Overtake
Keep Your Current PPC Provider, Pay Them Less
Automotive SEO
Content marketing (SEO) is something dealerships started to learn and understand around 2013 – 2014. Some masters of the craft, even earlier. Since then there’s been a major fallout of companies able to produce quality content. Whether you have one person or a team of in-house writers they must know all the rules the search engines play-by. The golden rule, produce original, relevant and high quality content that produces revenue for your business.
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Keep Your Current Provider, Pay Less
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This is one of the biggest opportunities dealerships have when it comes to advertising spend and it can be seen at too many dealerships across the nation. If your current paid search company is landing people on SRP’s or the homepage of your website. They are doing it wrong. Use SEO to work with your paid provider to create landing pages for low-funnel buying questions. This keeps users engaged on your website therefore increasing your chances of a conversion.
5 Essential Components To Landing Pages
1 - Engaging Headlines w/ Proper H1 & H2
2 - Information Relative To The Searched Keywords
3 - Video, Pictures, Infographics
4 - The Benefits of Your Offering
5 - Clear Call-to-Action
If you’re landing paid search on pages that don’t include these things, STOP. You’re paying too much and users are leaving your site without converting. This is also known as wasted ad-spend.
Pay Less Overtime With Your Paid Search
- For example, if your keyword is “new chevrolet lease offers” and your current provider is sending them to your homepage or chevy SRP’s on your website. Stop buying that keyword, your customers are bouncing. And you’re paying a premium for that keyword, probably close to $10 or more.
- With quality content, land people that click on your ad to landing pages specifically talking about your brands’ lease offers. And clicks could cost you 50% less.
- That’s right, with great quality content, you could be spending 50% less on paid search. Either you get double the results for the same spend, or you use that money for other advertising avenues.
Overtake
The Nasty Truth About Website Conversion Rate...Is Still Nasty
But wait, there is something brewing up this week and it's taking some flack on social media. 
The global website conversion rate as of Q3 2015 is 2.95%. Let's also keep in mind that conversion rate means money has been exchanged. This is true to the definition, but in automotive the term is misused. Money is exchanged in the F&I office, web conversions are leads.
Remember that not all of these leads give credit where credit is due, lots of consumers show up without calling or emailing. That's a web lead, but most dealers don't account for it.
Paul Potratz has a webinar on FEB 18th asking about a conversion rate of over 50% for an automotive website.
I think it's a good topic to talk about and I'm interested to see what the company has in store for us.
The conversion rate in automotive, as defined by some web companies can be whatever the company wants it to be. So any conversion rate can be possible. Not saying for a moment this is what's happening.
Before I was a Phone Ninja, I was VP of Sales for DealerFire, we defined conversion rate to our dealers as a phone call, lead form submission, online chat and a showroom visit. But it didn't mean we had an exchange of money taking place. Our average conversion rate was just under 3%. Sometimes closer to 2%.
Paul makes a good point when he said that if you're busy doubting and the company is busy paying attention to something your web company isn't, you're going to lose. I'm eager to listen and hoping to learn something.
I go into a lot more detail here in this post from a couple years ago. check it out. http://www.drivingsales.com/blogs/christian/2014/05/05/the-truth-about-vdp
And go check out that http://www.monetate.com/resources/research report!
Overtake
The Nasty Truth About Website Conversion Rate...Is Still Nasty
But wait, there is something brewing up this week and it's taking some flack on social media.
The global website conversion rate as of Q3 2015 is 2.95%. Let's also keep in mind that conversion rate means money has been exchanged. This is true to the definition, but in automotive the term is misused. Money is exchanged in the F&I office, web conversions are leads.
Remember that not all of these leads give credit where credit is due, lots of consumers show up without calling or emailing. That's a web lead, but most dealers don't account for it.
Paul Potratz has a webinar on FEB 18th asking about a conversion rate of over 50% for an automotive website.
I think it's a good topic to talk about and I'm interested to see what the company has in store for us.
The conversion rate in automotive, as defined by some web companies can be whatever the company wants it to be. So any conversion rate can be possible. Not saying for a moment this is what's happening.
Before I was a Phone Ninja, I was VP of Sales for DealerFire, we defined conversion rate to our dealers as a phone call, lead form submission, online chat and a showroom visit. But it didn't mean we had an exchange of money taking place. Our average conversion rate was just under 3%. Sometimes closer to 2%.
Paul makes a good point when he said that if you're busy doubting and the company is busy paying attention to something your web company isn't, you're going to lose. I'm eager to listen and hoping to learn something.
I go into a lot more detail here in this post from a couple years ago. check it out. http://www.drivingsales.com/blogs/christian/2014/05/05/the-truth-about-vdp
And go check out that http://www.monetate.com/resources/research report!
