One of the most amazing parts of my job is spending time reading, watching, and testing the practices of others. It's conceivable that the true secret to my success over the years has less to do with creativity and more to do with listening and deciphering. You have to listen to the channels like Google and Facebook. You have to listen to your customers. You have to listen to your customers' customers (if you're an agency like me).

The annoying part of my job is sifting through the recycled techniques and reinvented terminology that surrounds so many marketing practices. In most cases, it's the same old things repackaged into a different form or applied from a different angle. Those are valuable, but not gamechanging. Still, it's important to go through them all in order to find the hidden or not-so-hidden gems that arise. The best practices I've found over the years haven't been on the pages of Mashable, Search Engine Watch, or Social Media Today. The real winners have come from some of the least likely sources.

With all of that out of the way, let's get to the point. There are three types of marketing. Despite all of the various names - push and pull marketing, social media marketing, gravitational marketing, search marketing, influence marketing, content marketing - the easiest and arguably most pure way of looking at it is to tackle everything from a perspective of venue and intent. Where are the people going and what are they doing when they get there? It's important for me as well as business owners to look at it from this perspective because the collision of the various marketing types is forcing a holistic marketing model to outperform niche marketing techniques or specialized strategies.

In other words, if you look at venue and intent, you can craft your overall marketing strategy much more easily. We look at it as following the quest - what are they doing, why are thy doing it, and how can we be there to help them choose our clients. When people buy your products, they are fulfilling a quest. No, they're not slaying an actual dragon, but if they're on a quest to buy a car, then your dealership selling them a car is the culmination of that particular quest.

Here are the three types of marketing for 2014 (well, early 2014 at least - it changes so quickly) that we like to tackle:

Fulfilling the Quest

This is the easiest to understand and often the hardest to achieve because of the simplicity of purpose. Everyone knows that if someone is interested in buying a car, they're probably going to go to Google, Bing, or one of the various classified sites to start looking. They might go to review sites and OEM sites as well, but for the most part they're ready to seek the fulfillment of their quest, they're going to try to look for cars.

Search engine marketing of all types, whether it's SEO or PPC, gives you the opportunity to drive them to your website so they may fulfill their quest. They aren't searching for Honda dealers to have fun. They have a purpose. They're in buying mode. This is where you have to be in order to help them fulfill their quest.

Renewing the Quest

More businesses are starting to do this. Many of them tried to do it in 2009-2012 and failed miserably. Part of it was because the venues such as Facebook, banner advertisements, retargeting, and other forms of "passive" marketing arenas weren't developed to the point that they are today.

Now, the goals have come full-circle thanks to the overall availability of the internet. Mobile devices have made checking social media sites and reading websites the common activity when there are no activities to do. As people ride a bus, wait in line at the bank, or even perform other mundane activities like watching television, they are also surfing the internet. They aren't going to Facebook to buy things, but they're open to the concept. They're open to having their quest renewed.

When they go to Fox News to see what's going on and the retargeting ad pops up in front of them, they are reminded that they are still on a quest even if they aren't actively on it at that point. When the business they visited last week pops up on their Facebook news feed, they get that reiteration that they still need to buy something. It might take a dozen instances of seeing a brand and its message before they actually click through, but the statistics are showing that it's working. Not every sale is made through Google. In fact, some of the most important and actionable clicks come through other venues when they're not in active buying mode.

Creating the Quest

Of the three, this is the one that's ignored the most. It's the hardest to do and the least rewarding when not done right. However, it can be the most rewarding when companies are able to make it sing. This is one that we focus on in particular because in our industry, nobody is doing it right.

In many ways it's like good old fashioned advertising. No, it's not like the commercials that we see on television today. Think along the lines of the early days of television when brands were built by establishing a problem that people will see in the normal course of their day and then having that problem solved either in the middle of the initial marketing effort or after further research.

The reason that it's so hard today is because of attention span. We have seconds instead of minutes to get the message out through most advertising and marketing venues. There's no longer time to tell a story...

...or is there?

The art of creating the quest is about putting the right content on the right venues that will reach people and establish a need whether they're in the market right now or not. With this particular article already breaking the 1,000-word mark, there's not enough time to go into it in detail. We'll do that next time. Instead, watch the following video that shows two commercials that worked well in their day. Today, having a minute-long television commercial isn't practical for most businesses, but taking advantage of the various channels online to accomplish the same goal and better is something that we know will move the needle. It's hard. That's the point. If it were easy, everyone would be doing it.

