We live in an era of easy, convenient digital communication. Nevertheless, there are really only a handful of ways in which consumers will contact your used car dealership—and picking up the phone to call you is at the very top of the list.

Indeed, recent studies find that phone calls to the dealership still eclipse digital outreach by a large amount. Critically, this does not mean that digital marketing is somehow irrelevant; far from it. What it does mean is that, even if a potential customer finds your dealership through Craigslist, Facebook, or Google, they’re still more likely to call you than to reach out through email, text, or a social messaging platform.

To put it differently, phone calls are actually part of your digital marketing process—potentially the last step in the long journey toward an appointment. It’s important for your used car dealership to treat phone calls appropriately, then; they’re the fruit of your marketing efforts, and they bring you tantalizingly close to finalizing the sale.

Making the Most of Phone Calls to Your Dealership

With that said, what should your dealership be doing to make each call count—and to raise the odds of a call landing you with an appointment? Here are a few quick tips we can recommend.

1. Make call management your top priority. Again, calls are the fruit of all your marketing efforts, and they mean that you’re closer than ever to a sale. Treat inbound calls with all due gravity and importance.
2. Have a structured process in place. Have a paradigm for where inbound calls go—how they are channeled, and how the value proposition is built over the course of each call. Successful dealerships won’t ever leave their call management to chance!
3. Use data and analytics. Keep track of the types of leads you get (sales, service, parts, etc.) and measure the kinds of calls that tend to get the best results. Use that information to continually fine-tune your approach to call management.
4. Make sure your sales reps are consistent. Even the best sales pros can fall into a lull where they simply answer the phone without any passion or sense of direction. Make sure everyone has a basic script that keeps the process consistent and effective.
5. Align your digital marketing. Finally, make sure your digital marketing initiatives all have clear calls to action, encouraging potential customers to reach out by phone—and ensure that these incoming calls are all channeled through your call tracking system.

Your dealership website plays a key role in the sales process. Today, most buyers do online research before they commit to a particular make, model, or dealership. What you need, then, is a website that can be easily found by local search users. What’s more, you need a website that will address buyer queries and coax them to take the next step in their journey—calling you to speak with a sales rep and set up an appointment.

So does your website measure up? Does it do what it’s supposed to do? Here’s a checklist you can use to figure it out—10 hallmarks of a truly effective dealership website.

Checklist: 10 Signs of a Good Dealership Website

A good dealership website:

1. Has NAP information on every page. NAP refers to the name, address, and phone number of your dealership. For local SEO success, it’s critical to have this information posted consistently on every page of your website.
2. Is optimized for mobile users. Does your site have responsive design? Is it easy to navigate across all browser and device types? Mobile readiness is one of the most critical factors in any good website.
3. Informs the readers. Your site shouldn’t just be one big ad. It should also educate and empower. One way to make this happen is through a regularly updated dealership blog.
4. Has clear calls to action. Every page of your dealership website should have a clear call to action, encouraging your user to take the next steps in the buying process.
5. Includes both external and internal links. For SEO purposes, make sure you link to relevant pages within your site, and also to authoritative third-party resources. (Of course, you never want to link to your competition.)
6. Has full meta data. Again, for SEO, you want to have meta titles and meta descriptions that are optimized with the appropriate keywords. Don’t neglect these key pieces of online real estate!
7. Offers readability. Make sure your website content is formatted with section subheadings, bullet points, and plenty of white space, making reading a breeze.
8. Has robust and varied content. In addition to written content, pictures, infographics, and video content can help keep your readers engaged.
9. Focuses on benefits. Why should buyers pick your dealership over other dealerships in your area? That’s a key question for your site to address. Make sure you offer a clear value proposition.
10. Is aimed at conversions. Ultimately, a good dealership website is built to get people calling or visiting your dealership. And if your site isn’t generating those conversions, it’s time to give it an update.

Social media platforms provide invaluable marketing opportunities for local businesses—including your used car dealership. However, all of these platforms come with their own sets of rules. Take Instagram. It can be a powerful platform for promoting your used cars, but only if you leverage it correctly.

Participate in the Instagram Community

One way to grow your dealership’s presence on Instagram is to participate—not merely posting your own images and videos, but interacting with other content, as well. Some steps you might take:

• Follow influencers—vehicle manufacturers, car magazines and blogs, and local businesses in your community.
• Like and comment on some of the content they share.
• Also be sure you respond to comments and questions your followers leave on your own Instagram posts.

