May 4, 2016

• Consumers would prefer to conduct most of their business online. How "going vertical" on your finance page will help you sell more cars. 

According to a 2015 study by Autotrader, an astounding 72% of online shoppers would be willing to arrange their financing online, prior to coming in to the dealership. 56% want to start negotiating online and another 45% prefer to remain anonymous until the deal is locked down. Here's the link 

Enter Content Marketing 

Giving clients more "features" (in other words content) on your own landing pages will keep buyers on your site longer. It will provide them with trusted and valuable information they can use to determine whether or not they wish to proceed with a purchase, before they waste time with questions on the lot.

Here's some great features you can add on your finance pages to enhance clients' perception of your value to them:

1. Trade in Estimator
2. Leasing vs Financing
3. Payment Estimator
4. Insurance Estimator
5. "How to..." blog posts ( get a car loan, build credit, cosign...)

Horizontal Vs. Vertical Content Marketing

What's the difference in these marketing approaches? Here's the simplest (best) explanation I found so far:

"For example, maintaining an effective website, offering community classes, or participating in social media are all horizontal efforts. Compare those tovertical marketing initiatives and efforts, which are in place to support a specific marketing goal or effort. This might entail a go-to-market campaign that leverages a microsite and ramped-up social media posts to support the growth of a specific service line, for example." Reference

A tremendous opportunity for growth...

The explosive growth of companies like Canada Drives, CarsDirect and  other credit providers tells us, in the automotive business, that there is a huge demand for pre approved financing. 

These companies excel at creating valuable content online, marketing that information to buyers and capturing their credit information, which they then sell to you. 

By providing that service, and many more unique offers, on your own web-sites, you can educate your clients and build trust in your dealership and your services right away. 

After all, that same study by Autorader, tells us that shoppers are checking out Dealers' websites first, while they're "still looking" in the beginning of their buying cycle. 

This presents a tremendous opportunity to become the authority in your market for your brand. 

Content gets your rankings up

Content has been singled out as one of 3 crucial ranking signals Google uses to determine your website's ranking score (Links and the A.I. program "Rankbrain" are the other 2). 

Content builds relationships online

Being an authority on a particular subject builds trust in your consumer's eyes and turns shoppers into buyers. 

By being the first Hyundai dealership, say, to provide the right information to a client, you will position yourself as an expert source of knowledge. The more often the same shopper returns to you for that knowledge, the stronger your relationship will become.  

Get Vertical

It's becoming easier to see that the OEMs are taking a vertical approach to their content marketing efforts, your Dealership will benefit from being the first in its market to adopt these strategies. For more information on how to create valuable vertical content and content marketing strategies, download the Lead Generation Blueprint. 

Thanks for reading, I hope you got a ton out of it, all the best! Eduardo.