment.  Yahoo charges $299 a year and Business.com has the same charge but readers can email me to get a $50 discount code, which changes each month.

9. Place your website in www.dmoz.org which is the most authoritative website directory in the world.  Getting your site listed in the directory takes some careful investigation.  One word of advice is to look where your competitors are listed and choose that page to submit your site.  This is because the editor of that page has already "approved" car dealer websites and thus your chances of being added are greater.

10. Have your service manager or brand enthusiasts participate in automotive forums like www.vwvortex.com , www.bimmerfest, www.nicoclub.com  and others that represent your OEM brand.  After active participation get your staff established in the community, their responses can often link back to your dealer website as long as the links are going to pages that provide answers to questions. 

Forums have a high PageRank and if your website has color brochures, specification sheets, warranty manuals, etc you can often link to these assets to help forum members.    As long as the links provide value you will be golden.

Here To Help DrivingSales.com Members

I hope that of the 10 strategies suggested, some of them were new. When implemented, these tasks will enhance your automotive digital marketing campaigns.  If you have any questions, just ask or you can email me at brian@pcgdigitalmarketing.com

Once you start playing with FlipBoard, one of the biggest revelations is how it transforms Twitter into a really powerful content presentation tool. 

I started to think about how companies could leverage FlipBoard technology for sales support and customer service.

My idea was that a salesperson or company could create a Twitter account for the sole purpose of creating an inventory of articles that assisted their sales process.

In effect, creating a Twitter account for the purpose of creating a digital media magazine. The company or salesperson would use this Twitter account to tweet out any articles that they found online to support the purpose of the social media magazine. 

FlipBoard for the Automotive Industry

Since I assist many car dealers with their digital marketing strategies, I would like to give an example of how FlipBoard could assist a salesperson in a dealership showroom.

In this example, a fictitious salesperson called Annie Stone working for Classic Chevrolet could create a Twitter account called http://twitter.com/classicchevymag . This Twitter account would not be promoted as the primary account for the dealership and would not proactively seek followers. Consider this Twitter account as a means to create your custom social media magazine.

As Annie finds great articles or reviews about the new 2011 Chevrolet cars and trucks from third party websites like Edmunds.com, MotorTrend.com, or Consumer Reports she would tweet them from this targeted Twitter account. As her customers post reviews online about buying cars from Classic Chevrolet, she will tweet these review pages. As she adds customer testimonial videos on YouTube she will tweet these as well.

In essence, this special Twitter account is her social bookmarks for assisting her sales process. The FlipBoard App for her iPad in turn will create a beautiful presentation of all this data in a custom Classic Chevrolet Social Media Magazine.

Equipped with her iPad, whenever Annie needs sales support, she can turn on her iPad and stand "side by side" with her customer and show them the accolades about the cars they sell or the customer experience. Annie could also hand the customer her iPad to read while she speaks with her General Sales Manager or gets the keys for a test drive.

Since FlipBoard transforms a boring Twitter feed into a beautiful social media magazine, it save Annie the time to create digital sales tools on her own. It allows Annie to update her sales materials in real-time which means that the latest reviews, accolades are in her hand at all times. 

Creating a Custom Social Magazine

Business owners from all industries can follow the same model and actually have all sales professionals share a single Twitter account that is linked to their FlipBoard App on their iPad. The only logistics to work out is who can post new content on the Twitter feed. In this case, you could install FlipBoard on the sales team's iPads without revealing the password for the Twitter account.

Flipboard is a revolutionary application for social media and the possibilities to create social media magazines on the fly that can assist the sales process is just endless. If you have created a custom social media magazine for your dealership, please share your ideas.

If you need help creating a customized social media magazine for your business, feel free to give PCG Digital Marketing a call at 732.450.8200.

Once you start playing with FlipBoard, one of the biggest revelations is how it transforms Twitter into a really powerful content presentation tool. 

I started to think about how companies could leverage FlipBoard technology for sales support and customer service.

My idea was that a salesperson or company could create a Twitter account for the sole purpose of creating an inventory of articles that assisted their sales process.

In effect, creating a Twitter account for the purpose of creating a digital media magazine. The company or salesperson would use this Twitter account to tweet out any articles that they found online to support the purpose of the social media magazine. 

FlipBoard for the Automotive Industry

Since I assist many car dealers with their digital marketing strategies, I would like to give an example of how FlipBoard could assist a salesperson in a dealership showroom.

In this example, a fictitious salesperson called Annie Stone working for Classic Chevrolet could create a Twitter account called http://twitter.com/classicchevymag . This Twitter account would not be promoted as the primary account for the dealership and would not proactively seek followers. Consider this Twitter account as a means to create your custom social media magazine.