More on that next time. For now, here's the video:

Let’s keep this one short and sweet. If you run a business, you fall into one of four categories:

1. Those who are using social media and seeing mixed or minimal results
2. Those who have used social media in the past and stopped because they saw mixed or minimal results
3. Those who have never really bought into social media
4. Those who are killing it on social media

It’s easy for me to say that the last option is the one that just about every business should be striving towards, but the reality is that if everyone was in category four, it would actually mean that everyone was in category one. Despite the vast nature of social media, there is still a finite amount of room on news feeds, Twitter streams, and other visible portions of social media for businesses. It’s for this reason that I am glad most fall into the first three categories – it makes my job for clients much easier.

With that said, there definitely needs to be more in the last category and the likely reason that there aren’t is because so many fall into the second category. Whether on your own or through a vendor/guru hack, you’ve lost faith in social media. That was actually okay in 2012. It became less okay in 2013. In 2014, successful businesses will make it into category four or they’ll find it harder to keep their status as a “successful business”. Everything is migrating to include social as a major component. If you rely on organic search to drive traffic to your site, for example, you may will soon find that your traffic is dropping if it isn’t already. Google and Bing are betting high on social and they’re leaning towards social signals and page/profile quality as major components of their algorithm.

Search is just the start. This is the part that amazes me the most. There are local businesses that are spending thousands, even tens of thousands of dollars on digital advertising every month but they can’t seem to justify a couple thousand dollars to dedicate to a killer social media presence and integrated search engine optimization components. It’s the most trackable, tangible form of digital advertising and marketing – the smoke and mirrors required to try to prove value are gone (at least for some vendors/gurus). Make it real or go home – that’s what we’re faced with today.

In 2014, make it a priority to re-evaluate your position. Take a pitch or two. Read some blog posts. This isn’t about buying into a trend, though that alone should be pretty obvious. It’s about reading the writing on the wall – I see so many individuals who are active on social media, yet are unable to see the value of social media for their business. It’s not your fault. You simply haven’t been shown the real deal.

Find the real deal about social media. Your business success may depend on it.

Article originally appeared on Soshable.

Let’s keep this one short and sweet. If you run a business, you fall into one of four categories:

1. Those who are using social media and seeing mixed or minimal results
2. Those who have used social media in the past and stopped because they saw mixed or minimal results
3. Those who have never really bought into social media
4. Those who are killing it on social media

It’s easy for me to say that the last option is the one that just about every business should be striving towards, but the reality is that if everyone was in category four, it would actually mean that everyone was in category one. Despite the vast nature of social media, there is still a finite amount of room on news feeds, Twitter streams, and other visible portions of social media for businesses. It’s for this reason that I am glad most fall into the first three categories – it makes my job for clients much easier.

With that said, there definitely needs to be more in the last category and the likely reason that there aren’t is because so many fall into the second category. Whether on your own or through a vendor/guru hack, you’ve lost faith in social media. That was actually okay in 2012. It became less okay in 2013. In 2014, successful businesses will make it into category four or they’ll find it harder to keep their status as a “successful business”. Everything is migrating to include social as a major component. If you rely on organic search to drive traffic to your site, for example, you may will soon find that your traffic is dropping if it isn’t already. Google and Bing are betting high on social and they’re leaning towards social signals and page/profile quality as major components of their algorithm.

Search is just the start. This is the part that amazes me the most. There are local businesses that are spending thousands, even tens of thousands of dollars on digital advertising every month but they can’t seem to justify a couple thousand dollars to dedicate to a killer social media presence and integrated search engine optimization components. It’s the most trackable, tangible form of digital advertising and marketing – the smoke and mirrors required to try to prove value are gone (at least for some vendors/gurus). Make it real or go home – that’s what we’re faced with today.

In 2014, make it a priority to re-evaluate your position. Take a pitch or two. Read some blog posts. This isn’t about buying into a trend, though that alone should be pretty obvious. It’s about reading the writing on the wall – I see so many individuals who are active on social media, yet are unable to see the value of social media for their business. It’s not your fault. You simply haven’t been shown the real deal.

