In today’s consumer driven world, the most important aspect of your business is customer retention. Sure, you also want to work to acquire new customers, but your main focus should always be retaining the customers you already have and making sure they come back to you for future service and vehicle needs. Study after study shows that obtaining new customers will cost your dealership more money than ensuring satisfaction and building loyalty with current customers. How will you ensure your customers feel appreciated and know you value their business? Check out these three ways to fall into customer loyalty by leveraging the spirit of World Gratitude Day.

Send Thank You Notes
Ok, ok… this idea is probably a little cliché, but it works. Nothing shows your thankfulness like a thank you note. This type of marketing shows you took time out of your day to just say thank you. It comes across as heartfelt appreciation to the recipient. Think about having your sales team hand write personal thank you notes to each customer who purchases a vehicle from your dealership. Or, have your Service Advisors hand write notes for customers who have declined service or had service performed. These little gestures go a long way in building loyalty with your customers.

Start an Above and Beyond Contest
Many of your major retail outlets do these types of employee recognition programs all the time. Here’s the idea - provide a spiff to employees when a customer goes out of their way to tell management or the receptionist about their incredible customer service. The incentive will need to be enough to encourage employees to go above and beyond for every customer. The result will be an improvement in employee and customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Spend Time with Every Customer
This last idea is one you’ll see restaurants use all the time. In their world, it’s called manager table visits -each table gets a personal visit from a manager to ensure their expectations of their restaurant experience are met. Using this same principle, have your management team go out of their way to spend just a few minutes with every sales and service customer to make sure their experience at your dealership is meeting their expectations. It is a great way to spot an employee improvement or process problem, understand your customer experience, and address any concerns with customers while they are at your dealership.

In the spirit of World Gratitude Day on September 21^st, find ways your dealership staff can show appreciation to your most valuable asset, your customers!

In today’s consumer driven world, the most important aspect of your business is customer retention. Sure, you also want to work to acquire new customers, but your main focus should always be retaining the customers you already have and making sure they come back to you for future service and vehicle needs. Study after study shows that obtaining new customers will cost your dealership more money than ensuring satisfaction and building loyalty with current customers. How will you ensure your customers feel appreciated and know you value their business? Check out these three ways to fall into customer loyalty by leveraging the spirit of World Gratitude Day.

Send Thank You Notes
Ok, ok… this idea is probably a little cliché, but it works. Nothing shows your thankfulness like a thank you note. This type of marketing shows you took time out of your day to just say thank you. It comes across as heartfelt appreciation to the recipient. Think about having your sales team hand write personal thank you notes to each customer who purchases a vehicle from your dealership. Or, have your Service Advisors hand write notes for customers who have declined service or had service performed. These little gestures go a long way in building loyalty with your customers.

Start an Above and Beyond Contest
Many of your major retail outlets do these types of employee recognition programs all the time. Here’s the idea - provide a spiff to employees when a customer goes out of their way to tell management or the receptionist about their incredible customer service. The incentive will need to be enough to encourage employees to go above and beyond for every customer. The result will be an improvement in employee and customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Spend Time with Every Customer
This last idea is one you’ll see restaurants use all the time. In their world, it’s called manager table visits -each table gets a personal visit from a manager to ensure their expectations of their restaurant experience are met. Using this same principle, have your management team go out of their way to spend just a few minutes with every sales and service customer to make sure their experience at your dealership is meeting their expectations. It is a great way to spot an employee improvement or process problem, understand your customer experience, and address any concerns with customers while they are at your dealership.

In the spirit of World Gratitude Day on September 21^st, find ways your dealership staff can show appreciation to your most valuable asset, your customers!

With Labor Day here and the official start of fall coming up quickly, now is the time to leverage an end of summer campaign to drive revenue and traffic plus gain additional customer loyalty for your dealership. But, what is an impactful end of summer campaign to help you do just that? Before fall officially sets in, try one of these revenue generating campaign ideas.

