2023 Automotive Digital Marketing Guide
Marketing products or services has become necessary as the world keeps shifting toward online experiences. Businesses try to adapt to change and drive engagement throughout the entire customer journey.
In the automotive industry, though, the customer lifecycle is more challenging to keep up with. Automotive marketers and business owners strive to determine the best tools to increase sales and build awareness for their dealerships.
Setting up a carefully thought-out digital marketing strategy is critical to connecting with leads and building trusting relationships. And such a strategy takes more than having a great website. For optimal results, consider seeking assistance from a proficient automotive digital marketing agency. This guide will present you with the most effective strategies to nail your automotive digital marketing efforts. But before anything else, we will list the key reasons you should leverage digital marketing to create a memorable online experience for your audience.
What Are the Benefits of Using Automotive Digital Marketing?
Building an outstanding online presence is an integral part of your overall marketing strategy, no matter your experience in the automobile industry or whether you own a dealership or a car wash. Let’s see the benefits that come with it.
You reach a wider audience
We live in an era when most people spend much of their time online. A robust digital presence ensures your dealership reaches different audiences across multiple channels, increasing your brand’s visibility among potential customers. Also, you can gather valuable data like their age, location, buying habits, etc., and use that information to effectively target each audience group with relevant content.
It builds brand reputation
Setting up the right automotive digital marketing strategy makes creating a unique brand identity and establishing awareness easier. Testing which digital channels are the most effective for your dealership helps you increase exposure, reach your ideal customers right where they are, and stay top of mind to consumers.
It’s cost-effective
Traditional marketing methods are costly since they don’t allow you to monitor what’s working and what’s not and relocate your resources accordingly. In contrast, digital marketing gives you the metrics to track return on investment (ROI). Also, digital marketing allows car dealers to target the audience most likely to be interested in their inventory based on their online behavior and demographics.
It’s easier to track your performance
As already mentioned, the data gathered from several digital marketing platforms allow you to track crucial variables like your conversion rate and see where there is room for improvement in your marketing campaigns. This type of insight makes optimizing your digital marketing strategies to get the best results possible in future efforts easier.
A Complete Guide to Automotive Digital Marketing
The vast majority of car buyers conduct their research online. So, neglecting your online marketing practically makes your dealership invisible. That’s why you should implement the right practices to guide consumers to your digital doorstep and outperform your competitors. Now let’s break down what a successful automotive digital marketing strategy looks like.
Offer Lead Generation Incentives
Owning an automobile business, you know this is a complex customer journey. Not every user that searches for vehicles online is ready to buy one. Unless you are one of the big players, it’s difficult to sell to people with minimal to no exposure to your dealership. Therefore, just focusing on driving traffic to your sales page gets you nowhere. Instead, it would be best if you lured visitors into your business offers by hitting every consumer’s soft spot: getting value for free.
So, start the relationship off on the right foot by offering free value with a lead magnet, such as an eBook or a webinar. Then, all you have to do is figure out how to create a landing page that persuades visitors to give up their email addresses in exchange for your lead magnet. Later, you can use your email marketing campaigns to show value, nurture your recipients, and later convert them to loyal customers.
However, we have to say that this tactic will probably yield better results if you own an online business instead of a brick-and-mortar one. Brick-and-mortar businesses usually operate on a local level, so the people subscribing to your email list should be based in your geographic location. In that case, you could leverage a specific incentive like a discounted service to get them to know and trust you. And when they come in to redeem the incentive, it will be easier to convert them into paying customers.
Make Your Website User-friendly
Your website is usually the first touching point between your dealership and prospects. It’s the first impression they get before even considering purchasing. So, now is the time to showcase what your company is about and why doing business with you is a wise investment.
Cluttered web designs with complicated navigation are a big turn-off for users, turning their first-time visit into a disaster. Invest in an intuitive interface while making sure it’s designed with diversity standards in mind. Is that enough? Definitely not, so ensure your dealership website also meets the following requirements:
- It has fast loading times no matter the device it’s displayed on while also handling traffic coming from different devices without friction points
- Opt for a clear and user-friendly layout so that users can quickly sort through the most relevant content without facing information overload
- It should provide visitors with a seamless, consistent, and cohesive experience, regardless of their specific needs and permanent or situational limitations
- Give visitors the ability to perform their own research on detailed vehicle detail pages with high-quality vehicle images and in-depth specifics
- Offer options for users to filter results by price and check potential payments through integrated financing calculators
Invest in Targeted Email Campaigns
No digital marketing strategy can reach its full potential if you leave out the powerful weapon of email marketing. Regardless of the niche, emails are one of the top-performing channels in terms of ROI. Email campaigns offer you unlimited options to announce new launches, exciting business news, limited-time sales, exclusive offers, and many more.