Find the real deal about social media. Your business success may depend on it.

Article originally appeared on Soshable.

If you've participated in automotive internet marketing for long enough, you've very likely heard the concept that "content is King." It was in play back in the days when I started researching search engine optimization all those years ago and it never really stopped. There was a dirty little secret that few of us in the SEO community ever mentioned, but it's been safe to say it for a little over a year now.

Content wasn't really king. It was important, but it wasn't king - not by a long shot.

When I started at TK Carsites in 2007, I wanted to prove that point. I was given a single website that belonged to the company that we wanted to rank for the important "used cars" keywords. They had a gameplan that included creating pages for every major metro in the country, populating them with tons of unique content, and playing the game the way that it's supposed to be played. I told them to hold off for a while. This was an opportunity to do some testing.

We didn't add the content... nothing. The homepage was flash and had three words in the title tag - two of them being "Used Cars". I then went through an extremely aggressive link-building process and started attacking dozens of cities. In less than two months, we were ranked in the top 3 for over 30 major metros and #1 for a dozen. These weren't easy keywords. "Baltimore Used Cars". "Dallas Used Cars". "New York City Used Cars". We Google-bombed the site and it paid off. Sadly, we didn't develop the site very much after that, but the point was made.

Fast forward about a year and we started recognizing that Google was changing the game. I was certain that they were heading towards a set of quality-control mechanisms that would change the game. We started shifting towards a content model that included high-value sites, blogs, and guest posting. We still used some of the lesser link-building styles such as directory submissions, but we stopped all forms of footer/sidebar/signature link building. If it could be done in bulk, we weren't going to use it. Google was catching on. I was sure of it.

2009 came and went. No major change. Content was a little more important, but link-building still ruled. In fact, our high-touch, high-maintenance technique was working but not much better than the spammy techniques some were using that we abandoned.

2010 - same thing. I was getting worried. I was sure Google was close. They had to be. Unfortunately, I was getting a little pressure from the SEO team because they were seeing that the techniques that I assured were evil were still working.

2011 - Panda. YAAAAY! No, wait. It didn't address the links. The spammy techniques were still working and my expensive strategy was having trouble fighting off the bulk players.

Then it happened. Penguin. April 24, 2012. The day that I thought would be coming in 2008 or 2009 finally arrived and all of the things I had hoped for came true. Some of our competitors fell of the map, Death-Star-style. "as if millions of SEO's cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."

Today, the strategy, a content- and quality-based strategy, is alive and well. Finally.

So what was the point of all that? Today, content truly IS king, but not in the way that most perceive it. The reason that I build a new company that focuses solely on content, search, and social is that the three are now part of the same digital marketing strategy. You cannot do well with any one of them without doing well at the other two. Content is king because the quality necessary for pure link earning and social media marketing is finally bridging the gap. Unfortunately, that's bad news for the vast majority of dealers because the boilerplate content that populates so many dealer websites is hurting you. Chances are you're not really feeling it because you've never experienced the different; if nearly everyone is doing it wrong, then "bad" is actually average.

Here is a good infographic that demonstrates many of the connections that are associated with content as part of SEO and thus part of the holistic digital marketing strategy. Enjoy!

If you've participated in automotive internet marketing for long enough, you've very likely heard the concept that "content is King." It was in play back in the days when I started researching search engine optimization all those years ago and it never really stopped. There was a dirty little secret that few of us in the SEO community ever mentioned, but it's been safe to say it for a little over a year now.

Content wasn't really king. It was important, but it wasn't king - not by a long shot.

When I started at TK Carsites in 2007, I wanted to prove that point. I was given a single website that belonged to the company that we wanted to rank for the important "used cars" keywords. They had a gameplan that included creating pages for every major metro in the country, populating them with tons of unique content, and playing the game the way that it's supposed to be played. I told them to hold off for a while. This was an opportunity to do some testing.

We didn't add the content... nothing. The homepage was flash and had three words in the title tag - two of them being "Used Cars". I then went through an extremely aggressive link-building process and started attacking dozens of cities. In less than two months, we were ranked in the top 3 for over 30 major metros and #1 for a dozen. These weren't easy keywords. "Baltimore Used Cars". "Dallas Used Cars". "New York City Used Cars". We Google-bombed the site and it paid off. Sadly, we didn't develop the site very much after that, but the point was made.

