Tag: Websites

Is Your Website Mobile-First?

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Having a mobile-friendly website is one that correctly displays on mobile and handheld devices. This makes for a streamlined experience for your dealership staff and online car shoppers when viewing your website. According to Google, w hen web users visited a mobile-friendly site, 74% of people say they’re more likely to return to that site in the future.*

And as the automotive industry moves toward a more digital-first environment, many car shoppers use the internet to shop for cars, so you must make the experience as easy as possible.

Today, many businesses want their website to be fully responsive because it’s essential to have a mobile version of a website. This means the design and development of your website responds positively to the car shopper’s screen size, platform, and orientation.

But at Dealer.com, we use the latest, advanced, mobile-first technology to deliver a user-focused, search-engine-optimized experience when car shoppers visit your site with any device. We mobilize and optimize your site for any smart device.

But you might wonder what’s the difference between a fully responsive website and a mobile-first website.

A Fully Responsive Website

Today, almost everyone has a fully responsive website, meaning the browser will rescale itself to keep the user experience and look and feel across all devices — with no irritating zooming, scrolling, or resizing. Fully responsive websites are also the easiest to implement and maintain and to build a mobile experience at scale. But having a fully responsive website without having a mobile-first strategy does not fully optimize the user experience.

A responsive site only takes the desktop site and makes it mobile friendly. While it can be an adequate mobile platform, it doesn’t optimize for the best mobile experience like a hybrid platform. It also doesn’t account for behavioral differences going from a desktop to mobile device. Just because a desktop site can respond to a device and scale down, doesn’t mean the shopper wants to use a scaled down desktop site.

Additionally, responsive websites are likely to load slower on mobile devices with customized CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) because it loads the website in its entirety. Ideally, users want a mobile experience on mobile device which would require the web-developer to write additional CSS to hide/add elements to the responsive website causing search engines to crawl more code.

Dealer.com takes today’s web site experience a step further and uses a mobile-first approach that allows us to optimize every mobile experience so dealers can render a specific experience to any device.

Why Mobile-First? 

Mobile devices are at the forefront of the digital revolution that has taken place in the last decade. According to Dealer.com, 62% of traffic to dealership websites comes from personal devices. That’s why it’s so essential to ensure the mobile experience for your website is uniquely optimized for each user.

We also know that as dealers, many of your sales and service staff use personal and handle-held devices to interact with customers daily.

Google announced that a website’s mobile friendliness would be a new ranking signal for grading websites. So, the more your website can adapt seamlessly from desktop to a specific personal or handheld device, the higher your website is ranked.

Mobile-first technology from Dealer.com works to deliver a superior user experience across every device while controlling each experience from an intuitive dashboard. This allows you to configure every aspect of your website, simplify site updates across devices, merchandise inventory with precision, and deliver digital deals through transparent automotive digital retailing.

Adapted to Every Car Shopper

We’re committed to using responsive technology to build mobile-first, adaptive websites for our clients— the industry’s most flexible website response capabilities. Our technology incorporates the essential parts of a fully responsive website with the ability for device-specific experiences, we are not just responsive or only responsive.

By optimizing each shopper’s experience for device-specific content and configuration, we give dealers more flexibility and customization opportunities than other providers. So, no matter if you’re shopping on an iPad Pro or Galaxy S22, we create a website specifically for each device.

At Dealer.com we believe that designing with a mobile-first mindset ensures every car shopper has the unique experience they deserve.

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* Google Search Central Blog

Close More Deals with Your Digital Retailing Tools

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It’s no longer enough to simply implement digital retailing tools. To be competitive and close more deals, you have to understand the “why” of digital retailing. Why do consumers seek out these experiences? Why do they choose one dealership’s digital retailing over another? And, most importantly, why should you pay attention to consumers’ answers to these questions?

Amanda Hilerio, eCommerce Performance Manager at Dealer.com, recently spoke to dealers about how to take their digital retailing game to the next level. She discussed five talking points to help dealers attract more car sales leads and get the most out of their digital retailing investment.

  1. Consumer behavior trends and the factors affecting consumer decisions
  2. Why you should pay attention to these consumer trends
  3. How to align your processes with consumer trends
  4. Technology integrations that make your processes easier
  5. How to connect your digital storefront to your physical dealership

Watch the webinar to see how your dealership can connect with more dealer leads through your digital retailing experience.