Overtake
This Toyota Dealership Hit An Absolute Home Run... With My You Know What In A BOX!!!
Oak Lawn Toyota just trounced most marketing firms that I know about... This is epic and you have to see it...
It was so good, Car Blog CarDebater did a story on it that I came across today...
Would love to hear your feeback and if you have any other links to some cool dealership videos....
Oak Lawn Toyota is not my client... just calling out great work!!
here is the link to view the video!
http://www.cardebater.com/toyota-dealerships-keys-in-a-box-music-video-is-pure-gold
7 Comments
DealersGear
I want to buy a car from this dealership just because of this video!
DealerKnows Consulting
Thanks for sharing. Yes, they are proudly a DealerKnows client of mine. Moreover, the vid was my idea, as was some initial lyric work, but truthfully, their ISM Joe Mallet (in the pink shirt) executed my vision with such amazing skill and geniusness, he deserves all the credit for making it go viral. He and his partner in the vid are the champions of this piece.
theBDCtrainer.com
Now That's Thinking Automotive Marketing Outside of The Box
Kijiji, an eBay Company
Definitely an awesome video. It's timely, and very well done. When I see these, I often wonder how much it actually affects sales. Does it sell more cars, or does it never leave the automotive community. I guess it depends on how viral it goes. Would love to see a study on what happens after one of these videos.
CBG Buick GMC, Inc.
Definitely different and makes you just WANT to watch the whole video and not move on to the next one. I'm with Robert also. I wonder how much sales will vary after this video.
Overtake
This Toyota Dealership Hit An Absolute Home Run... With My You Know What In A BOX!!!
Oak Lawn Toyota just trounced most marketing firms that I know about... This is epic and you have to see it...
It was so good, Car Blog CarDebater did a story on it that I came across today...
Would love to hear your feeback and if you have any other links to some cool dealership videos....
Oak Lawn Toyota is not my client... just calling out great work!!
here is the link to view the video!
http://www.cardebater.com/toyota-dealerships-keys-in-a-box-music-video-is-pure-gold
7 Comments
DealersGear
I want to buy a car from this dealership just because of this video!
DealerKnows Consulting
Thanks for sharing. Yes, they are proudly a DealerKnows client of mine. Moreover, the vid was my idea, as was some initial lyric work, but truthfully, their ISM Joe Mallet (in the pink shirt) executed my vision with such amazing skill and geniusness, he deserves all the credit for making it go viral. He and his partner in the vid are the champions of this piece.
theBDCtrainer.com
Now That's Thinking Automotive Marketing Outside of The Box
Kijiji, an eBay Company
Definitely an awesome video. It's timely, and very well done. When I see these, I often wonder how much it actually affects sales. Does it sell more cars, or does it never leave the automotive community. I guess it depends on how viral it goes. Would love to see a study on what happens after one of these videos.
CBG Buick GMC, Inc.
Definitely different and makes you just WANT to watch the whole video and not move on to the next one. I'm with Robert also. I wonder how much sales will vary after this video.
Overtake
The Nasty Truth About VDP's and Conversion Rate In Automotive
Vehicle Details Pages (VDPs) have been a hot topic for some time now. Over the past few months, I have become increasingly convinced that their importance is not completely understood within the automotive industry.
E-commerce websites outside of automotive put a lot of emphasis on product pages. They are extremely important and measured with precise accuracy. Here are some things that are taken into consideration:
- Conversion Rate - What percentage of website visitors (now called sessions) are turning into paying customers?
- Cost per Transaction - How much does each transaction cost your business
- A / B Testing - Do certain versions of product pages produce more (or higher grossing) sales
- Average Transaction Value - Every time I ring the register, how much am I ringing it for
- Days and Visits to Purchase - How many days between the user’s website visit to the sale?
- Types of Users - What are the demographics of my website visitors?
- Task Completion - Did the user complete the task you wanted them to do while on your site?
From where do these criteria come? E-Commerce giants that are doing hundreds of millions of dollars per day online. The same e-Commerce giants that are getting over 100 million page views per day.
I have heard a few automotive website companies talk about and compare the industry to Amazon. I don’t believe this is an applicable or accurate model for car dealers. Take into consideration these quick stats about Amazon:
- $74 billion in sales last year
- $202 million in sales per day
- Over 150 million visitors each day
- Online only
- Trusted, fair prices, fast, convenient
Now, take a look at this scenario.
If I had a dealership group of 60 rooftops, and my stores were all open 7 days a week and each one of them sold 7 cars per day.
* My average selling price is $30,000. Each one of my websites gets 15,000 sessions per month.
- $4.6B in sales last year
- $12.6 Million in sales per day
- Over 30,000 visits per day
- In Person Only
- Trust has to be earned
- Fair Prices? Fast? Convenient?
