It's a topic that I hope to cover in detail at Driving Sales Executive Summit this year in Vegas and one that is very close to my professional heart. The reason that I'm so passionate about it is that the conceptual copout of branding for social media is spreading more in our industry instead of being debunked the way it should be.

Branding is not a proper goal of social media. It's one of the things that happens if you're doing social media the right way, but to call it a goal is like saying that you take ups at the dealership for the exercise. Sure, you're getting more exercise walking around the lot than you do when sitting at your desk, but that's not why you do it. You take ups and walk around the lot with customers in hopes of selling them a car.

Social media has been reduced during the time when it should be expanded. There are techniques, campaigns, and strategies that have been proven to drive more foot traffic to the dealership and more visitors to websites. Done right, social media can increase leads and drive more sales. It can bring people to the service bay who otherwise would never have visited the dealership if it weren't for social media. The examples keep mounting, but unfortunately it's only for an extremely small percentage of dealers who have cut ties with malformed strategies and processes.

I was once part of the problem. It wasn't much more than two years ago when I was preaching the power of branding through social media. Thankfully, I came to my sense as I watched social media evolve, witnessed an expansion of the medium's capabilities, and learned from some bold dealers ways that helped them to truly succeed on social media.

That's it for my late night rant. I hope to talk more about this extremely important topic October 13th-15th at the Bellagio.

This is the first (and most likely last) time that I will use a Hillary Clinton book title as the concept for a blog post. I didn’t read the book, but the concept is definitely applicable in social media.

I was speaking to a potential client yesterday who was telling me some of their challenges with social media. The main challenge they were having was in coming up with interesting content to post that was associated with business. As a car dealer, they had plenty of pictures of cars to post, but they weren’t very active in the local community and the person in charge of social media didn’t consider herself to be creative.

“Does anyone at the dealership do anything interesting?” It was a simple question that sparked a 2 minute conversation that turned into an hour-long brainstorming session. At the end, we came to the conclusion that she worked at the most interesting dealership in the world and didn’t know it.

The parts manage was in a country band that played at the local steak house saloon on Saturday nights. They had a customer that came in 5-days a week to get what he considered to be the best coffee in town with their fancy cappuccino machine in the service waiting area. A sales person was a little league baseball coach that recruited the top talent in town to take to tournaments across the country.

Last night, she did some further research and found even more interesting things. The land on which the dealership was built turned out to have a rich and somewhat controversial history. One of the secretaries had a son who was likely going to he starting for the state university basketball team the following year. Another sales person had a photography business on the side where people posed in or around classic cars.

Everyone gets into a rut. We try our best to be creative and to come up with interesting things to post to Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and Google+, but sometimes it seems that you’re posting the same things over and over again. Finding images is easy. Unfortunately, social media needs to be richer, more robust. It’s not just about pieces of content. It’s about stories that affect the local area and the people that make up your business, customer base, and community.

You don’t have to live on social media island. There are people around you who can inspire you, spark an idea, or become the subject of content that can all be tied back to the business itself. The difference between being isolated on social media and having a flood of potential content is often about getting up from your desk and talking to people. In essence, the key to successful social media is often as simple as being social in the real world and applying it to your business presence.

This is the first (and most likely last) time that I will use a Hillary Clinton book title as the concept for a blog post. I didn’t read the book, but the concept is definitely applicable in social media.

I was speaking to a potential client yesterday who was telling me some of their challenges with social media. The main challenge they were having was in coming up with interesting content to post that was associated with business. As a car dealer, they had plenty of pictures of cars to post, but they weren’t very active in the local community and the person in charge of social media didn’t consider herself to be creative.

“Does anyone at the dealership do anything interesting?” It was a simple question that sparked a 2 minute conversation that turned into an hour-long brainstorming session. At the end, we came to the conclusion that she worked at the most interesting dealership in the world and didn’t know it.

The parts manage was in a country band that played at the local steak house saloon on Saturday nights. They had a customer that came in 5-days a week to get what he considered to be the best coffee in town with their fancy cappuccino machine in the service waiting area. A sales person was a little league baseball coach that recruited the top talent in town to take to tournaments across the country.

Last night, she did some further research and found even more interesting things. The land on which the dealership was built turned out to have a rich and somewhat controversial history. One of the secretaries had a son who was likely going to he starting for the state university basketball team the following year. Another sales person had a photography business on the side where people posed in or around classic cars.