The bottom line? You’ve got to spend engagement in order to gain engagement.

Be Consistent and On-Topic

Another key element of Instagram marketing is maintaining a consistent brand identity.

Simply put, you sell cars—so posting memes or celebrity gossip, just to appear trendy, isn’t going to help your brand. Stick to the things that make sense coming from a used car dealership—images of your inventory, vehicle maintenance tips, images and testimonials from your happy customers, etc.

Remember that everything you post is a reflection of your business and needs to align with your vision and your value proposition.

Promote Local Events

To engage buyers in your community, use Instagram to promote community events. These might include:

• Fundraising events from local non-profits you support.
• Special events or family days at your dealership.
• Major sales events.
• Local events or festivals that your dealership is sponsoring.

Create some local buzz by posting local content.

Include Local Hashtags

Speaking of keeping things local, make sure you spend some time researching hashtags that are relevant to your community—and use them to label your content whenever appropriate.

This might be something as simple as #OrangeCountyCars, or even just something like #HuntingtonBeach. These local hashtags can really help your content be discovered by nearby buyers—and those, of course, are exactly the people you want to reach.

Buy Some Ads

If you’re just getting started on Instagram, it’s usually best to develop an organic content strategy and build a small following before you take out any paid ads. Sooner or later, though, you’ll need to pay in order to target potential buyers and grow your content reach.

There are various strategies for bringing traffic to your dealership website, including both paid and earned traffic. When we talk about paid traffic, we’re talking about PPC ads—an important part of your dealership marketing approach, but not what we’re focusing on today.

This post is all about earned, or organic traffic—the people you attract to your website through a focus on content marketing and SEO. It requires discipline and commitment to generate organic traffic, yet with a little patience and the right strategy, this can be a great way to boost your dealership website.

Boosting Organic Traffic to Your Dealership Website

So how, specifically, can you generate organic traffic for your used car website? Here are our top 10 recommendations.

1. Make sure your page is mobile optimized. Google actively penalizes sites that are not mobile-ready—and besides, most consumers will be researching your dealership from their mobile devices anyway. Make the mobile version of your site the primary version of your site.
2. Make your site fast. If it takes more than two or three seconds to load, you’re going to lose traffic. AMP technology can help you ensure optimal site performance.
3. Make your site secure. Buyers want to see that their personal information is safe and sound when they visit your website—and Google wants to see this, too. Use SSL/https to keep your site secure.
4. Optimize for local keywords. Sprinkle your content with terms like [City] used cars, [city] used car dealership, etc.
   Include plenty of photos and videos. Engaging content keeps people on your site for longer periods of time—an important SEO ranking factor. And thankfully, it’s easy to take plenty of pictures of your good-looking cars and trucks!
5. Get referenced in local directories. Citations from local Chambers of Commerce and other professional directories can significantly boost your rankings.
6. Write blogs. Regular content updates are key for maintaining your Google rankings. Write informative blog posts that educate your buyers about used car shopping, used car financing, used car maintenance, etc.
7. Offer resources. In addition to blog posts, we recommend including some evergreen pages that your buyers can consult—information on some of the specific financing options you offer, warranty packages, etc.
8. Be active on social media. Post regular content updates and ensure that your social media bios are all completely optimized.
9. Get online reviews. Actively seek feedback and star ratings on Facebook, Google, and other online review platforms. Ask your satisfied buyers or recurring customers to spend a moment reviewing your dealership!

Get Traffic for Your Dealership Website

There are plenty of ways to generate traffic for your used car dealership website—and getting earned traffic is a good start. Use these tips to guide you—and for additional help with dealership marketing, contact the Get My Auto team today!

Any business that can’t easily be found on the Web might as well be invisible; in fact, it might as well not exist at all. That’s a bold statement, but in today’s world, it’s really true. Consumers use the Web to locate the best nearby businesses—and if yours isn’t there to be discovered, you’re going to lose out on more and more customers.

But what can you do if your independent used car dealership has an online visibility problem? Here are five steps you can take right now to make your dealership truly discoverable.