Fast forward about a year and we started recognizing that Google was changing the game. I was certain that they were heading towards a set of quality-control mechanisms that would change the game. We started shifting towards a content model that included high-value sites, blogs, and guest posting. We still used some of the lesser link-building styles such as directory submissions, but we stopped all forms of footer/sidebar/signature link building. If it could be done in bulk, we weren't going to use it. Google was catching on. I was sure of it.

2009 came and went. No major change. Content was a little more important, but link-building still ruled. In fact, our high-touch, high-maintenance technique was working but not much better than the spammy techniques some were using that we abandoned.

2010 - same thing. I was getting worried. I was sure Google was close. They had to be. Unfortunately, I was getting a little pressure from the SEO team because they were seeing that the techniques that I assured were evil were still working.

2011 - Panda. YAAAAY! No, wait. It didn't address the links. The spammy techniques were still working and my expensive strategy was having trouble fighting off the bulk players.

Then it happened. Penguin. April 24, 2012. The day that I thought would be coming in 2008 or 2009 finally arrived and all of the things I had hoped for came true. Some of our competitors fell of the map, Death-Star-style. "as if millions of SEO's cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."

Today, the strategy, a content- and quality-based strategy, is alive and well. Finally.

So what was the point of all that? Today, content truly IS king, but not in the way that most perceive it. The reason that I build a new company that focuses solely on content, search, and social is that the three are now part of the same digital marketing strategy. You cannot do well with any one of them without doing well at the other two. Content is king because the quality necessary for pure link earning and social media marketing is finally bridging the gap. Unfortunately, that's bad news for the vast majority of dealers because the boilerplate content that populates so many dealer websites is hurting you. Chances are you're not really feeling it because you've never experienced the different; if nearly everyone is doing it wrong, then "bad" is actually average.

Here is a good infographic that demonstrates many of the connections that are associated with content as part of SEO and thus part of the holistic digital marketing strategy. Enjoy!

The excitement has been building for a little while now and we're finally here. 2013 was awesome for many of us on all three sides of the ball - dealers, vendors, and OEMs - and 2014 is trending towards being even better for many. On the other hand, the dangers popping up in many marketing disciplines are also casting some doubts on the future of a good chunk of the industry. Yes, that means that there are dealers, vendors, and even OEMs that are going to be in trouble if they don't keep up with these changes and watch the trends more closely.

Search marketing is definitely one of those arenas where the trends are amazing for those "in the know" and potentially disastrous for those who are missing the point or not paying closed enough attention to the writing on the wall.

In the infographic below by Arrae, there are some good bits of information that can help you make some marketing decisions in early 2014. We don't agree with all of them - for example, the list of companies to use for correcting and monitoring listings is in a completely misleading order. It's funny because they have GetListed at the top. Having worked with them all and others, I would put GetListed in the middle of the pack at best. It's a service owned by MOZ and that might be the reason it's listed so high, but that's not the best. In fact, if they would have put the list in the exact reverse order, it would have been more accurate. Oh well. I understand the love for MOZ - we use their software ourselves!

There are a few other points of contention but overall the list is great. Think mobile. Monitor your listings for both reputation management as well as SEO. Focus on localized content. Great stuff across the board.

Here's the infographic:

The excitement has been building for a little while now and we're finally here. 2013 was awesome for many of us on all three sides of the ball - dealers, vendors, and OEMs - and 2014 is trending towards being even better for many. On the other hand, the dangers popping up in many marketing disciplines are also casting some doubts on the future of a good chunk of the industry. Yes, that means that there are dealers, vendors, and even OEMs that are going to be in trouble if they don't keep up with these changes and watch the trends more closely.

Search marketing is definitely one of those arenas where the trends are amazing for those "in the know" and potentially disastrous for those who are missing the point or not paying closed enough attention to the writing on the wall.

In the infographic below by Arrae, there are some good bits of information that can help you make some marketing decisions in early 2014. We don't agree with all of them - for example, the list of companies to use for correcting and monitoring listings is in a completely misleading order. It's funny because they have GetListed at the top. Having worked with them all and others, I would put GetListed in the middle of the pack at best. It's a service owned by MOZ and that might be the reason it's listed so high, but that's not the best. In fact, if they would have put the list in the exact reverse order, it would have been more accurate. Oh well. I understand the love for MOZ - we use their software ourselves!