Everyone gets into a rut. We try our best to be creative and to come up with interesting things to post to Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and Google+, but sometimes it seems that you’re posting the same things over and over again. Finding images is easy. Unfortunately, social media needs to be richer, more robust. It’s not just about pieces of content. It’s about stories that affect the local area and the people that make up your business, customer base, and community.

You don’t have to live on social media island. There are people around you who can inspire you, spark an idea, or become the subject of content that can all be tied back to the business itself. The difference between being isolated on social media and having a flood of potential content is often about getting up from your desk and talking to people. In essence, the key to successful social media is often as simple as being social in the real world and applying it to your business presence.

Stop the madness! I, unfortunately, might be part of the cause of the recent trends happening on dealer Twitter profiles and for that, I am truly sorry.

For years, I've been harping on the concept that Twitter is something that no dealer should avoid because of how quick and easy it is. There's no huge investment of time required to have a strong Twitter presence. This advice and the advice of others has been turned into something that it should not have been, namely a willingness to completely automate Twitter. Please stop.

Twitter doesn't take much time, but it should take some time. Rather that go over the long list of things that you should and shouldn't do on Twitter in an extended format, here's the bullet points. Rather than try to convince anyone, I'm just going to state what I believe and let questions come in if there's need for further clarification. Just trust that I makes these statements with reasons in mind. They're not just spewing out of my mouth (or any other area) randomly.

• Don't feed from Facebook. It's all too common nowadays to take automatically post whatever you put on Facebook directly onto Twitter. This is a bad idea.
• Minimize the other feeds on Twitter. In an ideal world, there would be no feeds populating your Twitter account, especially your own blog, because it just doesn't save a ton of time and it limits the effectiveness. With feeds, you can't craft hashtags, you can't personalize the statements, and you aren't truly vetting the links.
• Post more than just links. Sadly, links get much lower engagement than purely text posts. Express an opinion. Give an interesting piece of information. Tell a little story. Ask questions. The posts with no links get much more attention than those that do have links.
• Don't use Hootsuite to post images. Hootsuite does not post images through Twitter directly and therefore they're not inline. They're just a link to the image itself hosted on Hootsuite. Your images should be through Twitter itself or through a tool that uploads the files to the native Twitter feed such as Bufferapp.
• Include @replies to people. It's very easy to see if a Twitter account sucks or is automated because they aren't talking to others.
• Retweet, but not too often. It's good to have other faces on your page, which means a direct retweet. This can be done through some tools such as Hootsuite or Bufferapp. Make sure it's a true retweet rather than one which is a mention.

Twitter is definitely the easiest of the social networks to manage and monitor. Done right, it should take less than 5 minutes a day. That doesn't mean that it's easy to skip days. That, my friends, is something you absolutely shouldn't do.

* * *

Article originally appeared on AutomotiveSocialMedia.com.

Stop the madness! I, unfortunately, might be part of the cause of the recent trends happening on dealer Twitter profiles and for that, I am truly sorry.

For years, I've been harping on the concept that Twitter is something that no dealer should avoid because of how quick and easy it is. There's no huge investment of time required to have a strong Twitter presence. This advice and the advice of others has been turned into something that it should not have been, namely a willingness to completely automate Twitter. Please stop.

Twitter doesn't take much time, but it should take some time. Rather that go over the long list of things that you should and shouldn't do on Twitter in an extended format, here's the bullet points. Rather than try to convince anyone, I'm just going to state what I believe and let questions come in if there's need for further clarification. Just trust that I makes these statements with reasons in mind. They're not just spewing out of my mouth (or any other area) randomly.

• Don't feed from Facebook. It's all too common nowadays to take automatically post whatever you put on Facebook directly onto Twitter. This is a bad idea.
• Minimize the other feeds on Twitter. In an ideal world, there would be no feeds populating your Twitter account, especially your own blog, because it just doesn't save a ton of time and it limits the effectiveness. With feeds, you can't craft hashtags, you can't personalize the statements, and you aren't truly vetting the links.
• Post more than just links. Sadly, links get much lower engagement than purely text posts. Express an opinion. Give an interesting piece of information. Tell a little story. Ask questions. The posts with no links get much more attention than those that do have links.
• Don't use Hootsuite to post images. Hootsuite does not post images through Twitter directly and therefore they're not inline. They're just a link to the image itself hosted on Hootsuite. Your images should be through Twitter itself or through a tool that uploads the files to the native Twitter feed such as Bufferapp.
• Include @replies to people. It's very easy to see if a Twitter account sucks or is automated because they aren't talking to others.
• Retweet, but not too often. It's good to have other faces on your page, which means a direct retweet. This can be done through some tools such as Hootsuite or Bufferapp. Make sure it's a true retweet rather than one which is a mention.