It should be easy to see that apples do not equal oranges in the example above. Amazon can A/B test product pages within an hour on any given day of the year. Cyber Monday 2013 was the single most impressive day in E-commerce history, raking in an astounding $2 Billion. The Average Conversion rate of all e-commerce websites is 2.67% as defined here: Monetate. Is your website company telling you that your conversion rate is higher? Are you hearing companies promise 25% increase in conversion? If they are, chances are they do not fully understand what conversion means.
For my clients a conversion is this: Website visitors who come to the dealership and service or purchase a vehicle.
I do sometimes have clients that ask map / direction clicks and phone numbers to be tracked within analytics. While these tell us about a click, they do not count as a conversion in my book. I do not possess the secret sauce for website conversion. I simply aim to get as many of them as possible. My clients are well versed on bounce rate, total sessions, session duration and conversion rate.
With respect to bounce rate, I want my clients getting entrances and visits from all over the country, not just their hometown. When you have visits from all over, your bounce rate may rise, but when you’re putting out blogs and landing pages that let consumers research on your website, that is not a bad thing.
For instance, if a consumer types this into Google - 2014 s class vs 7 series - the result is a landing page on a dealer's website that compares the two models. The information only takes 60 seconds or so to read and if the user leaves after viewing, this plays a part in your bounce rate and average session duration. If the dealership brings sessions from around the world to their website to answer a question that search engines are being asked every day this is a good thing. In the example above, pages like this bring in thousands of visitors each month.
Your dealership isn’t opposed to selling cars outside of your PMA right? The more content you have on your website in the form of landing pages, blog posting and rich content pages, the more organic traffic and entrances into your website you will have. Conversion rate may drop as website sessions increase, but as long as more conversions happen, I don’t see the business owner thinking twice about the minutiae. With too many factors playing into it, there isn’t one defined conversion rate in the auto industry. The standard for success is still website sessions compared to cars sold and serviced.
Autonation recently announced that they would stop relying on third-party websites to drive traffic to their websites. Mike Jackson also told CNBC that Tesla should be able to sell cars direct to consumers. Two things are happening here:
-
Dealerships should now start to invest in content writers that drive traffic to their OWN websites.
-
A better consumer experience is necessary when merchandising vehicles online.
This isn’t Amazon, and Scott Hernalseen said this at the 2013 DrivingSales Executive Summit, “Dealers must have a clear merchandising and pricing strategy that makes their vehicles stand out from the competition.” Dealerships should be pointing web traffic (most importantly Google and Bing Searches) to their own website. Third-party listing and lead providers know that content is king and that they are capturing searchers, bringing them to their sites, then selling to you.
Tim Martell, CEO and Founder of Wikimotive, said that third-party lead providers are “toxic to car dealers.” He explains that their negative impact begins in the messaging to consumers 
experience the consumer has in the buying process enforces the distrust.
car dealers where their own automated processes barrage the prospect with follow-ups. The consumer is left regretting ever entering their contact information in the first place. Martell adds, “Let’s not forget that in some cases, consumers will submit leads on multiple third-party sites. You do the math; phone calls and
Most third-party lead providers send traffic to VDP pages. The problem with this is that VDP pages in the auto industry are old and outdated. When I visit websites such as Converse, Zara or Coach, for example, I get one experience. When I visit car dealer websites I get another experience.
Ali Mendiola of DealerTrack recently told dealers, in her online webinar “How to break free from the website lead-to-sale conversion rate blues,” that VDP pages offer no guidance and give the consumer too many options. She said that “all of the buttons are the same” and that dealers should “limit the amount of information that is on the VDPs”. I couldn't agree more.
A call-to-action click is meaningless if it stops there. Where does the click take them? Do you want yet another opinion on what their trade-in is worth? Take a look at what the manufacturers offer consumers on their own VDP pages.
Shockingly, it looks nothing like a VDP on one of it’s own franchised sites! It does resemble e-commerce sites. From Mercedes-Benz to Kia, it’s all about a big photo, the price and one call to action. Not form leads. We all know that consumers do not surrender this type of information so easily.
The expert of online psychology Nathalie Nahai’s book Webs of Influence, allow us to understand our hidden motivations when viewing product pages and how to design persuasive experiences. Nathalie, whom has spoken to Google, Ebay, and Harvard Business Review, understands the principles of how to get the web user to do what you (the business) want them to do. The vehicle details pages used on our client’s websites implement these principles. Two noticeable mentions are the use of one main call to action and large images to persuade action.
Now look at the Nissan VDP. Yes! This is more like it; a large photo, no clutter and one main call to action. This lets consumers have the same experience across the entire e-commerce brand. One more thing, since the majority of new clients are all now built on responsive platforms, all of this is available on their iPads, iPhones and Android devices in the very same seamless format. For a case study of how this works you can access here: http://bit.ly/1uqj7SW
Continue to be the excellent automotive retail professional that you were when you started in the industry. Use your own original content - content that both you and your car buyers care about. The consumer gets to connect with a local business that has what they want and you get the opportunity to become their valuable local resource they were hoping to find. Everybody wins. You. Win.