Start a Google My Business Page

Google My Business is a free marketing tool that Google offers to companies of all kinds. You can sign up for a page and provide Google with important information about your dealership—like hours of operation, contact information, location, and more—that it will in turn supply to search engine users. This is a huge asset for your local SEO efforts—and again, it’s free, so you have nothing to lose!

Get Online Reviews

Online reviews are critical for building search engine visibility. The question is, how can you get them? Some basic tips:

– Email your best customers and ask them to leave you some feedback. Make sure you include the link to your – Google reviews, making it easy on them.
– Include your review link on your dealership website, too.
–  Consider adding your Google reviews link to invoices/receipts, as well.

Invest in AdWords

While organic search engine reach is critical, it works best when it’s augmented by paid ads. This allows you to truly canvas the Google search engine results page (SERP) and make your brand as visible as possible. Use AdWords in conjunction with your organic SEO efforts.

Post to Craigslist

Craigslist is the independent auto dealer’s secret weapon. Your listings will inevitably result in a big increase in website traffic, which can in turn improve your rankings overall. Just make sure you properly optimize your Craigslist posts. The Craigslist Wizard app, available from Get My Auto, can be a big help here!

Do Content Marketing

A final way to make your dealership more visible on the Web is to produce more branded content. A blog could be a good start. Write some posts that help, inform, and guide auto consumers, and optimize them for Google’s algorithms. It won’t have an effect overnight, but as you build thought leadership, you’ll also boost brand awareness. Content marketing is a great long-term plan.

Get Help Marketing Your Dealership

Of course, making independent auto dealerships more competitive on the Web is a huge part of what we do here at Get My Auto. We’d love to talk with you more about boosting your online visibility. Reach out to Get My Auto’s skilled marketing team today, and let’s start a conversation!

There are many reasons to use Facebook Ads to market your dealership—but one of the foremost reasons is that it allows you to precisely target the people to whom you’re advertising. Facebook’s targeting options are robust and effective, and worth going into in some detail.

Choosing the Right Facebook Audience

When you’re in Facebook Ads Manager, look for a section called Detailed Targeting, which is where you’ll get to start slicing and dicing your audience—segmenting the exact groups of people to whom you want to display ads. Be precise here, and make sure you’re only choosing folks who fit your buyer personas; when done right, audience targeting allows you to eliminate waste from your ad campaign by only reaching out to people who directly matter to your campaign—i.e., paying customers.

Facebook will allow you to target according to many different criteria; here’s just a partial list of them.

Demographics

–Education
–Ethnic affinity
–Financial
–Generation
–Home
–Life Events
–Parents
–Politics
–Relationships
–Work

Behaviors

–Automotive
–Behaviors
–Behaviors targeting
–Charitable donations
–Consumer classification
–Digital activities
–Expats
–Financial
–Mobile device user
–Network connection
–Purchase behavior
–Residential profiles
–Seasonal and events
–Travel

Again, this list is partial, though we’ve selected some of the options that make the most sense for auto dealerships. Many of these targeting categories are fairly self-explanatory; you might immediately see how they could relate to your dealership’s advertising endeavors. Others may not be relevant to your dealership, and that’s okay; you definitely don’t have to engage with all of these categories… just the ones where you see some benefit.

We recommend making your targeting decisions based on your buyer personas, of course, and we also endorse narrowing to an appropriate geographic area; there’s not much sense in marketing your Orange County car dealership to customers in New York, for example.

We’d also invite you to explore the options under Behaviors > Automotive, which is where you’ll be able to target individuals who like particular makes and models of cars and who may be in the market for a new one. This is where you’ll really find value and utility in Facebook’s targeting options!

More Considerations for Facebook Audience Targeting

Allow us to make a couple of additional notes about audience targeting. When you list the things you are looking for in your users, note that these things are not necessary requirements. If you put everything into the top box, then your ads will show to people who tick any of those boxes—so your targeting may not be quite as precise as you think it is.

However, if you click Filter and Narrow just below, then you get two more boxes. One says ‘and MUST ALSO match at least ONE of the following.’ This allows you to combine different targeting criteria, to narrow your search to people who fall into overlapping categories. This is where you can really hone in on your targeted buyers!

These tips show you some of the different ways to use Facebook audience targeting to your advantage—but if you need some additional help, we welcome you to contact Get My Auto today!