Twitter is definitely the easiest of the social networks to manage and monitor. Done right, it should take less than 5 minutes a day. That doesn't mean that it's easy to skip days. That, my friends, is something you absolutely shouldn't do.

* * *

Article originally appeared on AutomotiveSocialMedia.com.

When it comes to social media advice, the majority of the common catch phrases are there for a reason. Tips like “be engaging” and “communicate, don’t broadcast” are sound pieces of advice despite the annoying frequency that they’re used by gurus. There’s one common tip that is more than just annoying. In many ways, it’s actually wrong.

“Know your audience” is a mantra, a driving force behind many blog posts and help videos. For those building blogs or social networks for the sake of having a nice hobby or making money through traffic-based advertising, it’s good advice. For businesses using a blog and social networks to increase sales of their products or services, it’s the type of advice that can send people in the wrong direction. Unless you’re making money directly from your blog, you shouldn’t attempt to know your audience.

Instead, you need to know your customers and potential customers. The current audience is irrelevant.

Catering content to fit in with the current audience will appease them. It will make them more likely to share your content. It will get more interactions and engagement. These are all good things. However, catering content to fit in with them does not help grow your business. Sure, some of the people in your audience might be current or future customers, but unless they’re the majority, the opinions of your audience don’t really matter.

This all stems from a conversation I had yesterday with a client. She has an automotive blog that has accumulated a nice following because of the content that she was posting. It was fun content that included memes of people parking like idiots, stunts, and beautiful pictures of hot rods. The audience loved it. The problem is that the audience wasn’t buying cars from her. They were spread across the world. There was nothing local and only an occasional post about the brand itself.

If you’re blogging for SEO reasons only, then this isn’t a bad idea. The problem is that having one domain linking to your single website isn’t going to give you much SEO juice. The effort is wasted. Your company blog should not be used for SEO reasons to drive links to your website because if you only have one website and one blog linking to it constantly, the effects are minimal.

Your blog should be geared towards building amazing content that your customers and potential customers can enjoy. It should be relevant to them and them alone. It’s nice to reach thousands of people with your general interest blog posts, but it doesn’t drive business. You should be focusing on getting content up that 100 local potential customers will find interesting rather than 10,000 people spread across the world. That general content might draw more overall traffic, but it’s not driving business-relevant traffic. More importantly, it’s not making an impact on the locals that actually are visiting your blog, at least not as much as if you were posting content that they could associate with because of the local nature of it.

Having a large audience is a blessing, but having a good localized audience can help your brand and increase business. That should be your focus.

When it comes to social media advice, the majority of the common catch phrases are there for a reason. Tips like “be engaging” and “communicate, don’t broadcast” are sound pieces of advice despite the annoying frequency that they’re used by gurus. There’s one common tip that is more than just annoying. In many ways, it’s actually wrong.

“Know your audience” is a mantra, a driving force behind many blog posts and help videos. For those building blogs or social networks for the sake of having a nice hobby or making money through traffic-based advertising, it’s good advice. For businesses using a blog and social networks to increase sales of their products or services, it’s the type of advice that can send people in the wrong direction. Unless you’re making money directly from your blog, you shouldn’t attempt to know your audience.

Instead, you need to know your customers and potential customers. The current audience is irrelevant.

Catering content to fit in with the current audience will appease them. It will make them more likely to share your content. It will get more interactions and engagement. These are all good things. However, catering content to fit in with them does not help grow your business. Sure, some of the people in your audience might be current or future customers, but unless they’re the majority, the opinions of your audience don’t really matter.

This all stems from a conversation I had yesterday with a client. She has an automotive blog that has accumulated a nice following because of the content that she was posting. It was fun content that included memes of people parking like idiots, stunts, and beautiful pictures of hot rods. The audience loved it. The problem is that the audience wasn’t buying cars from her. They were spread across the world. There was nothing local and only an occasional post about the brand itself.