As Annie finds great articles or reviews about the new 2011 Chevrolet cars and trucks from third party websites like Edmunds.com, MotorTrend.com, or Consumer Reports she would tweet them from this targeted Twitter account. As her customers post reviews online about buying cars from Classic Chevrolet, she will tweet these review pages. As she adds customer testimonial videos on YouTube she will tweet these as well.

In essence, this special Twitter account is her social bookmarks for assisting her sales process. The FlipBoard App for her iPad in turn will create a beautiful presentation of all this data in a custom Classic Chevrolet Social Media Magazine.

Equipped with her iPad, whenever Annie needs sales support, she can turn on her iPad and stand "side by side" with her customer and show them the accolades about the cars they sell or the customer experience. Annie could also hand the customer her iPad to read while she speaks with her General Sales Manager or gets the keys for a test drive.

Since FlipBoard transforms a boring Twitter feed into a beautiful social media magazine, it save Annie the time to create digital sales tools on her own. It allows Annie to update her sales materials in real-time which means that the latest reviews, accolades are in her hand at all times. 

Creating a Custom Social Magazine

Business owners from all industries can follow the same model and actually have all sales professionals share a single Twitter account that is linked to their FlipBoard App on their iPad. The only logistics to work out is who can post new content on the Twitter feed. In this case, you could install FlipBoard on the sales team's iPads without revealing the password for the Twitter account.

Flipboard is a revolutionary application for social media and the possibilities to create social media magazines on the fly that can assist the sales process is just endless. If you have created a custom social media magazine for your dealership, please share your ideas.

If you need help creating a customized social media magazine for your business, feel free to give PCG Digital Marketing a call at 732.450.8200.

I was speaking with Alex Snyder today and he reminded me of a statement I made in 2009 which was:

"The most important person a car dealer can hire in 2010 will be a content writer."

With half of 2010 now past, I thought I would revisit why this statement made in October of 2009 has never been so timely.  Regardless of which digital marketing strategy is your favorite at this moment, Content is Still King to develop relevance for your website.

If Content is King then Link Building is the Queen. 

So the question for today is:  Do you have the Royal Family as part of your automotive marketing team?

Choices For Content Writing

If you are a single rooftop dealership, it will be difficult to justify a full-time content writer to be on your payroll but there are options.  You should inquire at local county colleges for marketing interns that often will work for free as long as they have the opportunity to work with a live digital marketing project. 

Dealers can also look to hire recently “downsized” writers from local newspapers; most have been cutting staff over the past few years.  There is actually a glut of well trained writers on the market so you can negotiate prices by the piece for by the hour.  Some services charge $20 an article and for a small dealership, this could be an alternative to consider.

With a content writer working inside your dealership or as an outside consultant you now have the resources to be adding new pages to your website every week.  It is shocking to see how many dealer website pages have little to no content.  Areas of high profit like service and parts often have pages with less than 100 words.    How many dealer websites have you visited where their specials page is just blank?

Dealers should try to create well written content pages with at least 400 words and make sure they are well formatted for the consumer to read.  Of course you also have to consider SEO design criteria but there is a perfect balance that can achieve both goals.  It is hard to find that balance so be careful who you hire.
 

What is the ideal content creation pace for car dealers?  Dealers should be updating their blogs with 3-4 new posts a month.  Their primary dealership website should be updated at least 3 times a month with new sales, promotions, testimonials, etc. 

For my business, I create at least 10 new articles a week and post those articles on my blogs and sites like this one.  I spend very little money on advertising because my articles generate traffic and calls for those who need help implementing my suggestions.

There are a good number of dealers who take my advice and never call. I'm actually very happy to be an assistant to their success with the hope that they will pass my name along to anyone who needs help.   In the same way, your content will increase the relevance for the cars you sell in your market.  These efforts will be rewarded with increased traffic to your website and higher relative ranking to your competitors that don’t have a content strategy in place. 

Some of this traffic will result in sales but there are other reasons to create content.  Good content will

• increase the number of pages that show in Google search results
• push your competitors lower in search results
• protect your brand name from lead collectors and poachers
• increase Google ratings and relevance for your website

Good content is not just about sales. Content is the fuel to power up your website for a battle with competitors on all fronts.

What About The Queen?

Once you have a content writer on your team, they need to be trained on how to write content to achieve the maximum benefit of the content.  There is an art to creating content that is compelling to read as well as achieve important link building goals.

When writing content you should divide the placement of the content to distribute it to your main website and also to external sites.  The reason for this balance is that your website needs to grow in size with static content pages but it also needs to grow in external links.

For example, if you are a Nissan dealer you should have a few pages written about the 2011 Nissan Leaf.  If you want to see how much dealers need content writers, visit 10 Nissan dealers at random and tell me how many dealers have any pages on the Leaf with more than 300 words.  

