We know that social networking is going to Change the World, but dealers are jumping in without any plan of action. You need to understand the medium and Get Ready before you Walk Out In The Rain or you’ll have a Losing Hand. Listening to one of the greatest musicians of all time, Eric Clapton, can give you advice on how to become successful at social media when he sings:

“It’s in the way that you use it, 
It comes and it goes.
It’s in the way that you use it,
Boy don’t you know.
And if you lie you will lose it,
Feelings will show.
So don’t ever abuse it.
Don’t let it go.”

As countless dealers create FB (and G+) pages every day, they need to develop a posting and sharing strategy and it MUST be tied in to what you are doing on the ground within the community. There are six primary ways that I see dealers posting on the social sites:

1)  C.R.A.P. – an acronym developed by my friend Eric Miltsch where he believes in posting Coupons, Reviews, And Pictures. This also includes service specials and fixed ops discounts.

2)  Celebrating your Customers – this is the posting of customer testimonials, pics of happy customers, and milestone purchases/services/mileage images.

3)  Celebrating your Employees – this is the posting of reviews, employee biographies, videos, personal accomplishments, and more to endear your staff to your followers.

4)  Celebrating your Community – Sharing your involvement in local events, charities, and organizational activities in and around your primary market area. Your goal is to align yourself with important aspects of local goings-on and act as a valuable, participating member of the nearby community.

5)  Trivia – Since your social prowess is determined by the amount of engagement you have on the social pages, many dealers post questions asking the opinions or their fans. (ie – ‘What was the best Christmas gift you ever received?’ Or ‘Where is the best place to eat barbecue?’) Any way to get others to comment or elicit a response.

6)  Being an Extension of the OEM – This is where dealers share information about the newest models, concept cars, third-party validating reviews, and OEM-style material that helps further the brand, but not so much the dealership.

So you are at a Crossroads. You don’t have to decide right now. Wait until After Midnight. Whichever way you choose, I urge you to listen to some Clapton and recognize that your success will be based on “the way that you use it”.

If you are only utilizing one of the strategies above (which is what most dealers are doing), you need to Reconsider Baby. Instead create a plan to post using ALL of the tactics above. Tell the Truth, you don’t have as many Lay Down Sally’s walking onto your showroom as before so you need to begin reaching them in a contemporary fashion. My guess is that if you look at your most recent posts on FB, with The Shape You’re In, it’ll take Five Long Years to see any reward from your current strategy.

If you aren’t involved in social networking at all, you’ll be Standin' Around Crying Tears in Heaven and Groaning the Blues without a franchise because these are the places the public is turning for information. Only those that develop a social marketing plan From the Cradle will look Wonderful Tonight. There is a way to be the Cream of the crop while marketing your dealership socially and that is to be a little like Clapton.

At the 2011 DrivingSales Executive Summit, an event will take place that is a first for the automotive industry.  DrivingSales presents the first DealerKnows Digital Media Battle.

Hosted by Joe Webb and Bill Playford of DealerKnows Consulting, twelve hand-picked dealership and vendor superstars will face off against each other in a Digital Media Battle.  

A series of six topics will be debated:

Dealership Mobile Apps
(For vs. Against)

Live Chat
(In-house vs. outsourced)

Followers
(Quality vs. Quantity)

QR Codes
(Worthwhile vs. Worthless)

Facebook marketing
(All in vs. All out)

And the Title Bout:
SEM vs. SEO

Round by round, the battlers will step forward and face off against their opponent.  The trick?  They have no idea who they are facing.  They only know their topic they’ll be speaking on. 

Don’t miss out on a high-energy, industry-first that will surely be one of the talks of the DrivingSales Executive Summit.  The DealerKnows Digital Media Battle presented by DrivingSales.com.  Come see the punches fly on Monday, October 10^th during block 2 (11:45am).

What is Your Internet Sales Religion… Baptized at Birth or Born Again?

You are on DrivingSales and attempting to learn (or share) the latest best practices of automotive Internet sales and digital marketing.  You have seen the light.

What brought you to this level of enlightenment is a different story.  We all have found our own paths, but there are only two primary denominations that we all follow.  You’ve been either “Baptized at Birth” or “Born Again”.

Being “Baptized at Birth” means that you came into this industry fully evolved and supportive of eCommerce initiatives.  You were a ‘connected’ individual and immediately understood the Internet could bring around an opportunity to change the culture of our industry.  You were already steeped in the online landscape and foresaw the powerful effect that the online medium would bring to the car business.