Watch the Webinar
Learn More About Dealer.com

5 Ways to Build Trust with Modern Car Buyers 

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5 Ways to Build Trust with Modern Car Buyers

Written By: Chase Abbott

Half of a consumer’s decision to repurchase or recommend an automotive brand or dealer is based on trust. While dealerships and car salespeople have long suffered from a lack of consumer confidence throughout the purchase process, gaining trust most certainly is possible when dealerships act intentionally. A leading way to win over auto sales leads is through a digital buying experience—if it is done properly. 

Even with digital sales methods, dealerships need to bolster consumer relationships to meet their goals. Ensuring that the digital sales process is developed and grounded in trust ultimately benefits both the car buyer leads and the dealership. Here are five ways your dealership can build trust with modern car buyers. 

1. Understand the power of digital 

Automotive sales have been trending toward an era of online shopping for some time now. But within the past 18 to 24 months alone, the percentage of vehicles purchased digitally has skyrocketed from 2% to almost 30%—a massive and sudden shift in consumer preferences that dealerships simply can’t ignore. 

This preference to purchase vehicles online is still gaining momentum. More than three-quarters (76%) of automotive dealer leads are willing to consider a complete online purchase process. This movement toward digital or hybrid purchasing is not likely to go away anytime soon, and savvy dealerships understand that the sales process has been permanently disrupted. Having the right technology available is a necessary basis for initiating customer relationships, anticipating their needs, and building trust from the get-go. 

2. Evaluate technology to ensure you have the right solutions in place 

Whether your dealership has digital experience tools already in place or if you’re just getting started, it’s important to evaluate available technology so it is serving both your customer base and internal needs. With the right functionality, these tools can guide automotive leads through the sales funnel, close deals with more efficiency, and increase profits. 

Connecting those dots and getting the technology right ultimately impacts your bottom line. Dealerships surveyed earned 25% higher front-end gross profits and 24% higher back-end gross profits, compared to traditional dealer leads. The right technology will meet customers where they already are in the sales process, providing tailored support that demonstrates your business recognizes their unique needs. 

3. Use customer data to keep deals moving forward 

Through responsible customer data usage, dealerships can target buyers with relevant automotive digital marketing in spaces that are of most use for them, resulting in a win-win situation. Admittedly, it’s not easy to do. About half of dealerships say that it is a challenge to leverage data and systems to identify opportunities, while 86% of dealers agree that having accurate and complete customer data is a dealership priority. However, the right software and tools can assist. 

Customer data can come from a variety of sources, including the consumer sharing it directly with the dealership, the consumer sharing it with a trusted third-party partner, or outside entities collecting it. Ideally, the dealership combines its own data with that of trusted partners for the most well-rounded view. The data can help your dealership understand the customer’s vehicle type preferences, budget, stage in the sales process, communication preferences, and more. 

Your own data should provide the insights you need to offer personalized online user experiences like recommendations, specials, and fixed operations content based on their previous shopping behaviors. Customer data provides a 216% increase in lead form submission rates, based on a Dealer.com study of 524 franchise dealers who subscribed to Experience Optimization. Dealerships using Experience Optimization showed that customers were three times more likely to initiate a trade-in deal. Salespeople can use data to inform their approach to a deal and to better assure customers that they are being supported throughout their ownership journey. 

4. Give customers control of their buying experience 

Customers want to be in control of their shopping experience, so most successful dealerships offer a range of online and offline communication options to help make customers comfortable and enable open dialogue. Offering a hybrid experience that combines the functionality of brick-and-mortar operations with the convenience of shopping online is key for building strong relationship with a wide range of customers. 

With this hybrid model, customers can do as much of the shopping online as they would like, and then come to the dealership when they’re ready. This level of flexibility helps bolster confidence and trust in the process. Two-thirds of dealer leads say that they want to complete more of their next car-buying process online compared to their prior vehicle purchase. If a customer can purchase on their own terms, they’re more likely to give your dealership good reviews/referrals and remain a loyal customer. 

5. Gather and utilize feedback from recent happy buyers 

Consumers familiar with shopping online are overwhelmingly satisfied with their dealership experience, with 77% expressing this sentiment. Harness the power of your happy customers and make it easy for them to spread the word for you. Build the feedback-solicitation process into the car-buying experience. 

This is especially important because 90% of consumers read online reviews before visiting a business, and almost the same percentage trust these reviews the way they trust personal recommendations. More than half of shoppers say that the most important factor when choosing a dealership is the dealer’s reputation. 