Once upon a time, press releases were considered to be invaluable for local SEO. They are not as popular as they used to be, and some marketing professionals ignore them altogether. In our opinion, though, press releases can be invaluable for building awareness about your used car dealership—but only when they are used wisely.

So what’s the right way to use press releases? The important thing is to send releases only when you have real dealership news to report. Don’t view press releases as SEO gimmicks. Use them as ways to connect with your community and let them know what makes your dealership special.

The Best Ways to Use Press Releases

There are plenty of ways in which you can make press releases work for your dealership. A few examples include:

Sharing news about dealership growth. Are you branching out into a new location? Adding on to an existing one? Or simply bringing on some new employees? Any kind of business growth is worth sending out a press release—letting your local business community know how vibrant your dealership is.

Promoting an event. Many used car dealerships hold community events—cook-outs, parties, or open houses—to get people down to the showroom. The next time you have an event like this planned, send out a news release, and start building awareness well in advance!

Highlighting charitable work. Many dealerships like to give back to their community, making donations or sponsoring events for local non-profits. There’s nothing wrong with sending out a press release to let the community know about causes you care about. This is especially smart around the holiday season, when charitable giving is on everyone’s mind.

Showcasing new inventory. Used car dealerships frankly can’t afford to send out news releases announcing all their new inventory—but if you branch out into a new kind of inventory (say electric cars), that may be worth noting in a press release.

Announcing big sales. Finally, if your dealership is a planning a big sale, it’s wise to let people know about it in advance—generating some excitement and bringing more foot traffic to your promotional event. Let local buyers know about chances to save big!

Marketing Your Dealership the Smart Way

When used correctly, the press release can be invaluable marketing collateral. Of course, it’s just one key component in a good dealership marketing plan, and we also recommend a robust focus on Facebook Ads, Craigslist, SEO, and more.

To learn more about marketing your used car dealership holistically, contact our experts. Reach out to the automotive marketing specialists at Get My Auto today, and learn how you can start generating positive attention for your car lot!

Craigslist is nothing new, and it’s certainly nothing flashy. As such, many dealers are tempted to ignore it, to exclude it from their marketing efforts altogether. This is a critical error.

Consider that Craigslist remains one of the 50 most visited websites in the world. Consider, too, that it gets more than 60 million American users each month. Finally, consider that Craigslist buyers tend to move through the sales process pretty quickly—meaning that dealers who use Craigslist wisely can get some quick conversions.

You’ll notice that there’s a catch: To get maximum benefit from Craigslist, it is important to use it in a strategic, effective manner—but how? A big part of it is making sure your listings are properly optimized.

To help, here are some quick Craigslist optimization tips from the Get My Auto marketing team.

Optimizing Your Craigslist Listings: 6 Tips

1. Make the title count. The title is the most important part of your whole post, because it’s what determines whether buyers click through to read more. Make sure yours is clear, crisp, and memorable. Do include the major selling points of the vehicle. Don’t include price (generally), and don’t say anything deceptive or untrue.
2. Use keywords judiciously. You don’t need to clog your ad copy with keywords to the point where it’s unreadable, but do make sure you hit all the highlights, ensuring your listing shows up in filtered searches.
3. Keep it simple. There’s no need for a lot of fancy HTML coding within your ad. In fact, Craigslist may see that as a spam trick. Stick with text and a few good images. Speaking of which…
4. Include pictures. Don’t post a car without some good images that showcase its main features. Ideally, you’ll take pictures somewhere outside your showroom—maybe against a nice, green backdrop somewhere in town.
5. Sell the dealership. Remember that you’re not just trying to sell a particular car; you’re ultimately trying to get people interested in your dealership as a whole. Include your primary “why buys” in each ad.
6. Be original. To avoid getting your ads labeled as spam, it’s best not to repeat yourself. Vary your ad copy as much as you can, and provide each new ad with its own distinct message and verbiage.

Get Help Optimizing Your Ads

It’s a tall order, really making those Craigslist ads sing—but you don’t have to do it alone. Get My Auto offers unparalleled expertise in Craigslist ad optimization—and we can help you make your ads truly effective.

To get started, reach out to us today. The Get My Auto team is standing by to help your dealership achieve marketing success.