17 Comments
Berman Auto Group
Interesting read, thanks Christian. I think there's a large difference in Autos as to a typical consumer good that is transacted as cited in the Amazon model but I can agree with a parallel. I give AutoNation full respect for stepping out, we all know it was a calculated maneuver. I had a conversation regarding this just recently, we came to the conclusion, " we wish we had the balls to do something like it". It is truly a daunting reality for small groups and single points.
Luther Automotive Group
Content is King! I have a hard time understanding why a dealer wouldn't want to be globally relevant? Producing original content that is interesting to the world only amplifies your regional relevance thus confirming the dealer is the "BIG SME" (subject matter expert). Your second point regarding consumer experience is also spot on in my book. Easy to use web sites that showcase information consumers are interested in is the way of the future in my humble opinion. It is time to leave behind our pop-ups, pop-unders, falling business cards and random cyber video people interrupting our web surfing to explain how easy it is to submit a lead. I vote to encourage and increase consumer interaction by driving overall satisfaction through consumer oriented web sites. I love it Christian. Keep up the great work! #ThoughtLeader
Dealer Inspire & Launch Digital Marketing
A great book on conversion rate optimization is "Don't Make Me Think" by Steve Krug. I read this years ago trying to learn everything possible about CRO. Christian, you are right on by recommending one call to action. Each page needs a goal and the quantity of "conversion points" a.k.a buttons everywhere doesn't equate to more leads. I think a busy page can lead to a less than ideal consumer experience. Yes, there should be secondary CTA's but when is enough enough? #awesome illustration - http://goo.gl/SFE6gw Next point- Conversions are sales. Leads, phone calls, and direct-non sales actions from the dealers' website are simply key performance indicators (KPI's). It's great to measure KPI's- VDP views, CTR, web traffic, goal conversions, time-on-site, etc but they are the correlation of a sale, not the cause (right on Tim). Having been a dealer (GM) and having reported to DP's I can say that only a few things matter- the top of that list includes sales and profitability (gross baby). The remaining metrics, as previously stated, are indicators on our performance but not the performance itself. (non affiliate book link) http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Make-Me-Think-Usability/dp/0321344758
Harbin Automotive
Great Blog Christian.. Really makes us think about things.
402.427.0157
This would be really relevant if buying and selling automobiles occurred as an eCommerce transaction. It doesn't. At least not right now, maybe in the future. Car shopping and buying doesn't depend on CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization), because it's a ROPO (Research Online, Purchase Offline) process, today.
DealerFire
Ed - I have also always gotten wrapped up in the similarities and differences between selectively and exclusively distributed products and how that effects consumer behavior online and off. While you can go back and forth all day about extensive research vs light research vs compulsion etc... The common denominator becomes tailoring the website to the USER and not necessarily the product. Obviously there is a line there, but ultimately if a person consumes 99% of their information in a certain way, does it not make sense to study and ‘borrow’ from that user experience? For the sake of using the example, a dealer doesn’t have to BE Amazon or FUNCTION like Amazon to be able to piggyback off of widespread success of their UI/UX. Instead of making/expecting a user adapt to using a ‘dealer website’ to shop for a car, why not adapt the website and information flow to make it more comfortable for them? Not all Fords are black! :)
22squared
Good post. However, that Dealer.com VDP performs very well and if you're testing your sites with heat mapping to increase leads and it's working, I don't care how it looks. Comparing Tier 1/2 sites to dealer sites is like comparing Auto to Amazon. Not sure where you were going there. I also wouldn't suggest a global SEO strategy without a local SEO strategy first. Few, if any, dealers reading this will rank organically for nationally searched terms unless they put major bucks behind the pages with PPC. I'd love to see a few dealer examples you have of your sites improving with less lead conversion forms. Do you have any case studies?
Kijiji, an eBay Company
Excellent article. I love discussion the progression of E-Commerce in automotive. There is one giant, overwhelming, elephant in the room sized complication with automotive e-commerce that has us as an industry landlocked; we love negotiating. Negotiations prevent us from fully embracing e-commerce, and fragment the selling process. Instead of one closing ratio, we need to worry about traffic/lead%, lead/appt%, and appt/sale%. The concept of negotiations being part of a vehicle sale will undoubtedly be the death of the dealer, as our competition (OEM's, 3rd Party & Portals) are moving forward without us. How long can we keep the customer in our sales process, when everything else online is point, click, buy, delivered.