Building trust with the modern car buyer will help enhance and solidify your reputation. You can accomplish this by understanding what car buyers want, utilizing technology to your advantage, giving customers the ability to shop online, and then seamlessly moving the process forward. To learn more about how you can build trust with modern car buyers, visit Dealer.com. 

A version of this article originally appeared in Digital Dealer. 

Marketing in a Cookie-less Future

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Automotive internet marketing is changing. Third-party cookies—data used to display personalized ads and track internet users between websites—are going away for good. Advertisers will no longer be able to track and target shoppers the way they always have. They will have to rely on their own first-party data to deliver the personalized shopping experiences customers expect. So, what does that mean for your dealership?  

Data and Marketing Basics  

The more you know about your customers, the better you can serve them. If you know that a particular customer keeps looking at a particular vehicle online, you can take action to advertise specific makes and models to that customer. You may also be able to identify that customer’s current vehicle, price range for a new vehicle, propensity to buy, and more. All this data makes automotive digital marketing more effective. But as third-party cookies go away, you’ll know less about your customers, and your advertising has the potential to be less personalized and less effective.  

The Importance of First-Party Data 

If your dealership doesn’t have a way to track consumers outside of third-party cookies, your advertising audience is about to get smaller. Dealerships that have access to first-party data have a better chance of coming out on top in this new landscape. But what is first-party data exactly? First-party data—data that you have the right to collect and access—includes the following:  

  • – Data stored under your website
  • – Data stored in your CRM  
  • – Data stored in your DMS  
  • – Tier one data, including some OEM data  

Your Dealership’s Auto Advertising Plan  

Your dealership can approach auto advertising and take advantage of first-party data in one of three ways. You can: 1) manually provide advertisers with your first-party data, 2) purchase first-party data to create audiences, or 3) partner with an advertising provider that already has access to large amounts of first-party data.  

  • Manually Provide Data: This approach involves providing transaction records from your DMS, for example, to your automotive advertising agency to create specific audiences. You may also be able to provide this data to cable television companies to show ads tailored to your audience. 
  • Purchase First-Party Data: The approach involves purchasing consumer data from companies that aggregate different pools of first-party data so dealerships can target and personalize auto advertising.  
  • Partner with an Advertiser with Access to First-Party Data: If an advertiser is already part of an ecosystem of companies that collect data about consumers, your dealership automatically has access to more first-party data and can advertise more effectively to a wider audience. 

Advertising with Dealer.com   

When your dealership advertises with Dealer.com, you get access to exclusive first-party Cox Automotive data throughout the entire buyer’s journey. That includes first-party signals from three out of every four car shoppers. That is the biggest basket of first-party data available to dealerships today. This data allows you to track customers and households based on their browsing data from Kelley Blue Book, Autotrader, and Dealer.com websites to create targetable profiles that make your dealership’s advertising more effective. 

As third-party cookies go away, it’s time to meet with your advertising team to reevaluate your advertising approach. Whether leveraging your DMS and CRM data, purchasing data, or partnering with Dealer.com to leverage the largest pool of first-party data in the industry, create an action plan now that can help you personalize your customers’ experience and keep them coming to your dealership. 

To learn more about the importance of first-party data and how your dealership can gain an advertising advantage in the coming months, watch our detailed video all about marketing in the cookie-less future. 

Differentiate Your Digital Buying Experience to Stand Out from Your Competition

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As the automotive sales industry shifts toward offering more digital buying experiences, dealerships need to do more to stand out from the increasing crowd of competition. It’s no longer enough to simply offer a digital buying experience. Your dealership needs to seriously consider how to be different. That means appealing to auto sales leads with a digital buying experience that’s appealing and gives them reason to choose your dealership over your competitors. 

B. Malaczewski, manager of Performance Management at Dealer.com, recently spoke to dealers about the importance of differentiating the digital buying process. She offered valuable insight into what motivates car dealer leads to choose one digital shopping experience over another and how you can promote your brand to best appeal to buyers. Key takeaways from the presentation included: 

  • A list of essential and optional steps for your digital shopping experience 
  • How to decide which digital processes are right for your dealership and your customers 
  • Branding considerations that will set you apart from the competition 
  • How to maximize communication on your digital storefront for digital shopping 
  • How to leverage connected Cox Automotive brands to differentiate your dealership online 

Watch the webinar to see how your dealership can stand out from the crowd to offer a distinct digital buying experience.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgchwHZTpUU

Differentiate Your Digital Buying Experience

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The pandemic drastically changed the habits and expectations of car buyers. With shoppers spending more time online, it’s becoming harder to differentiate your business from the dealers down the street. To keep customers—and their dollars—coming your way, you’ll need to adapt and implement new digital shopping experiences that your competitors can’t match.  