Host an End of Summer Blast
Invite customers, prospects, and members of your community to an event at your dealership. Be sure to have appealing activities to attract an audience such as live music, food and beverages, games, giveaways, etc. You can partner with other local business to keep costs down. Make sure to send an announcement to all customers to let them know you’re hosting one last blast before the cooler weather sets in.

Beach Ball Blowout
Chances are you’re looking to get rid of those 2014 vehicles on your lot to make room for your 2015 lineup. You could host a blowout event at your dealership to offer a fun way for customers to get additional savings on the vehicle of their choice. Get some blow-up beach balls and write different savings offers on each. Then display them throughout your showroom. When a prospect comes in to inquire about a vehicle, have them pick a beach ball to discover their additional savings. You could also transfer this same idea to your Service Department.

Dust Off the Sand Savings
Depending on your region of the country, most of your customers have been to the beach this summer, and you know, with the beach comes sand. Even if your customers have had their vehicle cleaned since their trip to the beach, chances are they haven’t had it detailed. So, offer them a chance to have a discounted detail to dust off the sand in their vehicle or host a detail clinic in your Service Department to show them how to properly clean the sand out of their vehicle.

Regardless of the type of end of summer campaign you decide to run, you’ll drive revenue and traffic plus gain additional customer loyalty for your dealership.

With Labor Day here and the official start of fall coming up quickly, now is the time to leverage an end of summer campaign to drive revenue and traffic plus gain additional customer loyalty for your dealership. But, what is an impactful end of summer campaign to help you do just that? Before fall officially sets in, try one of these revenue generating campaign ideas.

Host an End of Summer Blast
Invite customers, prospects, and members of your community to an event at your dealership. Be sure to have appealing activities to attract an audience such as live music, food and beverages, games, giveaways, etc. You can partner with other local business to keep costs down. Make sure to send an announcement to all customers to let them know you’re hosting one last blast before the cooler weather sets in.

Beach Ball Blowout
Chances are you’re looking to get rid of those 2014 vehicles on your lot to make room for your 2015 lineup. You could host a blowout event at your dealership to offer a fun way for customers to get additional savings on the vehicle of their choice. Get some blow-up beach balls and write different savings offers on each. Then display them throughout your showroom. When a prospect comes in to inquire about a vehicle, have them pick a beach ball to discover their additional savings. You could also transfer this same idea to your Service Department.

Dust Off the Sand Savings
Depending on your region of the country, most of your customers have been to the beach this summer, and you know, with the beach comes sand. Even if your customers have had their vehicle cleaned since their trip to the beach, chances are they haven’t had it detailed. So, offer them a chance to have a discounted detail to dust off the sand in their vehicle or host a detail clinic in your Service Department to show them how to properly clean the sand out of their vehicle.

Regardless of the type of end of summer campaign you decide to run, you’ll drive revenue and traffic plus gain additional customer loyalty for your dealership.

Believe it or not, the world of advertising is changing. NADA reports that during the last decade, there has been a 30% decrease in newspaper advertising and a 30% increase in internet adversiting.* Do you find some of the same trends in your advertising spend? If not, it may be time to reevaluate your advertising approach. The average American doesn’t consume media like they did before; they aren’t looking for mass-marketing advertisement, but rather a direct one-to-one approach.

Like any advertising, you want your efforts to return the highest ROI and spend as little as possible for as much brand exposure as possible. Since Americans are spending more and more time on their social media networks, this could be the shift in internet advertising spend you’re missing out on.

With social advertising, you’re able to reach more people than traditional radio or print, stay in front of your target audience through ad criteria, spend as little or as much as you deem appropriate – even as little as a $1 a day, and social ads are the lowest cost per impression of any other advertising in history. Here are five easy steps for getting your social advertising going to start building your social brand recognition and growing your online community.

Identify Your Advertising Goals
Before you set up your first social ad, be sure to determine what your specific goals are. Obviously you want to sell and service more vehicles, but what are your specific goals in regards to your social channels? Do you want to grow your audience, increase website conversions, promote your new social app, draw attention for your next event, or increase page engagement? Each of these goals will result in a different outcome and ads should be tailored to assist in accomplishing the desired results.