DealerTeamwork LLC
Love this Christian. While this is obviously not the same thing as traditional eCommerce (and I don't think you're making a direct comparison) I do believe there is a tremendous amount of UI/UX elements & contributions that make a world of difference in the performance of these pages. For me, this one line you mentioned sums it up for me: "I do not possess the secret sauce for website conversion. I simply aim to get as many of them as possible." Having a holistic approach to your efforts by combining the best marketing efforts, the best designed/performing pages & the best lead management processes you're going to get as many leads as possible. I'll take that everyday over just a stock website, canned marketing & weak lead follow up - yet many dealers opt for the latter every single day. Your website will always be the best lead source. Nice job on putting together such a well thought out & organized post.
Remarkable Marketing
I love the focus on VDP's in this post. Dealers seem to underrate the power of the VDP. We all know VDP's are one of the most important pages on the site except 9 out of 10 dealers still have stock photos, no videos, no comments... Great Content = Great VDP Awesome post Christian!
DealershipMarketingServices.com
This is what we preach, People said it was crazy, but it works. Here's why: Unmarked space stands out and draws your attention. Then, it pushes your attention to what is on the page. On a website, it might be your logo, or a call to action, or just a simple tag line, but it will get noticed. Clutter indicates a lower value. Think of it like a front yard. If a yard is so cluttered that you can't see any grass growing, or it doesn't look well maintained, that house likely has a perceptible lowered value. A cluttered website can indicate the same thing. Whitespace seems to add value to your online real estate.Whitespace gives you staying power. When you aren't competing with yourself for attention, people will be more likely to spend time on your site. Imagine having a visitor in your home. You can ask if they'd like coffee, tea, soda, to watch the football game or some other show, a seat on the couch or in the recliner, and on and on, and you'll likely only push them out the door. However, if you give them a choice between two things, you'll probably get some interaction.
DigiSphere Marketing, Inc
A few issues with the article. Why compare auto to Amazon?? People don't buy cars online. They research them online and then physically visit a dealer to buy offline. Also really disagree with the argument that global content bringing irrelevant high bounce rate traffic to your site is a good thing. Those negative signals could very well hurt your organic authoritative status in Googles ranking algorithm. It's not as. Great an idea as the author makes it seem.
Kijiji, an eBay Company
I agree with Chris. Unless you are a giant like AutoNation or AutoCanada, having traffic from far, far, faaar outside your geographical region is irrelevant. I remember a few years ago one of our sites was getting a large amount of traffic from BC and Newfoundland (opposite sides of the country) and it significantly declined our quality score over time. Not to mention, getting a sizable chunk of Black Book requests that were of negative value. If you are a normal sized dealer, focus in your own area. Don't try and be what you are not.
Oak Lawn Toyota
Great article, Christian. I've recently loved taking control of our marketing/advertising and using our in-house talent. Thanks!
Matt Ford Sales
As always Christian you break down where we are at now and what the future may bring. It's a fine line deciding on how far ahead you want to be and relevance right now. Can't speak highly enough on yourself and your team and where you are headed!!
Overtake
I want to thank everyone for the comments and praise here! To see all the views and replies has been awesome! Lets see if we can get some more. After speaking at Digital Dealer in Atlantic City it is apparent to me that automotive is ready for this change in the way we display inventory. Also, content is happening right now.. I wasn't talking about anything the dealers hadn't heard before when I addressed the packed room in DD16. You must have writers putting up fresh content on your website on a daily basis. It's just necessary to be found today. In my promise to stay ahead of the curve, look for even more simplicity in VDP pages. Mozcon is my next event in July.. I'll be bringing back more cutting edge ideas to share with all of you!
Overtake
The Nasty Truth About VDP's and Conversion Rate In Automotive
Vehicle Details Pages (VDPs) have been a hot topic for some time now. Over the past few months, I have become increasingly convinced that their importance is not completely understood within the automotive industry.
E-commerce websites outside of automotive put a lot of emphasis on product pages. They are extremely important and measured with precise accuracy. Here are some things that are taken into consideration:
- Conversion Rate - What percentage of website visitors (now called sessions) are turning into paying customers?
- Cost per Transaction - How much does each transaction cost your business
- A / B Testing - Do certain versions of product pages produce more (or higher grossing) sales
- Average Transaction Value - Every time I ring the register, how much am I ringing it for
- Days and Visits to Purchase - How many days between the user’s website visit to the sale?
- Types of Users - What are the demographics of my website visitors?
- Task Completion - Did the user complete the task you wanted them to do while on your site?
From where do these criteria come? E-Commerce giants that are doing hundreds of millions of dollars per day online. The same e-Commerce giants that are getting over 100 million page views per day.
I have heard a few automotive website companies talk about and compare the industry to Amazon. I don’t believe this is an applicable or accurate model for car dealers. Take into consideration these quick stats about Amazon:
- $74 billion in sales last year
- $202 million in sales per day
- Over 150 million visitors each day
- Online only
- Trusted, fair prices, fast, convenient
Now, take a look at this scenario.