During this session, we’ll share key insights and best practices for creating easy, fast and frictionless car buying processes. You’ll also learn how to market and communicate those experiences with a multi-channel digital marketing strategy. 

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How the Right Partnership and Personalization Deliver a Premium Consumer Experience

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By Nuan Openshaw-Dion, vice president operations, Dealer Marketing for Dealer.com

Personalization is at the core of the way we shop and buy. Whether consumers are online shopping for groceries or for cars, they want a convenient, streamlined experience that works for them and happens on their terms.  

That means dealers must adapt and meet the customers wherever they are in their buying journey with relevance and personalization. A shopper who is exposed to personalized content during their visit views more VDPs, submits more lead forms and is more likely to start their deal online.1 

Dealers must ensure that engagement is backed by rich data and tailored insights—powered by the right partnership with the right marketing experts to attract and retain the right customer. Personalization, intuitive search, aggregated research, and buyer reviews are all part of this new wave of digital marketing for the modern dealer-buyer experience. 

Working with specialized, integrated marketing partners (especially under one roof) is a key driver to converting early-stage shoppers to loyal customers. These partners understand how to balance dealers’ needs to meet challenging, competitive sales goals with consumers’ needs for an intuitive, high-quality experience at every touchpoint. 

A strong partnership between a dealership and their automotive digital marketing partner should do three things—elevate a dealer’s performance through cohesive activity across channels, eliminate the burden of juggling multiple vendors (and a barrage of viewpoints), and maximize their time spent on targeted digital campaigns delivered to the right consumer. 

I’ve seen that the most successful dealers are choosing partners that have the right combination of people and technology across core expertise: automotive digital marketing, data analytics, and customer experience. As the only complete digital marketing provider for the automotive retail industry, Dealer.com has more than 20 years of experience understanding and shaping strategies amidst shifting market dynamics, shopping behaviors, and industry standards.  

With vast amounts of data available around car-buying trends and shopper behavior, it’s imperative to look at customers not just quantitatively but also qualitatively. In each moment there is the right next step to take, and this is where the power of Cox Automotive data comes into play. Cox Automotive’s vast data network, which touches two out of every three car buyers in the U.S.,2 provides deep insights on when to deliver the right message to the right consumer. 

Personalization is critical to the car shopping, buying, and ownership journey. That experience should be immersive, valuable, memorable, and relevant to a consumer. Working with a dedicated auto dealer marketing partner that sees and affects the total process—and that shares the goal of delivering a premium consumer experience—differentiates between dealers barely catching up to those trying to catch their breath. 

A version of this article originally appeared in CBT News.  

Sources:  

  1. Dealer.com Study January 2020 – June 30, 2020 
  1. 2020 Cox Automotive Car Buyer Journey Study 

Survive the Cookiepocalypse: A How-To Guide

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The retail automotive industry has been through a lot in the last few years—a global pandemic, an economic crisis, and a historic inventory shortage. As it always does, the industry came out on top and is in a surprisingly profitable period. But don’t breathe too easy, because the next big challenge is already on its way — “the cookiepocalypse!” Don’t be fooled by the deceptively sweet name — the cookiepocalypse has the potential to upend the way your dealership currently connects with customers. Fortunately, there’s a sure way to protect your business from digital disaster, and it’s already in your possession — your own data.  

What is the cookiepocalypse?  

By now, you’re probably familiar with the concept of cookies — the little bits of data websites deposit onto your computer as you browse the internet. Cookies can be used for a variety of purposes, from streamlining your web browsing experience to tracking your search and shopping history. Cookies are especially important to advertisers because they are essential to target relevant audiences. But cookies also have a downside. Many argue that by tracking users undetected, they violate people’s privacy on the internet.  

Caught between its lucrative advertising business and its commitment to privacy protections, Google has announced that its Chrome browser will stop allowing third-party tracking cookies beginning in 2023. Other less popular web browsers have already started the process of phasing out third-party tracking cookies. That’s welcome news for privacy advocates, but it has many digital marketers preaching doom and gloom about the future of targeted advertising, earning the 2023 date the calamitous name of “cookiepocalypse.” 

What can your dealership do?  