There are a few other points of contention but overall the list is great. Think mobile. Monitor your listings for both reputation management as well as SEO. Focus on localized content. Great stuff across the board.

Here's the infographic:

This is a quick reminder that nobody needs now. It's also a permanent reminder about the way that a dealership's internal marketing culture should operate (in my humble opinion based upon experience) and should be repeated every month, not just at the end of the year.

It's the end of arguably the best year for the car business in a long time. I remember the last time I was working at a dealership at year-end and the excitement we felt as we were closing in on the all-time record for a 40-year-old company. I also remember a lecture I had to give to the owner that went something like this:

• Owner - Who were you meeting with just now?
• Me - A website vendor.
• Owner - Why are you messing around with a vendor? We have one week left to break the record! They can wait.
• Me - You know my philosophy on vendors. We get the best deals at the end of the month.
• Owner - Then talk to them at the end of next month. We need sales now!
• Me - I understand, but there's only so much I can do to influence this month and all of it's in motion. However, spending an entire extra month with a poor website would do more damage than any positive I can bring to the table for this month. Your sales people are responsible for making the sales happen. I'm responsible for putting the deals together and making the leads happen. Every lead you're seeing today is a result of what I've been doing for the last 2 months, 6 months, and even 12 months.

I won't go into details about the rest of the conversation because it didn't go well. I left the dealership a few months later, not out of spite but out of commitment to continued excellence.

With the right strategy and a strong work ethic, everyone is capable of playing now and planning for tomorrow. They are not two masters pulling in two different directions. If there's a deal to work with a customer right now, work it. During the downtime between customers, work the future. In our industry, we often get so wrapped up the now (for good reason) that we betray our plans for the future (for bad reasons).

This is it. It's the last week of the year. Every month, there's a last week of the month during which just about everyone is pushing to make it happen. Just don't get so engulfed by the end of year or end of month push that you forget to make time for improving your marketing today. If there was ever a time to grind a vendor on prices or services, this is the time. Just as you're trying to make your month, they're trying to make their month.

Plan ahead. Make it happen.

This is a quick reminder that nobody needs now. It's also a permanent reminder about the way that a dealership's internal marketing culture should operate (in my humble opinion based upon experience) and should be repeated every month, not just at the end of the year.

It's the end of arguably the best year for the car business in a long time. I remember the last time I was working at a dealership at year-end and the excitement we felt as we were closing in on the all-time record for a 40-year-old company. I also remember a lecture I had to give to the owner that went something like this:

• Owner - Who were you meeting with just now?
• Me - A website vendor.
• Owner - Why are you messing around with a vendor? We have one week left to break the record! They can wait.
• Me - You know my philosophy on vendors. We get the best deals at the end of the month.
• Owner - Then talk to them at the end of next month. We need sales now!
• Me - I understand, but there's only so much I can do to influence this month and all of it's in motion. However, spending an entire extra month with a poor website would do more damage than any positive I can bring to the table for this month. Your sales people are responsible for making the sales happen. I'm responsible for putting the deals together and making the leads happen. Every lead you're seeing today is a result of what I've been doing for the last 2 months, 6 months, and even 12 months.

I won't go into details about the rest of the conversation because it didn't go well. I left the dealership a few months later, not out of spite but out of commitment to continued excellence.

With the right strategy and a strong work ethic, everyone is capable of playing now and planning for tomorrow. They are not two masters pulling in two different directions. If there's a deal to work with a customer right now, work it. During the downtime between customers, work the future. In our industry, we often get so wrapped up the now (for good reason) that we betray our plans for the future (for bad reasons).

This is it. It's the last week of the year. Every month, there's a last week of the month during which just about everyone is pushing to make it happen. Just don't get so engulfed by the end of year or end of month push that you forget to make time for improving your marketing today. If there was ever a time to grind a vendor on prices or services, this is the time. Just as you're trying to make your month, they're trying to make their month.

Plan ahead. Make it happen.