If I had a dealership group of 60 rooftops, and my stores were all open 7 days a week and each one of them sold 7 cars per day.
* My average selling price is $30,000. Each one of my websites gets 15,000 sessions per month.
- $4.6B in sales last year
- $12.6 Million in sales per day
- Over 30,000 visits per day
- In Person Only
- Trust has to be earned
- Fair Prices? Fast? Convenient?
It should be easy to see that apples do not equal oranges in the example above. Amazon can A/B test product pages within an hour on any given day of the year. Cyber Monday 2013 was the single most impressive day in E-commerce history, raking in an astounding $2 Billion. The Average Conversion rate of all e-commerce websites is 2.67% as defined here: Monetate. Is your website company telling you that your conversion rate is higher? Are you hearing companies promise 25% increase in conversion? If they are, chances are they do not fully understand what conversion means.
For my clients a conversion is this: Website visitors who come to the dealership and service or purchase a vehicle.
I do sometimes have clients that ask map / direction clicks and phone numbers to be tracked within analytics. While these tell us about a click, they do not count as a conversion in my book. I do not possess the secret sauce for website conversion. I simply aim to get as many of them as possible. My clients are well versed on bounce rate, total sessions, session duration and conversion rate.
With respect to bounce rate, I want my clients getting entrances and visits from all over the country, not just their hometown. When you have visits from all over, your bounce rate may rise, but when you’re putting out blogs and landing pages that let consumers research on your website, that is not a bad thing.
For instance, if a consumer types this into Google - 2014 s class vs 7 series - the result is a landing page on a dealer's website that compares the two models. The information only takes 60 seconds or so to read and if the user leaves after viewing, this plays a part in your bounce rate and average session duration. If the dealership brings sessions from around the world to their website to answer a question that search engines are being asked every day this is a good thing. In the example above, pages like this bring in thousands of visitors each month.
Your dealership isn’t opposed to selling cars outside of your PMA right? The more content you have on your website in the form of landing pages, blog posting and rich content pages, the more organic traffic and entrances into your website you will have. Conversion rate may drop as website sessions increase, but as long as more conversions happen, I don’t see the business owner thinking twice about the minutiae. With too many factors playing into it, there isn’t one defined conversion rate in the auto industry. The standard for success is still website sessions compared to cars sold and serviced.
Autonation recently announced that they would stop relying on third-party websites to drive traffic to their websites. Mike Jackson also told CNBC that Tesla should be able to sell cars direct to consumers. Two things are happening here:
-
Dealerships should now start to invest in content writers that drive traffic to their OWN websites.
-
A better consumer experience is necessary when merchandising vehicles online.
This isn’t Amazon, and Scott Hernalseen said this at the 2013 DrivingSales Executive Summit, “Dealers must have a clear merchandising and pricing strategy that makes their vehicles stand out from the competition.” Dealerships should be pointing web traffic (most importantly Google and Bing Searches) to their own website. Third-party listing and lead providers know that content is king and that they are capturing searchers, bringing them to their sites, then selling to you.
Tim Martell, CEO and Founder of Wikimotive, said that third-party lead providers are “toxic to car dealers.” He explains that their negative impact begins in the messaging to consumers
experience the consumer has in the buying process enforces the distrust.
car dealers where their own automated processes barrage the prospect with follow-ups. The consumer is left regretting ever entering their contact information in the first place. Martell adds, “Let’s not forget that in some cases, consumers will submit leads on multiple third-party sites. You do the math; phone calls and
Most third-party lead providers send traffic to VDP pages. The problem with this is that VDP pages in the auto industry are old and outdated. When I visit websites such as Converse, Zara or Coach, for example, I get one experience. When I visit car dealer websites I get another experience.
Ali Mendiola of DealerTrack recently told dealers, in her online webinar “How to break free from the website lead-to-sale conversion rate blues,” that VDP pages offer no guidance and give the consumer too many options. She said that “all of the buttons are the same” and that dealers should “limit the amount of information that is on the VDPs”. I couldn't agree more.
A call-to-action click is meaningless if it stops there. Where does the click take them? Do you want yet another opinion on what their trade-in is worth? Take a look at what the manufacturers offer consumers on their own VDP pages.
Shockingly, it looks nothing like a VDP on one of it’s own franchised sites! It does resemble e-commerce sites. From Mercedes-Benz to Kia, it’s all about a big photo, the price and one call to action. Not form leads. We all know that consumers do not surrender this type of information so easily.