Once a Nissan dealer adds a few content pages about the Leaf on their website, they should:

• post articles on their external blog on the Leaf
• issue a few press release on the Nissan Leaf and when it is coming
• include mentions on their social media sites with links to their dealer pages

Each one of these posts should have links back to the primary dealer's website and specifically the pages on the Leaf.  If you see the picture, the content pages on a dealer's website NEED links from external sources to increase the relative value compared to other local Nissan dealers.

There is another art form in finding places where you can post your articles for free that add valuable links to your website.  That could be a webinar in itself!

Time To Take Action

If you are just too busy or too intimated about starting a consistent content writing program for your dealership, you really cannot wait much longer.  I see a Tsunami coming for car dealers who ignore proven digital marketing strategies that are content based.

If you want to be completely blown off Google Page One in your own backyard, then ignore this warning.   Need more proof?

Test #1

Do a Google Search on your #1 keyword phrase that sells the MOST cars for your dealership.  You don't have to look at any reports since it's your dealership name.  So take a minute to search your business name in Google.

If you own ALL ten organic listings on Page One...you are doing well!  This would place you in the top 1% of car dealers nationwide.   If you don't own all of Page One you will most likely see lead collectors, review sites and parasites leaching equity from your brand.  You need immediate action.

Test #2

Now do a Google search for your OEM brand and your city name; like Oxnard Toyota.  If there are competitors and lead collectors on a search of your own city and OEM brand, you are allowing people to drain equity, leads and sales from your multi-million dollar investment.

So you can decide to Hire a King and a Queen or you can lease them. 

(I know a few great companies!)

 If you ignore this warning, you will soon be a slave to others.

Brian Pasch, CEO

PCG Digital Marketing

http://www.dealer-seo.com

732.450.8200

P.S.  Regardless of how well your content strategy becomes, these efforts must be partnered with Google Adwords (SEM) campaigns to capture the broad search phrases that consumers type.  Your content writing needs to be focused on the search phrases that will yield sales and are feasible to acheive rankings on Google Page One.    Digital Marketing is an inclusive game:  SEO + SEM + Social Media + (some secrets) = winning strategy!  :)

I was speaking with Alex Snyder today and he reminded me of a statement I made in 2009 which was:

"The most important person a car dealer can hire in 2010 will be a content writer."

With half of 2010 now past, I thought I would revisit why this statement made in October of 2009 has never been so timely.  Regardless of which digital marketing strategy is your favorite at this moment, Content is Still King to develop relevance for your website.

If Content is King then Link Building is the Queen. 

So the question for today is:  Do you have the Royal Family as part of your automotive marketing team?

Choices For Content Writing

If you are a single rooftop dealership, it will be difficult to justify a full-time content writer to be on your payroll but there are options.  You should inquire at local county colleges for marketing interns that often will work for free as long as they have the opportunity to work with a live digital marketing project. 

Dealers can also look to hire recently “downsized” writers from local newspapers; most have been cutting staff over the past few years.  There is actually a glut of well trained writers on the market so you can negotiate prices by the piece for by the hour.  Some services charge $20 an article and for a small dealership, this could be an alternative to consider.

With a content writer working inside your dealership or as an outside consultant you now have the resources to be adding new pages to your website every week.  It is shocking to see how many dealer website pages have little to no content.  Areas of high profit like service and parts often have pages with less than 100 words.    How many dealer websites have you visited where their specials page is just blank?

Dealers should try to create well written content pages with at least 400 words and make sure they are well formatted for the consumer to read.  Of course you also have to consider SEO design criteria but there is a perfect balance that can achieve both goals.  It is hard to find that balance so be careful who you hire.
 

What is the ideal content creation pace for car dealers?  Dealers should be updating their blogs with 3-4 new posts a month.  Their primary dealership website should be updated at least 3 times a month with new sales, promotions, testimonials, etc. 

For my business, I create at least 10 new articles a week and post those articles on my blogs and sites like this one.  I spend very little money on advertising because my articles generate traffic and calls for those who need help implementing my suggestions.

There are a good number of dealers who take my advice and never call. I'm actually very happy to be an assistant to their success with the hope that they will pass my name along to anyone who needs help.   In the same way, your content will increase the relevance for the cars you sell in your market.  These efforts will be rewarded with increased traffic to your website and higher relative ranking to your competitors that don’t have a content strategy in place. 

Some of this traffic will result in sales but there are other reasons to create content.  Good content will

• increase the number of pages that show in Google search results
• push your competitors lower in search results
• protect your brand name from lead collectors and poachers
• increase Google ratings and relevance for your website

Good content is not just about sales. Content is the fuel to power up your website for a battle with competitors on all fronts.

What About The Queen?

Once you have a content writer on your team, they need to be trained on how to write content to achieve the maximum benefit of the content.  There is an art to creating content that is compelling to read as well as achieve important link building goals.