If you’re blogging for SEO reasons only, then this isn’t a bad idea. The problem is that having one domain linking to your single website isn’t going to give you much SEO juice. The effort is wasted. Your company blog should not be used for SEO reasons to drive links to your website because if you only have one website and one blog linking to it constantly, the effects are minimal.

Your blog should be geared towards building amazing content that your customers and potential customers can enjoy. It should be relevant to them and them alone. It’s nice to reach thousands of people with your general interest blog posts, but it doesn’t drive business. You should be focusing on getting content up that 100 local potential customers will find interesting rather than 10,000 people spread across the world. That general content might draw more overall traffic, but it’s not driving business-relevant traffic. More importantly, it’s not making an impact on the locals that actually are visiting your blog, at least not as much as if you were posting content that they could associate with because of the local nature of it.

Having a large audience is a blessing, but having a good localized audience can help your brand and increase business. That should be your focus.

I wish that this was going to be a story about baseball. I really do. Unfortunately, it's a story about education and the art of the sales pitch as it pertains to vendors on Driving Sales and other networks.

It is important to understand that every vendor in our industry has a responsibility. This is a tough business. Those of us who have been on the other side at the dealership level receiving pitches from vendors know that they come hard and they come often. It's part of the game. This is one of the most competitive industries out there from both perspectives - dealers competing against other dealers and vendors competiting to earn their business.

The internet in general and these networks, blogs, and webinars in particular are the tools we need to succeed at both levels. For dealers, it's an opportunity to learn ways to improve business, harness best practices, and bounce ideas against others in the industry. For vendors, it's a chance to hear what dealers think about certain topics, what they want out of products, and to what degree they want assistance versus direct help.

These venues are for mutual education. They're for dialogue. They're for ideas. They're not the place to pitch your products.

Some would say that education is worthless if it doesn't yield increased business at the vendor level. That's a different argument altogether, but I can tell you this much with a certainty...

If you help dealers by giving them tips, techniques, strategies, and advice that helps them with their business, they will be more inclined to look to you when they need your services.

It works. I see it every day. I don't have to pitch my social product to get calls and emails from dealers wanting to know how I can help. I simply post information as it comes to me that can help dealers succeed with or without my help. Some will do nothing with the information. Some will take it and apply it themselves. Some will take it and inquire about ways I can make it easier or do it for them.

As I said, it's the responsibility of every vendor in this industry to take the knowledge that they gain from their bird's eye view of things and translate it into ways that can help in the trenches at the dealership. The market is too questionable and the competition level is too high for anyone to hold their cards too close to the vest. It doesn't help the industry. It doesn't help dealers.

It doesn't help you.

I wish that this was going to be a story about baseball. I really do. Unfortunately, it's a story about education and the art of the sales pitch as it pertains to vendors on Driving Sales and other networks.

It is important to understand that every vendor in our industry has a responsibility. This is a tough business. Those of us who have been on the other side at the dealership level receiving pitches from vendors know that they come hard and they come often. It's part of the game. This is one of the most competitive industries out there from both perspectives - dealers competing against other dealers and vendors competiting to earn their business.

The internet in general and these networks, blogs, and webinars in particular are the tools we need to succeed at both levels. For dealers, it's an opportunity to learn ways to improve business, harness best practices, and bounce ideas against others in the industry. For vendors, it's a chance to hear what dealers think about certain topics, what they want out of products, and to what degree they want assistance versus direct help.

These venues are for mutual education. They're for dialogue. They're for ideas. They're not the place to pitch your products.

Some would say that education is worthless if it doesn't yield increased business at the vendor level. That's a different argument altogether, but I can tell you this much with a certainty...

If you help dealers by giving them tips, techniques, strategies, and advice that helps them with their business, they will be more inclined to look to you when they need your services.

It works. I see it every day. I don't have to pitch my social product to get calls and emails from dealers wanting to know how I can help. I simply post information as it comes to me that can help dealers succeed with or without my help. Some will do nothing with the information. Some will take it and apply it themselves. Some will take it and inquire about ways I can make it easier or do it for them.

As I said, it's the responsibility of every vendor in this industry to take the knowledge that they gain from their bird's eye view of things and translate it into ways that can help in the trenches at the dealership. The market is too questionable and the competition level is too high for anyone to hold their cards too close to the vest. It doesn't help the industry. It doesn't help dealers.

It doesn't help you.