If you weren’t “sold” on Internet initiatives from the beginning, but are now, then you have been “Born Again”.  It could be that you simply have been in the industry long before Internet was prevalent.  You may have fought its arrival on your showroom floors, resented the customers walking in with loads of information from the online sites, or maybe you were simply hesitant to jump aboard the newest trends.  One way or the other, you saw the error of your ways, renounced your previous beliefs and have sought guidance and shelter under the sanctity that is eCommerce.  You are 100% dedicated to the medium now and bask in the warm glow that it shines upon us.

Everyone on here who knows me by know has heard of my history.  And many times this question will answer itself by either your age or how long you’ve been in the industry (or if you were hired directly into an Internet position.)  These upcoming questions are more relevant for those who began on the sales floor and in the fixed ops departments of dealerships, yet now represent the new culture of dealership employee, but I’d be interested in hearing your story.

Now I ask you… which one are you?  Were you Baptized at Birth or Born Again?  If you were Born Again, what was the deciding factor or instance that made you realize you needed to enter into the revival tent and join a new sect? 

Moreover, which people do you feel had it tougher?  Was it those Baptized at Birth that came in preaching about the medium, but not able to sell the people in the pews on the benefits…always fighting for buy-in?  Or was it the Born Again that embraced the medium a little later and had to rewire their thinking and understanding of how the world works to bring Internet into their homes and hearts?  Who had it easier and who had it tougher?

Tell us your story and give us a testament to your proud Internet sales religion.

You are a dealership.  Most people don’t like the thought of visiting you.  Through the years, a good majority of everyone who drives cars has had a frustrating experience at a dealership.  Maybe not yours, but they’ve had a bad taste put in their mouths by others.  They don’t want to be your friend, they just want to be serviced by you.

I don’t believe that in all of my (coughing) years I ever heard a normal person stand up for a car dealership’s reputation as another besmirches it in conversation.  I’ve never heard “Hey!  You leave XYZ Motors out of this.  They are great people – the lot of them!”  No.  Doesn’t happen.  When a dealers’ name is raked over the coals by an unhappy party, it is commonly accepted as unfortunate and realistic.  So when you ask someone to “Like” you on FB, is it for reasons personally worthy to a customer? 

My guess is, short of thinking they are going to win an iPad/TV or receive coupons for service, many could honestly go without seeing your customer reviews, pictures of happy customers, videos of salespeople, and alerts of the “big sale”.  These things don’t carry much weight with most.

Try to tap into what people REALLY care about.  Get your dealership involved in the community.  Sponsor Little League teams, attend the Chamber of Commerce meetings to network, give to charities and participate in their local events, get involved in the local schools and help run food drives, car washes, etc.  Give, give, and give to the philanthropies in your area.

Then… simply document (film, photograph, and blog) all of your involvements.  Be a spectator to the events and video your participation.  Those are the elements worthy of being shared socially.  People don’t want to “Like” your dealership, but I guarantee you that someone in your community feels pretty strongly tied to things such as Breast Cancer Awareness events or the local Special Olympics.  THOSE are organizations close to their heart.  Your dealership likely will never be.  However, if you can just tap into (and honestly serve) those entities that are meaningful to some, you will at least be in the right company.  You will start feeling more goodwill toward you because you yourself have given something back.

I’ve accomplished a lot in automotive retail, but I am more proud of the hands I’ve shook and the smiles I’ve made happen when participating in local community events than any metric I’ve reached.  If you want to make a difference and be “Like”able, then start by serving the community’s efforts before your own.

Superman is my all-time favorite superhero.  There isn’t another that comes close.  Needless to say, I’m a big fan.  But as much as I like wearing the iconic S-emblazoned shirts, I’m no Superman.  I’d like to think I live by some of the same moral code attempting to help others through my training, but that comparison and analogy is a stretch (as it would be for anyone.)

There are very few superheroes in our business, but there are many people trying to help you succeed and thrive.   They share a willingness to assist, educate, and train the same way that Superman is driven with the need to help people.  The problem?  There are a lot more Lex Luthors out there looking to take advantage of you than there are automotive online crime-fighters.

In the original Superman (and I say “original” because to me and my generation, there is only one Superman and that is Christopher Reeves’ Superman), Lois Lane falls off of a helicopter dangling from a large tower.  She simply doesn’t have the ability to fly or the know-how to stop from smacking the ground (much the same way a dealership doesn’t understand how to stop their online sales from dipping or their closing ratios from waning).  Thankfully for her, Superman swoops in and saves her.  He grabs her and flies her upward.