To paraphrase the immortal movie icon, Ferris Bueller, "The Internet moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

That seems to be the case with many digital marketing practices, particularly in the realm of advertising versus marketing. Oddly enough, it wasn't too long ago that I was preaching the reverse; advertising and marketing were completely different disciplines that should be handled separately for best results. Things have changed. In 2014, the holistic digital marketing approach seems to be the best way to go (by far) and integrating advertising into the mix will allow the whole to be greater than the sum of the parts.

Here's what I mean:

Search Marketing and Advertising

For years, SEO was completely independent from PPC and other forms of paid search advertising. My former company didn't even offer PPC because of the differences and we were able to demonstrate that those PPC companies that were offering SEO as an add-on were really just padding their bottom line with low-cost efforts and ambiguous results. That was 2010-2012 with 2013 showing the first real signs of dual specialization rather than singular specialization as the right way to go.

Notice something in that last statement - "dual specialization". There's a huge difference between having a company that offers PPC solutions and also has an SEO service and a company that truly integrates the two to allow one to guide the efforts of the other. An easy way to see this in action is in selective bidding. For example, allowing the organic rankings influence the bidding levels from a paid perspective can assist in maximizing ROI. If the organic rank for an important keyword is low, then the PPC can be bumped up until the organic rankings take over. If the results are strong enough for both paid and organic and the conversion rates (both click-thru rates as well as conversion rates on the site itself) are high, then it might make sense to own top spots organically as well as through paid.

They can work together to go after different search types as well. For example, a paid ad might be titled "2014 Ford Fusion Lease Specials" while the corresponding organically-ranked page might be titled, "2014 Ford Fusion Best Prices in Chicago".

While it's hard to find specialists that operate properly in both realms, the better tradeoff is to shoot for a search engine optimization service that offers search advertising rather than a PPC company that offers SEO. The gap between good and bad optimization is much larger than the gap between good and bad PPC.

Social Marketing and Advertising

The good ol' days of "free social media love" are behind us. Sure, you can still have a strong Twitter presence without paid ads and Google+ hasn't exactly pushed out their paid platform in full force, but Facebook marketing without Facebook advertising is pretty much worthless. This has been the case for over a year but companies are only now starting to realize it.

It's okay. Compared to other forms of advertising, social media advertising is much cheaper and has the greatest level of targeting known to humankind. There's a caveat, and it's the reason that marketing and advertising not only have to go hand-in-hand, they must be handled professionally. This is the hardest part; I've heard bad practices being preached by many, even people at the social media sites themselves who for some reason aren't quite understanding how to maximize performance on their own platforms.

It's not like search. If you mess up on search advertising, you're okay. If you mess up on SEO, you can recover. With social media, if you mess up on either the marketing aspect or the advertising aspect, the repercussions can be long-lasting and devastating. There's a reason that we do not offer one without the other - you have to advertise if you want us to manage your accounts and you have to let us manage your accounts if you want us to help with advertising. That's not to say that we don't partner with our clients, but the possibilities for poor performance based upon a single misstep are too high to leave to chance.

Website Marketing and Banner Advertising

There has always been a relationship between banner advertising and website marketing in the form of landing pages. The best practice has always been to build a killer landing page and then send traffic to that page with killer banner ads. Things are different now thanks to two major changes in the last couple of years: speed of the internet and access via mobile devices.

Landing pages are no longer the end result. It's funny because they were named properly all this time but didn't really represent what their name implied until recently. Before, landing pages were often the key lead generators. Today, they're literally landing pages - pages upon which visitors land when they click on the ad. More than ever, people are not acting upon the first page they hit. It's for this reason that the relationship between paid ads and website marketing, UI, and flow work properly to generate the leads and sales.

A perfect example of this is in inventory ads. There are some innovative techniques to draw people from websites across the internet directly to inventory pages, but once you have them there, it's important that your website is able to handle the various types of visitors. Assuming that they're targeted visits, giving them quick and easy access to additional inventory as well as other shopping tools is imperative. While the technology improves to drive the traffic, the marketing on the websites themselves must keep pace.

Final Warning

This is NOT an endorsement for mega-vendors and marketing firms that offer 55 different services. My experience with the companies that can do everything is that they do nothing really, really well. Nimble, aggressive, results-driven companies are still the best when it comes to digital advertising and marketing in 2014. However, the super-tight niche companies must learn to embrace both sides of the ball if they're going to keep up with the trends.