Determine Your Advertising Platform
The world of social media is forever growing so it makes it hard to know where you should be and what platform you best fit into. If your dealership currently has social media channels, check out which ones you are receiving the most engagement on and start there. Once you start to gain some traction, then branch out to other social platforms. Each time you start advertising on a new platform, be sure to review your goals and change or customize the ads for that specific audience.

Create an Eye-Catching Ad
For the most part, social ads have two components: text and imagery. When constructing your first social ad, you’ll want to spend some time on the text, writing and re-writing it to make it stand out. Use trigger words to create a sense of urgency and capitalize on the recipient’s pain points. Next, work on your ad’s imagery. You may want to use your company logo or trademark symbol; both will work fine if they are eye-catching. If not, think about using an image to capture the recipient’s attention, something that will get noticed.

Select Your Audience
No one knows your customers better than you, so use the filters on each social channel to sort through for your ideal vehicle buyer. You’ll want to start by narrowing your audience down by location from your dealership, then select things like language, gender, relationship status, age, and education level. Lastly, narrow your search by the audience’s interest. This filter is definitely more selective, but helps you hone in on the specific audience who is most likely to buy from you. You can also create custom audiences where in you use your dealership’s database to target current customers and prospects to influence them to join your social networks.

Define Your Budget
Like any advertising budget, it depends on the size of your dealership, how long you’ve been in business, what your overhead is, and how much monthly revenue you bring in. Our advice is to carve out a portion of your marketing budget designated for internet marketing for social advertisement. A good place to start is allocating about 25% of your internet marketing budget to social ads, but this may not work for all dealerships. Once you get your social ad budget set, be sure to monitor your performance to confirm you are receiving the desired results based on your goals and tweak accordingly.

If you haven’t ventured into the world of social advertising, now is the time! You will see an increase in brand recognition, growth in your online community, additional website traffic, and most importantly a competitive advantage.

 *http://www.nada.org/Publications/NADADATA/

Believe it or not, the world of advertising is changing. NADA reports that during the last decade, there has been a 30% decrease in newspaper advertising and a 30% increase in internet adversiting.* Do you find some of the same trends in your advertising spend? If not, it may be time to reevaluate your advertising approach. The average American doesn’t consume media like they did before; they aren’t looking for mass-marketing advertisement, but rather a direct one-to-one approach.

Like any advertising, you want your efforts to return the highest ROI and spend as little as possible for as much brand exposure as possible. Since Americans are spending more and more time on their social media networks, this could be the shift in internet advertising spend you’re missing out on.

With social advertising, you’re able to reach more people than traditional radio or print, stay in front of your target audience through ad criteria, spend as little or as much as you deem appropriate – even as little as a $1 a day, and social ads are the lowest cost per impression of any other advertising in history. Here are five easy steps for getting your social advertising going to start building your social brand recognition and growing your online community.

Identify Your Advertising Goals
Before you set up your first social ad, be sure to determine what your specific goals are. Obviously you want to sell and service more vehicles, but what are your specific goals in regards to your social channels? Do you want to grow your audience, increase website conversions, promote your new social app, draw attention for your next event, or increase page engagement? Each of these goals will result in a different outcome and ads should be tailored to assist in accomplishing the desired results.

Determine Your Advertising Platform
The world of social media is forever growing so it makes it hard to know where you should be and what platform you best fit into. If your dealership currently has social media channels, check out which ones you are receiving the most engagement on and start there. Once you start to gain some traction, then branch out to other social platforms. Each time you start advertising on a new platform, be sure to review your goals and change or customize the ads for that specific audience.

Create an Eye-Catching Ad
For the most part, social ads have two components: text and imagery. When constructing your first social ad, you’ll want to spend some time on the text, writing and re-writing it to make it stand out. Use trigger words to create a sense of urgency and capitalize on the recipient’s pain points. Next, work on your ad’s imagery. You may want to use your company logo or trademark symbol; both will work fine if they are eye-catching. If not, think about using an image to capture the recipient’s attention, something that will get noticed.