The expert of online psychology Nathalie Nahai’s book Webs of Influence, allow us to understand our hidden motivations when viewing product pages and how to design persuasive experiences. Nathalie, whom has spoken to Google, Ebay, and Harvard Business Review, understands the principles of how to get the web user to do what you (the business) want them to do. The vehicle details pages used on our client’s websites implement these principles. Two noticeable mentions are the use of one main call to action and large images to persuade action.
Now look at the Nissan VDP. Yes! This is more like it; a large photo, no clutter and one main call to action. This lets consumers have the same experience across the entire e-commerce brand. One more thing, since the majority of new clients are all now built on responsive platforms, all of this is available on their iPads, iPhones and Android devices in the very same seamless format. For a case study of how this works you can access here: http://bit.ly/1uqj7SW
Continue to be the excellent automotive retail professional that you were when you started in the industry. Use your own original content - content that both you and your car buyers care about. The consumer gets to connect with a local business that has what they want and you get the opportunity to become their valuable local resource they were hoping to find. Everybody wins. You. Win.
17 Comments
Berman Auto Group
Interesting read, thanks Christian. I think there's a large difference in Autos as to a typical consumer good that is transacted as cited in the Amazon model but I can agree with a parallel. I give AutoNation full respect for stepping out, we all know it was a calculated maneuver. I had a conversation regarding this just recently, we came to the conclusion, " we wish we had the balls to do something like it". It is truly a daunting reality for small groups and single points.
Luther Automotive Group
Content is King! I have a hard time understanding why a dealer wouldn't want to be globally relevant? Producing original content that is interesting to the world only amplifies your regional relevance thus confirming the dealer is the "BIG SME" (subject matter expert). Your second point regarding consumer experience is also spot on in my book. Easy to use web sites that showcase information consumers are interested in is the way of the future in my humble opinion. It is time to leave behind our pop-ups, pop-unders, falling business cards and random cyber video people interrupting our web surfing to explain how easy it is to submit a lead. I vote to encourage and increase consumer interaction by driving overall satisfaction through consumer oriented web sites. I love it Christian. Keep up the great work! #ThoughtLeader
Dealer Inspire & Launch Digital Marketing
A great book on conversion rate optimization is "Don't Make Me Think" by Steve Krug. I read this years ago trying to learn everything possible about CRO. Christian, you are right on by recommending one call to action. Each page needs a goal and the quantity of "conversion points" a.k.a buttons everywhere doesn't equate to more leads. I think a busy page can lead to a less than ideal consumer experience. Yes, there should be secondary CTA's but when is enough enough? #awesome illustration - http://goo.gl/SFE6gw Next point- Conversions are sales. Leads, phone calls, and direct-non sales actions from the dealers' website are simply key performance indicators (KPI's). It's great to measure KPI's- VDP views, CTR, web traffic, goal conversions, time-on-site, etc but they are the correlation of a sale, not the cause (right on Tim). Having been a dealer (GM) and having reported to DP's I can say that only a few things matter- the top of that list includes sales and profitability (gross baby). The remaining metrics, as previously stated, are indicators on our performance but not the performance itself. (non affiliate book link) http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Make-Me-Think-Usability/dp/0321344758
Harbin Automotive
Great Blog Christian.. Really makes us think about things.
402.427.0157
This would be really relevant if buying and selling automobiles occurred as an eCommerce transaction. It doesn't. At least not right now, maybe in the future. Car shopping and buying doesn't depend on CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization), because it's a ROPO (Research Online, Purchase Offline) process, today.
DealerFire
Ed - I have also always gotten wrapped up in the similarities and differences between selectively and exclusively distributed products and how that effects consumer behavior online and off. While you can go back and forth all day about extensive research vs light research vs compulsion etc... The common denominator becomes tailoring the website to the USER and not necessarily the product. Obviously there is a line there, but ultimately if a person consumes 99% of their information in a certain way, does it not make sense to study and ‘borrow’ from that user experience? For the sake of using the example, a dealer doesn’t have to BE Amazon or FUNCTION like Amazon to be able to piggyback off of widespread success of their UI/UX. Instead of making/expecting a user adapt to using a ‘dealer website’ to shop for a car, why not adapt the website and information flow to make it more comfortable for them? Not all Fords are black! :)
22squared
Good post. However, that Dealer.com VDP performs very well and if you're testing your sites with heat mapping to increase leads and it's working, I don't care how it looks. Comparing Tier 1/2 sites to dealer sites is like comparing Auto to Amazon. Not sure where you were going there. I also wouldn't suggest a global SEO strategy without a local SEO strategy first. Few, if any, dealers reading this will rank organically for nationally searched terms unless they put major bucks behind the pages with PPC. I'd love to see a few dealer examples you have of your sites improving with less lead conversion forms. Do you have any case studies?