There are many people in the automotive industry attempting to be the superhero that carries you to the promise land.  I would like to think my team and I at 

 are some of those trainers and consultants.  However, even when Superman reassures her that he’s got her, Lois Lane asks the obvious question...  “You - You’ve got me… who’s got you?”

In other words, how does their involvement in your situation guarantee you will be saved?  How this relates to our industry is this:  You have to ask what qualifies someone else to control the path your dealership is on.  There are no superheroes so what makes them the entity powerful enough to swoop in and control the destiny of your dealership?

Are you outsourcing your social media?  What makes that company qualified to do so?  Have they had success with social media before this or do they just know how to “sell” social media?

Are you outsourcing your BDC?  What makes them stronger at phone handling than your own staff?

Are you outsourcing your blog writing? Your chat?  Your search engine marketing?  Are you sure you can’t do this yourself?  Do you really need someone else to whisk you away from these responsibilities or can they be done in store by your own team with just a little training?

Is there a trainer leading the digital initiatives at your store that doesn’t have the experience or expertise themselves?  If so, maybe you shouldn’t be handing them the keys to your online kingdom so quickly.  Your online presence is one of your most valuable commodities – you can’t just trust it to someone who knows how to speak the hot-topic lingo.  They must know how to execute.  You need an expert.  Otherwise, there is a good chance you can hire (or promote internally) someone that would be just as effective as they are if given the proper tools and training.

The DrivingSales Vendor Rating system was created to allow dealership staff at the Daily Planet to show who can really fly and who just makes whooshing sounds with their arms pointed outward toward the sky.  It asks dealers to rate who they feel the real deal is.   It comes down to trust.  As a dealer, you want to trust your Superman, but it is imperative you make sure they have a history of being super before you asked to be saved.  And whoever has served you with trustworthy information over the years, those are the people you seek out for advice, training, and assistance.

Too many vendors out there are all cape, no substance.  They claim to be superheroes, but they are evil, smiling Lex Luthors, twisting buzzwords into sales pitches and walking away with your money.  Make sure to ask Lois Lane questions.  If they’re holding you, who is holding them?  What other experiences and successes can they pull from that proves they are the superheroes to your Lois Lane.  Be an investigative reporter before outsourcing your departments and make sure that you are teaming up with a real Superman.  

I grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio and throughout my youth, our fine city would be infiltrated, so to speak, with unsightly visitors.  Bandits would swarm the town, shopping malls, and neighborhoods.  They would loiter about, often even able to go unseen without a keen eye looking for them.

They were vagabonds and pick-pockets, always looking for the edge to take advantage of you and fleece you on something (purse, wallet, game tickets) if you weren’t watching your belongings.  Some would go to the extreme.  If they saw you grilling out in your backyard, they’d walk right in through the open front door and steal the paintings white off your walls.  They were almost magicians at taking from you without you ever noticing.

Well we have Automotive Bandits as well.  They are right there, taking from you, and you don’t even see them.  You do nothing to prevent it because you are unaware they are taking money away from you.

The Bandits of the automotive world are these lead-generating website on YOUR Google Page One, singlehandedly stealing your customers right out from under your nose.  They live and breathe off of you and your business.  They optimize their own sites for your dealership’s name and gather leads that should be yours.  They take your business, customers looking for you specifically, and they sell them off to the highest bidder.  These Automotive Bandits are scavengers and will take whatever they can get their hands on.

They litter Google Page One with both organic positioning – based on their optimized content about YOUR dealership or they actually pay through PPC campaigns, leeching right off of you.

Here are some of the top Automotive Bandits I see.

AutoSite.com

AutoND.com

Autodealerbase.com

Autobodyalliance.com

Autodiscountgroup.com

AutoSales.com

Mystore411.com

Quickr.com

Vast.com

I’m sure there are some others I’ve missed so feel free to share them with the rest of us.  They are a dime a dozen and worth less than that.

Some of these are sometimes just microsites to third-party lead providers trying to maliciously get in on YOUR opportunities such as: 

Edmunds (everyone who wants to harvest leads buy PPC on dealership names)

Autotropolis – Going after YOUR organic internet shoppers because they are optimizing their site with keywords involving your dealership name and city in an effort to sell your leads right back to you – or your closest competitor.

Some are local directories, using solely PPC/SEM to break in onto your turf, such as:

Autos.aol.com – local directories where they can search for other cars.

Superpages.com.

I strongly urge you to start keeping a close eye on the 10-12 spots that take up your dealership’s Google Page One.  Are they all of your online entities and digital assets that you control or are they Automotive Bandits, slyly pickpocketing your dealership of its leads right from under your nose.