When writing content you should divide the placement of the content to distribute it to your main website and also to external sites.  The reason for this balance is that your website needs to grow in size with static content pages but it also needs to grow in external links.

For example, if you are a Nissan dealer you should have a few pages written about the 2011 Nissan Leaf.  If you want to see how much dealers need content writers, visit 10 Nissan dealers at random and tell me how many dealers have any pages on the Leaf with more than 300 words.  

Once a Nissan dealer adds a few content pages about the Leaf on their website, they should:

• post articles on their external blog on the Leaf
• issue a few press release on the Nissan Leaf and when it is coming
• include mentions on their social media sites with links to their dealer pages

Each one of these posts should have links back to the primary dealer's website and specifically the pages on the Leaf.  If you see the picture, the content pages on a dealer's website NEED links from external sources to increase the relative value compared to other local Nissan dealers.

There is another art form in finding places where you can post your articles for free that add valuable links to your website.  That could be a webinar in itself!

Time To Take Action

If you are just too busy or too intimated about starting a consistent content writing program for your dealership, you really cannot wait much longer.  I see a Tsunami coming for car dealers who ignore proven digital marketing strategies that are content based.

If you want to be completely blown off Google Page One in your own backyard, then ignore this warning.   Need more proof?

Test #1

Do a Google Search on your #1 keyword phrase that sells the MOST cars for your dealership.  You don't have to look at any reports since it's your dealership name.  So take a minute to search your business name in Google.

If you own ALL ten organic listings on Page One...you are doing well!  This would place you in the top 1% of car dealers nationwide.   If you don't own all of Page One you will most likely see lead collectors, review sites and parasites leaching equity from your brand.  You need immediate action.

Test #2

Now do a Google search for your OEM brand and your city name; like Oxnard Toyota.  If there are competitors and lead collectors on a search of your own city and OEM brand, you are allowing people to drain equity, leads and sales from your multi-million dollar investment.

So you can decide to Hire a King and a Queen or you can lease them. 

(I know a few great companies!)

 If you ignore this warning, you will soon be a slave to others.

Brian Pasch, CEO

PCG Digital Marketing

http://www.dealer-seo.com

732.450.8200

P.S.  Regardless of how well your content strategy becomes, these efforts must be partnered with Google Adwords (SEM) campaigns to capture the broad search phrases that consumers type.  Your content writing needs to be focused on the search phrases that will yield sales and are feasible to acheive rankings on Google Page One.    Digital Marketing is an inclusive game:  SEO + SEM + Social Media + (some secrets) = winning strategy!  :)

Robert Scoble on his blog Scobleizer.com broke a story about some new technology called Flipboard and it included the video included below which I was drawn to watch to completion.  The Flipboard software running on an iPad is a perfect example of how many innovations will be coming for the iPad in the coming year.

Flipboard is very exciting for me since I use social media regularly and have many people I want to stay in touch with; personally and for business.  The Flipboard software is a social media aggregator and presents the social media streams in a magazine format. 

It is mind-blowing how cool this application take an ugly stream of data and turns it into something very easy to read and with full content; a social media magazine.  For example, Flipboard takes a 140 character tweet and follows the link and finds the related story and presents it in an attractive format.

Take a moment to view the video and tell me if you agree that Flipboard is a really cool way to get rich data and stories from your social media streams.

Flipboard Video

Flipboard Setup

It tool two minutes to setup Flipboard on my iPad and look how cool my Twitter feed looks with articles shown from Eric Miltsch, Cobalt and also from my own posts.

When you setup Flipboard in your iPad make sure you add two important data streams:

http://twitter.com/automotiveseo

http://facebook.com/pcgdigitalmarketing.com

Then the application will truly have "richer" data. :)

Robert Scoble on his blog Scobleizer.com broke a story about some new technology called Flipboard and it included the video included below which I was drawn to watch to completion.  The Flipboard software running on an iPad is a perfect example of how many innovations will be coming for the iPad in the coming year.

Flipboard is very exciting for me since I use social media regularly and have many people I want to stay in touch with; personally and for business.  The Flipboard software is a social media aggregator and presents the social media streams in a magazine format. 

It is mind-blowing how cool this application take an ugly stream of data and turns it into something very easy to read and with full content; a social media magazine.  For example, Flipboard takes a 140 character tweet and follows the link and finds the related story and presents it in an attractive format.

Take a moment to view the video and tell me if you agree that Flipboard is a really cool way to get rich data and stories from your social media streams.

Flipboard Video

Flipboard Setup

It tool two minutes to setup Flipboard on my iPad and look how cool my Twitter feed looks with articles shown from Eric Miltsch, Cobalt and also from my own posts.

When you setup Flipboard in your iPad make sure you add two important data streams:

http://twitter.com/automotiveseo

http://facebook.com/pcgdigitalmarketing.com

Then the application will truly have "richer" data. :)