Kijiji, an eBay Company
Excellent article. I love discussion the progression of E-Commerce in automotive. There is one giant, overwhelming, elephant in the room sized complication with automotive e-commerce that has us as an industry landlocked; we love negotiating. Negotiations prevent us from fully embracing e-commerce, and fragment the selling process. Instead of one closing ratio, we need to worry about traffic/lead%, lead/appt%, and appt/sale%. The concept of negotiations being part of a vehicle sale will undoubtedly be the death of the dealer, as our competition (OEM's, 3rd Party & Portals) are moving forward without us. How long can we keep the customer in our sales process, when everything else online is point, click, buy, delivered.
DealerTeamwork LLC
Love this Christian. While this is obviously not the same thing as traditional eCommerce (and I don't think you're making a direct comparison) I do believe there is a tremendous amount of UI/UX elements & contributions that make a world of difference in the performance of these pages. For me, this one line you mentioned sums it up for me: "I do not possess the secret sauce for website conversion. I simply aim to get as many of them as possible." Having a holistic approach to your efforts by combining the best marketing efforts, the best designed/performing pages & the best lead management processes you're going to get as many leads as possible. I'll take that everyday over just a stock website, canned marketing & weak lead follow up - yet many dealers opt for the latter every single day. Your website will always be the best lead source. Nice job on putting together such a well thought out & organized post.
Remarkable Marketing
I love the focus on VDP's in this post. Dealers seem to underrate the power of the VDP. We all know VDP's are one of the most important pages on the site except 9 out of 10 dealers still have stock photos, no videos, no comments... Great Content = Great VDP Awesome post Christian!
DealershipMarketingServices.com
This is what we preach, People said it was crazy, but it works. Here's why: Unmarked space stands out and draws your attention. Then, it pushes your attention to what is on the page. On a website, it might be your logo, or a call to action, or just a simple tag line, but it will get noticed. Clutter indicates a lower value. Think of it like a front yard. If a yard is so cluttered that you can't see any grass growing, or it doesn't look well maintained, that house likely has a perceptible lowered value. A cluttered website can indicate the same thing. Whitespace seems to add value to your online real estate.Whitespace gives you staying power. When you aren't competing with yourself for attention, people will be more likely to spend time on your site. Imagine having a visitor in your home. You can ask if they'd like coffee, tea, soda, to watch the football game or some other show, a seat on the couch or in the recliner, and on and on, and you'll likely only push them out the door. However, if you give them a choice between two things, you'll probably get some interaction.
DigiSphere Marketing, Inc
A few issues with the article. Why compare auto to Amazon?? People don't buy cars online. They research them online and then physically visit a dealer to buy offline. Also really disagree with the argument that global content bringing irrelevant high bounce rate traffic to your site is a good thing. Those negative signals could very well hurt your organic authoritative status in Googles ranking algorithm. It's not as. Great an idea as the author makes it seem.
Kijiji, an eBay Company
I agree with Chris. Unless you are a giant like AutoNation or AutoCanada, having traffic from far, far, faaar outside your geographical region is irrelevant. I remember a few years ago one of our sites was getting a large amount of traffic from BC and Newfoundland (opposite sides of the country) and it significantly declined our quality score over time. Not to mention, getting a sizable chunk of Black Book requests that were of negative value. If you are a normal sized dealer, focus in your own area. Don't try and be what you are not.
Oak Lawn Toyota
Great article, Christian. I've recently loved taking control of our marketing/advertising and using our in-house talent. Thanks!
Matt Ford Sales
As always Christian you break down where we are at now and what the future may bring. It's a fine line deciding on how far ahead you want to be and relevance right now. Can't speak highly enough on yourself and your team and where you are headed!!
Overtake
I want to thank everyone for the comments and praise here! To see all the views and replies has been awesome! Lets see if we can get some more. After speaking at Digital Dealer in Atlantic City it is apparent to me that automotive is ready for this change in the way we display inventory. Also, content is happening right now.. I wasn't talking about anything the dealers hadn't heard before when I addressed the packed room in DD16. You must have writers putting up fresh content on your website on a daily basis. It's just necessary to be found today. In my promise to stay ahead of the curve, look for even more simplicity in VDP pages. Mozcon is my next event in July.. I'll be bringing back more cutting edge ideas to share with all of you!
2 Comments
Bart Wilson
DrivingSales
Great to hear from you Christian!
Content marketing is a great way to improve paid search. Where do you recommend a dealer start? In other words, if I'm creating content that maps to a campaign, how should I make sure I'm providing value on that landing page?
Christian Salazar
Overtake
Hey Bart, a few different places come to mind.. first, ask the dealer the top model they would like to push and use this info including a geo to create your first page. Secondly, take a look at search console and see the most often queried search terms that don't use the brand name. Third, as it directly related to the title of this post... log into your Google Ads account and click on keywords, then sort by impressions, that will give you loads of content ideas to write about...