Do your best to dominate these sites and move them down the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) so you can protect what is rightfully yours.  Automotive Bandits aren’t deadly.  They are just dangerous to your bottom line if you let them run wild on the streets of Google. 

Keep your eyes open.  Do you see them?  You may not even noticed they’ve been hanging around you all along.  They’re tricky little buggers and the first step to preventing their mischief is by seeing them in the first place.

1. Tiny font tends to get caught in spam. If you have font smaller than 10px, it can get you nailed by the triggers. (Think of all the legalese trapped at the bottom of special offers…that is why)
   
2. Large font sizes bigger than 2+ gets trapped in spam filters
   
3. More than two font sizes and two font types are no good either
   
4. More than two images or two links in your email can get you caught as well
   
5. If you do send an image, make sure it isn’t too large and overwhelming to the email
   
6. If you do send an attachment, make sure it is under 300k
   
7. Don’t use too many bolds, colors, exclamation points, or italics
   
8. Make sure your email text has the same font and size as your signature. (Not sure if it affects spam, but it ticks me off and looks unprofessional :)
   
9. Don’t use punctuation in your subject line  (Writing a good subject line is a necessity and worthy of another blog entirely.  Recognize its importance)
   
10. Make sure that if you are sending an html email, you have a higher percentage of text to html image. (I just learned of this one by researching… pretty cool)
    
11. Always test yourself by mystery shopping as you can easily get put on a blacklist – and that can be the primary reason you are getting sent to spam
    
12. And do your best to steer clear of these “trigger” words:

Returning from NADA 2011, it was more than apparent that we are in an age of “enlighten me”.  With Google stating that their entire focus in 2011 will be focusing on Social, Mobile, and Local, it means they understand that we consumers are me-centric and only willing to seek out opinion from our credible, close, personal, connected contingency of contacts.  A focus on social, mobile, and local could easily be combined to say this is the year of reputation management because reviews will run rampant.

If the NADA vendors and speakers taught us anything this last week it is that the public's perception of your store is going to be one of the driving sources of eyeballs and traffic to your store.  It seems like every Tom, Dick, and Harry were selling some form of social media and reputation management.  You'd approach a booth and say, "Tell me about your product." and they'd reply "We build car washes in dealerships and assist with social media/rep management services."  Any amalgam of offerings was seen, but the constant is that EVERYONE thinks they are more reliable than you are to handle your own reputation.

Your reputation, loudly (and proudly?) displayed across the search engines and business listing sites will be your brand.  How do you want to be known?  What do you want to be known for?  Is your business map not only atop the search engines, but is it adorned with raving fans of your dealership?

It is abundantly clear that if you want to start building trust with the public, it starts from within.  Above and beyond how you conduct yourselves in an everyday setting (That is a given), it takes proactively reaching out to your loyal customers and asking for those reviews.

These online review sites (and the positive customer testimonial videos you can acquire - video or otherwise) will single-handedly determine the trust level that your local (and national) customers hold in your brand.

It is apparent that you need to stop relying on Google Alerts to see if your name is being dragged through the mud and THEN responding.  You must seek out positive reviews from your loyal customers.  How?  There are several answers.  From QR Codes on table tents and business cards to 3G connected iPads on-site to kiosks in service to long-term email/phone calling all the way to the simplest form… just asking for it when they’re in-store, you must put processes in place to start developing some goodwill reviews from your loyal, happy, local customers.

Reputation is important to everyone.  Even me.  I've written countless articles and blogs over the last several years dedicated to helping the in-the-trenches Internet professionals to create a positive, profitable department.  There is no fame or fortune in it.  I do it for the love of the craft.  Our craft.  If any of those articles or conference sessions or videos I've made have helped you, I couldn't ask for anything better than having you rate me as an Internet Trainer in the DrivingSales vendor rating section - here on the site.  http://www.drivingsales.com/ratings/companies/dealerknows-consulting

That's the easiest way I can ask "How Ya Like Me Now?"

Buford Beauregard is a former car-selling superstar turned acclaimed stand-up comedian from the south. Buford sells out trailer parks nationwide with his comedic act about automotive internet sales and is known for his catchphrases "Ain't she a beaut!" and "...you might not be an e-Dealer."

*It is well known that he is not related to Joe Webb, but does often use Joe as his opening act. Likely, based on the accent and hairstyle, Buford originates from either Alabama, Arkansas, or Mississippi. He cannot recall. But what he does know is automotive sales and digital marketing tactics.