Many of the advertising technologies you’ve invested in rely on third-party cookies to track, find, and reach consumers. As a result, the disappearance of third-party tracking cookies could have disastrous impacts on the effectiveness of your digital ads. Without cookies, you’ll have a harder time reaching your audiences, personalizing their experiences, and connecting online and in-store experiences, especially through retargeting.  

Your dealership advertising will also become much more expensive.  

That’s bad news for both dealers and car buyers because personalization doesn’t just lead to more profits, it also leads to a better shopping experience. Bret Towne, Senior Director of Enterprise Data Products at Cox Automotive recently discussed the importance of personalization in approaching car shoppers. 

“When visitors get personalized experiences, whether it’s personalized specials or listings, we see a 4 times increase in automobile leads, deal pencils and digital retailing. We see a 3.3 times increase in trade-in deals, and a 216 percent increase in conversion rates for those visitors. You want to personalize your digital storefront and make it as relevant as possible for that consumer.”  

With third-party cookies on their way out, dealers need to be prepared with new ways to engage consumers as they arrive at their websites. Given the current level of reliance on third-party cookies, the transition will be no easy task for most dealerships. Fortunately, the solution is something you already have — your own first-party data, which is now more valuable than ever before. Your dealership doesn’t need a third party to track and store a shoppers’ interactions with your company, and it’s easy to use that information to continue personalizing the experience for that limited set of customers.   

Augmenting First-Party Data 

While it’s about to become the next-best alternative to third-party tracking cookies, first-party data has limitations for most dealerships. Because it can only show how a shopper has interacted with their specific dealership, it gives a fairly limited view of that consumer’s interests and intentions. To be truly useful, dealers need the ability to gather, cleanse, and act upon shopper data, and they’ll need a broader view than their own data can provide. That’s why Dealer.com has developed cookie-less personalization technology. 

Bret Towne explained at a recent industry-wide event, “Dealer.com has been looking to solve this cookie-less problem for a long time now. We’ve been collecting over 26 billion key digital online activities that consumers are engaging in every single year, all in first-party cookie, with zero third-party cookie reliance. We also have a proprietary technology that’s allowing us to stitch together cross-platform first-party cookie activity. We’re able to reliably stitch together all of those digital signals about consumers that gives us a very holistic view about what those consumers are interested in, what level of in-market readiness they are, and ultimately, we can make predictions about what they’re going to do next.” 

It’s easy to see how dealerships that learn to leverage and supplement their first-party data will have a competitive advantage as everyone is weaned off of their reliance on third-party cookies. On the vendor side of this transition, Dealer.com is in a very strong position to enhance your company’s ability to personalize the shopping experience as you move increasingly further away from third-party cookies.  

How Does It Work?  

There’s a clear reason for Dealer.com’s strong position as the industry transitions into a cookie-less world. It’s part of the end-to-end Cox Automotive ecosystem that allows the company to make connections no one else can. At a recent industry event, Noah Lee explained the exclusive process in detail.  

“When somebody comes to the website, we recognize their device ID or IP address or the internet provider they’re coming from and we query our database to say, ‘do we know anything about that shopper?’ We have that info if they’ve visited Autotrader or Kelley Blue Book or if they’re in VinSolutions. And with our unique website solutions, we can show them vehicle- and customer-specific data.” 

More important than how it works is that it really does work. Personalized experiences increase engagement and that’s not going to change with the death of the third-party cookie. Dealers are going to continue to need the ability to learn about consumers and use that information to predict behaviors and customize the buying process. Cox Automotive is doing that today without the use of third-party data, and the technology will become a lifeline for dealers following the phase out of third-party tracking cookies. 

“When dealers have this identity capability powering their digital storefront for personalization,” explained Lee, “they personalize at a rate of 58 percent of visitors. 58 percent of visitors then get personalized experiences to drive up engagement. When we see that dealers aren’t using this technology, only 24 percent of website visits are being personalized. And what’s going to happen when the third-party cookies fully deprecate? That 24 percent will drop down to nearly nothing.”  

Finding a Future Beyond Cookies 

The cookiepocalypse may be on its way, but by now, your dealership is ready for anything. You’re already more prepared than you know for the death of third-party cookies because, in the form of your own first-party data, part of the solution is already in your possession. By adding Dealer.com’s cookie-less personalization technology and its vast universe of shopper data, you’ll have all the tools you need to continue powering your advertising, personalizing the sales process, and making profits. With the power of a powerful automotive advertising agency like Dealer.com in your corner, the cookiepocalypse might not be so apocalyptic after all.  