Select Your Audience
No one knows your customers better than you, so use the filters on each social channel to sort through for your ideal vehicle buyer. You’ll want to start by narrowing your audience down by location from your dealership, then select things like language, gender, relationship status, age, and education level. Lastly, narrow your search by the audience’s interest. This filter is definitely more selective, but helps you hone in on the specific audience who is most likely to buy from you. You can also create custom audiences where in you use your dealership’s database to target current customers and prospects to influence them to join your social networks.

Define Your Budget
Like any advertising budget, it depends on the size of your dealership, how long you’ve been in business, what your overhead is, and how much monthly revenue you bring in. Our advice is to carve out a portion of your marketing budget designated for internet marketing for social advertisement. A good place to start is allocating about 25% of your internet marketing budget to social ads, but this may not work for all dealerships. Once you get your social ad budget set, be sure to monitor your performance to confirm you are receiving the desired results based on your goals and tweak accordingly.

If you haven’t ventured into the world of social advertising, now is the time! You will see an increase in brand recognition, growth in your online community, additional website traffic, and most importantly a competitive advantage.

 *http://www.nada.org/Publications/NADADATA/

If you’ve been out shopping over the past couple of weeks, you’ve probably noticed the abundance of back-to-school gear flooding the aisles. Even if you haven’t stepped foot into one of the major retail outlets, you’ve likely seen the back-to-school fliers stuffed into your mailbox offering exclusive savings. Even if you don’t want to believe it, the back to school season is here.

A great way to get involved in your community and help local kids get a great start to the new school year is by hosting a back-to-school supply drive at your dealership. This type of campaign generates good press, additional traffic, and a great way for your dealership to give back. Here are three easy steps to get your drive started.

Step #1 Pick an Organization
Probably the simplest place for you to start is by contacting your local school district; many of them have programs to help underprivileged children get the school supplies they need. If that is not an option, try Google - look in your area for school supply drives. Many cities have non-profit organizations that specifically help needy kids and would appreciate donated school supplies. If that still produces a dead end, contact some local churches; many host supply drives for local kids and can help you get in touch with their organization of choice.

Step #2 Determine the Need
Many organizations that work with underprivileged children will take any and all donations, but others won’t. You will need to work with your organization of choice to determine exactly what their need is so your drive is meaningful and helpful to the children it supports. Also, be sure to understand when the supplies are needed so you can determine your drive’s end date.

Step #3 Communicate Drive Details
The easiest way to get the word out about your campaign is by placing clearly marked receptacles in your Sales and Service Departments. Anyone visiting your dealership will see that you are collecting school supplies. You can also use digital and print communications to share details about your drive to current and potential customers. If you want to get additional exposure for your back-to-school supply drive, you can publish a press release about your efforts and send to local news outlets for pickup. As you communicate details about your school supply drive, be sure to include a start and end date, supplies needed, and which organization will receive the donations.

End your summer with a sizzle by extending community outreach to needy kids in your local community with a back-to-school supply drive.

If you’ve been out shopping over the past couple of weeks, you’ve probably noticed the abundance of back-to-school gear flooding the aisles. Even if you haven’t stepped foot into one of the major retail outlets, you’ve likely seen the back-to-school fliers stuffed into your mailbox offering exclusive savings. Even if you don’t want to believe it, the back to school season is here.

A great way to get involved in your community and help local kids get a great start to the new school year is by hosting a back-to-school supply drive at your dealership. This type of campaign generates good press, additional traffic, and a great way for your dealership to give back. Here are three easy steps to get your drive started.

Step #1 Pick an Organization
Probably the simplest place for you to start is by contacting your local school district; many of them have programs to help underprivileged children get the school supplies they need. If that is not an option, try Google - look in your area for school supply drives. Many cities have non-profit organizations that specifically help needy kids and would appreciate donated school supplies. If that still produces a dead end, contact some local churches; many host supply drives for local kids and can help you get in touch with their organization of choice.