Is your auto dealership doing everything in its power to connect with local buyers—and to project your dealership as the dealership of choice among used car customers? Certainly, the age of digital marketing provides dealerships with many opportunities. Actually recognizing those opportunities, and taking full advantage of them, can be a bit of a growing process.

Maybe you already have some basic digital marketing measures in place, but are ready to take them to the next level. We’ll help you do exactly that, with five quick recommendations—simple ways to enhance your digital marketing efforts today.

How Your Dealership Can Grow Its Digital Marketing Efforts

Learn to Write Effective Calls to Action

Never assume that your buyers know what action you want them to take; instead, go out of your way to invite them to take action, in every piece of content you write. You should have a clear, strong call to action on every page of your website, every Facebook ad, and every Craigslist post. And it doesn’t have to be about buying a car, either; downloading an e-book or signing up for a newsletter can be a perfectly valid action to seek, too.

Be Active on Craigslist

Craigslist marketing may not be flashy and it may not seem cutting edge—but it gets results. We’ve seen it, time and time again, and we always encourage the dealerships we work with to give Craigslist a try. Just make sure you’re strategic, and that you take time to familiarize yourself with Craigslist’s rules for dealerships.

Be Active on Facebook

This may sound like an obvious point—but would you believe that only about 10 percent of all auto dealerships maintain an active Facebook presence? You’ll want to lean heavily on organic reach, but also invest some dollars into Facebook Ads, which allows you to display your advertisements to highly targeted audiences, essentially removing waste and risk.

Invest in Mobile

Does your dealership website display properly on all types of devices? Test it on phones and tablets of all kinds, and make sure it can be easily seen and navigated without the need for a lot of zooming or scrolling. If your site is not mobile-friendly, bring that up to your Web designer right away.

Build Credibility

Establish thought leadership—proving your dealership to be a trustworthy resource and an invaluable ally to buyers. You can build thought leadership by starting a dealership blog, and providing valuable tips about the buying process, financing, even auto maintenance. As an added bonus, your dealership blogs will make for great Facebook fodder. And don’t forget to include a call to action in each one!

Take Your Dealership Marketing to the Next Level

One additional way in which you can enhance your marketing efficacy? Reach out to our team at Get My Auto today. Allow us to work with you in developing a comprehensive approach—one that will translate into bottom line success.

On the surface, it would seem like the world of car buying is becoming increasingly digitized. Study after study confirms that today’s buyers want to spend as little time as possible in the showroom. They would rather do the bulk of their research online, using the dealer website as well as consumer reviews. Most buyers are reluctant to even give out their contact information to a lead capturing form.

Yet, this does not mean that the need for personal connection is a thing of the past. Far from it, actually. While consumers would rather do online research than come down to the dealership, most surveys indicate that there is still a strong desire for a personalized experience, and for a dealership that makes the buyer feel truly welcome—both online and off.

The question is, what can dealerships do to balance their digital focus with their personal touch?

Personalizing Your Dealership Website

There are several ways for a dealership website to offer a personalized experience.

–Through custom content. There should be sections of the dealership website to speak to each stage of the buyer’s journey. Remember that some website visitors will just want information about your latest inventory. Others may be ready to schedule a test drive. And still others will be more interested in service and maintenance issues. Your dealership website should speak to all of these needs.
–Through custom delivery. At the same time, your dealership should be using website analytics, retargeting, and other advanced digital tools to ensure that the right people are seeing the right content. For instance, retargeting can help you to locate frequent website visitors, and direct them to content that moves them further down the sales path.
–Through conversion tools. Finally, your dealership website should provide tools that aid in the conversion process—for example, trade-in calculators, appointment setting apps, and more.

Beyond the Website

In addition to your dealership website, there are other channels for personalization. One is Facebook. Here, your content can provide helpfulness and authority, answering consumer questions, providing real value, and showing buyers that your job is to help them, first and foremost. Facebook Ads offers some great tools for personalization, as well, including some of the retargeting options we mentioned above.

And of course, eventually, buyers will come to the showroom, if only to take their test drive and sign on the dotted line. Don’t neglect this opportunity to build on the connections you’ve already made through your website, and to carry out those values of trustworthiness and helpfulness.

Personalization is key to the process, and even in the world of digital marketing there is much you can do to truly connect. To learn more, we invite you to contact the digital marketing professionals at Get My Auto today!