In the not-so-distant past, many dealerships neglected their own websites in favor of paying third-party sites like AutoTrader and Cars.com to promote their inventory. As dealers educated themselves on digital marketing, they realized the power that their own sites and strategies wield.

This created a conflict: Dealerships compete in paid search against those same third-party sites, who have responded by spending more aggressively for the same SERP real estate.

So what’s the best way to move forward?

The answer isn’t simple, but it works.

The Way You Can Beat Third-Party SEM Strategies

Let CarGurus and AutoTrader fight over broader terms like “2018 Toyota Camry.”

You should focus your budget on the lowest funnel search terms. Searches that include modifiers like “for sale” and “lease offers” should receive the largest portion of your paid search dollars. Once you dominate these search queries, you can pursue broader terms and adjust the budget accordingly.

Unless you’re located in a major metro, like New York City or Chicago, third-party sites aren’t in the local market and aren’t reviewing local search terms. If you focus on these queries and apply the right strategies, you’ll have a higher Quality Score and pay a lower cost per click.

To achieve this, look no further than Google Analytics and Google Ads to understand local car shopping search behaviors. Ask yourself:

• What searches bring in highly qualified traffic?

• Which Ads perform better?

• How do people behave on your site after they click through?

  • Do they bounce?

  • Do they view SRPs and VDPs?

  • Do they spend time on the site?

You can leverage this data to prioritize or remove keyword sets.

If your efforts reach the benchmarks you set, you can spend as much money as you want.

Content Is the Key

You need custom content built around your market’s search volume to make your paid search campaigns as effective as possible. The content should focus on new cars, used core series, service and parts, lease information, and finance offers — things that customers search for every day.

By routinely creating, updating, and refreshing your content, you can earn positions that rank above Cars.com and other third-party sites like AutoTrader and CarGurus. That’s because you’re giving customers reasons to visit the site, stay on the site, and come back.

Content is more than just landing pages. It includes the following:

Correct metadata

Easy navigation

Homepage to inventory

Comparison pages

MRPs, VDPs, SRPs

Full inventory

High-quality photos

If you make sure your content follows Google’s best practices, you can create remarkable results. Below are two dealerships that followed these simple guidelines.

What’s stopping your site from achieving results like these? Take some time to re-evaluate your approach to paid search and the content on your dealership’s website.

With how quickly trends and behaviors can change in digital marketing, it’s often tempting to jump on the next “big thing.” But a savvy marketer must understand when emerging platforms and strategies are profitable or when they are too premature and risky.

These days, you’ll see many thought leaders championing voice search. Yes, voice search is “sexy.” It, however, hasn’t evolved as quickly as some people contend. That doesn’t mean you don’t need to research the topic or stay current with how it’s progressing.

You need to recognize that change is coming, but you don’t want to chase a shiny object that’s ill-defined and questionably effective.

Any digital marketing agency worth its salt will continue to regularly watch trends like this.

It’s just as important that they do so without sacrificing the strategies that connect your dealerships with how people are shopping now.

While we would love to tout the greatness of voice search, we have to keep our feet on the ground and perfect the strategies that fall within the current scope of what sells products and services.

Let’s take a look at a breakdown of what another industry professional has found.

Will Critchlow of Distilled on Voice Search

Will Critchlow has often been on the right side of digital marketing history. Here are a few of his observations and insights:

• - 75% of voice searches were incremental and not “real” searches.
• - They are things like, “Ok, Google, set a timer for 20 minutes.”
• - There is no intent to discover information or learn anything.
• - They are only searches because you’re Googling them.
•  

A breakdown of “search” volume from Distilled:

300 million: control actions

- Set a time

- Remind you of an event

- Play a song

- Add something to your shopping list

120 million: informational repeated queries

- What’s the weather?

- What’s my commute?

- 30-60 million: Personal requests

- Listen to [X] podcast

- Hear [news from previously listed source]

Our Findings of How Car Shoppers Search

We know that voice search isn’t a current commodity for dealerships. That’s why it’s important to understand how they do conduct searches, which is exactly the data our team analyzed from our nationwide dealer network. We already have an informative blog that details this information, but here’s the gist of it:

95% of car shopper queries consist of five or fewer words.

They are intent-based, looking for direct feedback about a model, make, or dealership. It’s important that you have the content that satisfies these searches and that you’ve streamlined the process for car shoppers to click through to SRPs and VDPs — the less friction, the better.

Let’s continue the conversation. What are your thoughts and feedback regarding voice search and car shopping behaviors?

There is no shortage of digital marketing agencies, but there is a shortage of transparent ones. As your choices expand, it’s more important than ever to identify when your agency isn’t being open with you.

Some cheap tactics are obvious. Others, not so much.

Luckily, our leadership team has firsthand experience in the retail side of the automotive industry.

Let’s take a look at some of the more obvious schemes. The agency doesn’t give you:

- Ownership of and/or access to Google Analytics (GA)

- Ownership of and/or access to Google Ads

- Responses to calls or emails

- Authentic reporting from GA

With regard to the last point, a lot of agencies will use their own reporting platforms. It helps them hide the real data and highlight or manipulate data to make them look more favorable. If you’re not seeing raw Google Analytics data, what are they hiding?

Subtle Clues Your Agency May Not Be Transparent

The first issue that comes to mind is knowledge.

Your point of contact should be able to articulate a one-month plan versus a three-month plan. He or she needs to be an expert at the job. If you cannot get answers at the moment to general questions without their needing assistance, it’s time to look elsewhere.

“I'm not sure.”

“Let me check, and I’ll let you know in a day or two.”

Next, it’s important to know if and how you’re making gains. Ask yourself the following questions:

- Is your organic traffic increasing?

- Are you seeing Quality Score go up and cost go down on paid search?

• - Are you getting more phone calls and form submissions?

From SEO to PPC to social media, you want to gain traffic and leads in the right markets. If you’re a client in New Jersey and getting a ton of traffic from Boston, check your Google Analytics goals. Chances are good that you’re getting no phone calls or leads from it.

Now let’s assume that you’re getting some new leads, phone calls, or traffic. Your agency partner celebrates those wins with you. Are they still discussing where they are falling short? A true and healthy partnership should make an agency comfortable enough to admit when things are not where they are wanted to be — and offer a plan to improve.

Other Things to Look For

Look for steady increases over time as opposed to a roller coaster. Overnight shots may not be legitimate or may indicate the agency jumps in, then sets and forgets.

Also look for your point of contact to have a finger on what the competition is doing. Do they benchmark data in some way? This is the sign of a transparent and savvy partner who’s aware of factors that may influence variations beyond marketing.

Final Thoughts...

Does your agency charge a commission for paid search? Make your partner explain why spending increases are needed because commission-based agencies will often recommend that you spend more for the sake of spending more. Ask them to show you decreases in impression share and who’s taking it from you. Test them with questions that will gauge their integrity.

Know what questions to ask.

Pro-Tip on PPC: You can ask your provider for a paid search activity history report. This will show historical changes so you can see whether or not they’re actively working on your account.

You invest a lot in digital marketing (or you plan to). Find a partner that matches your goals. And make sure that you work with the agency to help them achieve those goals. Don’t just pick up a phone when it’s convenient or when things are trending downward. A good agency wants you to be involved and be active.