Step #2 Determine the Need
Many organizations that work with underprivileged children will take any and all donations, but others won’t. You will need to work with your organization of choice to determine exactly what their need is so your drive is meaningful and helpful to the children it supports. Also, be sure to understand when the supplies are needed so you can determine your drive’s end date.

Step #3 Communicate Drive Details
The easiest way to get the word out about your campaign is by placing clearly marked receptacles in your Sales and Service Departments. Anyone visiting your dealership will see that you are collecting school supplies. You can also use digital and print communications to share details about your drive to current and potential customers. If you want to get additional exposure for your back-to-school supply drive, you can publish a press release about your efforts and send to local news outlets for pickup. As you communicate details about your school supply drive, be sure to include a start and end date, supplies needed, and which organization will receive the donations.

End your summer with a sizzle by extending community outreach to needy kids in your local community with a back-to-school supply drive.

It’s no secret that auto buyers are turning to online resources before making an in-store purchase. Today’s buyers are more informed and ready to purchase when they walk into their dealership of choice. This is because these internet-savvy shoppers are researching their favorite model, including options and availability, examining local dealerships to see who carries the model of their choice, and visiting review and social sites to gather other consumers’ opinions to solidify their decisions. Once this extensive research is complete, then buyers go to the dealership to test drive the vehicle. Sound about right?

With these types of buying patterns, it is more important than ever for your dealership to make a good first impression. But, how do you make a good first impression on the internet?

Believe it or not, there are plenty of ways to accomplish this, but today we’re going to focus on upholding a positive online brand image through reputation management of online reviews. If you’re not sure what reputation management is, BusinessDictonary.com describes it as the process of identifying what other people are saying or feeling about your business and taking steps to ensure that the general consensus is in line with your goals.

Reputation is Important to Your Business
Since the pool of internet-savvy shoppers is turning more and more to online resources, it’s imperative you have a good image when they come across your dealership. In order to do this, you have to work to maintain a positive brand image.

There are many companies that fail to produce a positive image and the negative comments produced by consumers typically appear on websites that have high SEO ranking. These types of negative comments can lead to loss in sales, poor press coverage, inadequate employment applicants, and lower investor opportunities. On top of all that, negative consumer comments are difficult and sometimes impossible to clean up. How do you plan to keep a healthy, positive online presence?

Listen to Reviews
This tip seems pretty obvious, but it is often overlooked. Just setting up a spot for consumers to review your business is not enough; you want to constantly monitor the sites. By honing in on these reviews, even if they are positive, you gain insightful information about your business. Sometimes, you can identify areas of profit loss, underperforming employees, or areas of your business that should be highlighted as a competitive differentiator.

Respond to Reviews
The internet is an ever-changing and evolving platform where information can spread like wildfire. Because of this, it is key that you address reviews quickly, professionally, and most importantly, personally. We advise our clients to elect a person to monitor reviews daily and then set up a process for how to respond to a review, positive or negative. When responding to a negative review, be sure to first empathize with the issue, then provide a resolution to the problem, and lastly invite the customer to come back. Depending on the review site, you’ll want to direct message your response instead of blast your conversation all over the site, but in some cases this will not be possible. When responding to a positive review, there is no need to direct message, nor is there a need to respond to every positive comment about your dealership. Just make sure your response is personal and timely.

Ask for Reviews
Often the only time consumers post reviews is when they want to complain about a bad service experience or a recent product they purchased. So, many retail outlets end up littered with only bad reviews because consumers don’t usually post reviews about their pleasant experiences. To combat this, a needed step to any reputation management strategy is to actively solicit positive reviews. You can do this in multiple ways, but the most efficient is by requesting reviews from customers through email marketing after a purchase or service.