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Marketing in a Lean Inventory Environment

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Given today’s inventory shortage challenges, it can be tempting to cut back on advertising. After all, what’s the point in marketing when you don’t have as much inventory to sell. But experience has shown that cutting advertising can lead to significant, long-term setbacks.

Henry Ford understood this concept way back in the early 1900s when he said that stopping advertising to save money is like stopping a clock to save time. But that doesn’t mean your marketing has to stay at status quo. Here are a few smart ways to evolve your marketing strategy for lean inventory times.

Adjusted New-Inventory Campaigns

Now is a great time to focus your marketing on vehicles with more availability. Promote in-transit inventory and vehicles scheduled to arrive. Remove bargain pages and raising prices to match demand. It may also be wise to add urgency to advertisements that help customers understand the realities of availability limits. Fear of missing out can bring in new customers, even if those customers have to wait just a little longer to get their vehicle.

Used Car Advertising Campaigns

New cars may not be immediately available, but there are a lot of pre-owned cars in the world, many of which are prime for purchase and resell opportunity. Shift your used car advertising dollars toward pre-owned campaigns, targeted at shoppers with trade-ins and who are more likely to buy used. As long as you can continue to source used inventory, you can sustain sales operations until manufacturers catch up to meet new inventory demands.

Pre-Order Purchase Campaigns

A car doesn’t have to be physically on the lot for you to sell it. Advertise the opportunity to pre-order a car and promote the option to hand-select features, giving your customers a customized, personalized vehicle purchase experience. These types of pre-order campaigns can also direct your automobile leads to your dealership’s digital retailing tools, allowing them to complete large portions of the buying process online.

Brand Awareness Campaigns

Inventory may be scarce, but buyers are still out there. Brand awareness campaigns can keep your dealership top of mind with active or soon-to-be active shoppers, while reinforcing all the reasons to buy from your dealership. Just as importantly, these types of campaigns prevent competitors from stealing market share by filling an advertising void.

Service Campaigns

Less inventory also means more miles on your customers’ current cars. Shift some of your advertising spend to promote your service department. In doing so, don’t forget about lesser-known services like your wash bay, auto detailing, and other services that can be attractive for drivers wanting to make small upgrades and make do with what they have for the foreseeable future.

Conclusion

As Henry Ford predicted all those years ago, time and car sales continue to march forward. And while inventory shortages are only temporary, the customers you bring in through your marketing can last a lifetime and help your dealership sustain short- and long-term success. To learn more strategies for thriving in the current inventory environment, check out our free Lean Inventory Playbook.

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Are Negative Reviews Discouraging Your Potential Customers?

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The Customers Are Always Right (Even When They’re Wrong)  

Your target audience spends a total of about 14 total hours researching and buying a car online. Part of that time is spent researching the right make and model, but a significant portion is also spent researching the right dealership by reading online reviews. And remember, those customers are always right in the minds of the online car buying public. In fact, a whopping 93% of consumers say online reviews impact their purchasing decisions and 91% of people trust online reviews.  

You can do everything possible to give your customers an excellent buying experience, but if the right customer leaves the wrong kind of review, it can—and probably will—negatively impact future sales opportunities. That’s why it’s so important for your dealership to actively manage its reputation online, and that includes prioritizing the positive reviews and leveraging them in your marketing materials. 

Online Reviews Swing Both Ways  

Just as negative customer reviews can leave a bad impression on would-be buyers, positive reviews can convince customers to shop at your dealership. It’s just a matter of harnessing the power of consumer opinion for good. And sometimes it’s as easy as asking. In fact, 77% of people would be willing to leave a review, if asked.  

Begin this process by recognizing where your dealership stands today. Do a little digging to determine your dealership’s Google My Business rating. Then, develop a comprehensive review and response plan with your team, including who will read your reviews and how they will respond (promptly) with on-brand answers.  

Rather than passively waiting for your customers to offer feedback, invite them to share their opinions with review generation tools. This allows your dealership to cultivate a steady stream of positive customer reviews, so you can build trust with online customers and establish your dealership as a leader in the marketplace.  

Partner with a Purpose 

If you’d like help managing your dealership’s online reputation, Dealer.com can give you access to the industry’s best social marketing team. These experts understand your audience and know how to engage happy customers, encourage positive reviews, and keep your dealership top-of-mind online.  

To learn more ways your dealership can adapt in a new age of automotive sales, check out our free eBook: “4 Questions to Improve Your Dealership’s Digital Marketing.” 

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