Choosing the Right Resources to Monitor Reviews
There are hundreds of software programs in the market today that will help you manage your review sites and even provide you alerts when a consumer posts a new review. Or, you could opt to pay a vendor for consulting and reporting of your review sites and not take the burden of doing it in house. Regardless, these services will analyze and understand the magnitude and sentiment of how consumers feel about your dealership. Whichever you decide, you’ll want to find a solution that works across multiple platforms to provide you a complete solution so you won’t need more than one.

Get Started
Now is the best time to get started on your dealership’s online reputation management strategy and start building your positive online presence. Regardless of the review sites your consumers are visiting, these five principles still apply and can even be carried over to your social media sites.

It’s no secret that auto buyers are turning to online resources before making an in-store purchase. Today’s buyers are more informed and ready to purchase when they walk into their dealership of choice. This is because these internet-savvy shoppers are researching their favorite model, including options and availability, examining local dealerships to see who carries the model of their choice, and visiting review and social sites to gather other consumers’ opinions to solidify their decisions. Once this extensive research is complete, then buyers go to the dealership to test drive the vehicle. Sound about right?

With these types of buying patterns, it is more important than ever for your dealership to make a good first impression. But, how do you make a good first impression on the internet?

Believe it or not, there are plenty of ways to accomplish this, but today we’re going to focus on upholding a positive online brand image through reputation management of online reviews. If you’re not sure what reputation management is, BusinessDictonary.com describes it as the process of identifying what other people are saying or feeling about your business and taking steps to ensure that the general consensus is in line with your goals.

Reputation is Important to Your Business
Since the pool of internet-savvy shoppers is turning more and more to online resources, it’s imperative you have a good image when they come across your dealership. In order to do this, you have to work to maintain a positive brand image.

There are many companies that fail to produce a positive image and the negative comments produced by consumers typically appear on websites that have high SEO ranking. These types of negative comments can lead to loss in sales, poor press coverage, inadequate employment applicants, and lower investor opportunities. On top of all that, negative consumer comments are difficult and sometimes impossible to clean up. How do you plan to keep a healthy, positive online presence?

Listen to Reviews
This tip seems pretty obvious, but it is often overlooked. Just setting up a spot for consumers to review your business is not enough; you want to constantly monitor the sites. By honing in on these reviews, even if they are positive, you gain insightful information about your business. Sometimes, you can identify areas of profit loss, underperforming employees, or areas of your business that should be highlighted as a competitive differentiator.

Respond to Reviews
The internet is an ever-changing and evolving platform where information can spread like wildfire. Because of this, it is key that you address reviews quickly, professionally, and most importantly, personally. We advise our clients to elect a person to monitor reviews daily and then set up a process for how to respond to a review, positive or negative. When responding to a negative review, be sure to first empathize with the issue, then provide a resolution to the problem, and lastly invite the customer to come back. Depending on the review site, you’ll want to direct message your response instead of blast your conversation all over the site, but in some cases this will not be possible. When responding to a positive review, there is no need to direct message, nor is there a need to respond to every positive comment about your dealership. Just make sure your response is personal and timely.

Ask for Reviews
Often the only time consumers post reviews is when they want to complain about a bad service experience or a recent product they purchased. So, many retail outlets end up littered with only bad reviews because consumers don’t usually post reviews about their pleasant experiences. To combat this, a needed step to any reputation management strategy is to actively solicit positive reviews. You can do this in multiple ways, but the most efficient is by requesting reviews from customers through email marketing after a purchase or service.

Choosing the Right Resources to Monitor Reviews
There are hundreds of software programs in the market today that will help you manage your review sites and even provide you alerts when a consumer posts a new review. Or, you could opt to pay a vendor for consulting and reporting of your review sites and not take the burden of doing it in house. Regardless, these services will analyze and understand the magnitude and sentiment of how consumers feel about your dealership. Whichever you decide, you’ll want to find a solution that works across multiple platforms to provide you a complete solution so you won’t need more than one.

Get Started
Now is the best time to get started on your dealership’s online reputation management strategy and start building your positive online presence. Regardless of the review sites your consumers are visiting, these five principles still apply and can even be carried over to your social media sites.