Email marketing gives you access to a prospect’s most private place: their inbox. Offering value through a newsletter with targeted and relevant content is a great starting point. Dispatching useful email content shows recipients you’re not just about selling, therefore building trust. There’s no golden rule regarding ideal email sending time and frequency, so test those components to see what best resonates with your target audience.
Small business email marketing services like Brevo or other reputable Brevo alternatives can divide your audience into segments and customize each email offer based on subscriber demographics, behavioral data, or psychographics. For instance, if a customer has purchased a car from you, they might consider purchasing related items too. So, you can use your email marketing to target them with limited-time discounts, insurance options, and more.
Leverage the Right Social Media
The number one rule of marketing is to meet your customers where they are. And let’s face it: the vast majority of them hang out on social media. So, if you want to target potential car buyers, social media marketing isn’t something you can afford to ignore. Just keep in mind that building social media traffic is a long-term goal, and you have to be patient to see your efforts paying off.
Before anything, create a social media posting calendar to schedule your social media posts and stick to that schedule no matter what. Study your posting times and ensure you take advantage of special occasions to provide your followers with timely and valuable content. And always remember that social media are, by definition, an interactive channel. Therefore, don’t leave your followers waiting long for your responses, and try to interact with every one of them.
Each platform has its own requirements and features. You must build solid customer personas to determine which platforms your customers prefer and which will better serve your marketing objectives. But let’s dive into your automotive dealership’s best social media channels and how to use them to optimize your marketing efforts.
With Instagram, you get to invest in visual marketing and give your products the visibility they deserve. All you have to do is create a business account, find out the best Instagram posting times, and use the platform’s analytics to optimize your shared content performance.
Facebook has great potential as a marketing channel, seeing that you can take advantage of various elements. For example, you can participate in Facebook groups or leverage Facebook Business Pages and share different components like videos, business updates, or any type of information your audience finds interesting.
YouTube
We could go on and on regarding the power of videos in your overall marketing strategy. YouTube is the perfect place to engage your audience and address their pain points. How can you do that? By using different types of videos, such as informative videos, to educate consumers on how to use your products or present them with the services offered.
Range Rover does a good job in this medium with their new ad, with over 5M views to date.
LinkedIn is one of the most effective channels for automotive businesses to build their online presence. By curating valuable content, you can use the platform’s capabilities to stay top of mind for business contacts and consumers in your niche. There’s also the opportunity to leverage Sales Navigator and LinkedIn groups to discover opportunities based on your existing network.
Content Is King, and Search Engines Know it
High-quality and consistent content that is written with readers and search engines in mind is key to building a successful SEO strategy. A carefully-planned organic SEO strategy enables you to acquire leads for free by moving your website as close to the top of the first page of Google – and other search engines, for that matter – as possible.
You could take advantage of SEO best practices to rank for specific keywords that serve your marketing objectives and are relevant to your niche. When a user makes a specific search intent on Google, its algorithm displays the most relevant resources. And while Google’s algorithm frequently changes, creating great content is part of every content marketing strategy that aims at increasing your ranking in search engine results.
If your website features high-quality content, you increase the chances of prospective customers finding your site and going through its content. Once your web pages and blog start ranking high in SERPs, your content will keep generating new leads without you taking extra time or effort – well, except for creating new and equally valuable content.
Never Neglect Customer Testimonials
If there’s an industry where customer testimonials make more sense than anywhere else, that’s the automotive industry. Cars are high-priced products, which makes customers think of a potential purchase multiple times. Customer reviews are a powerful tool in your marketing arsenal. And we don’t just talk about having great reviews on Google or Yelp. From creating testimonial videos and adding them to your newsletter to including them on a dedicated page on your website and turning visitors into customers, the sky is the limit.
Why should you leverage customer testimonials at every opportunity and across most marketing channels? Because no marketer can advertise your dealership better than satisfied customers. Research has shown that shoppers put their trust in online customer reviews much more than in salespeople or ads. Customer reviews instill trust and help prospective buyers see how you might address their needs.
But don’t just leave things to chance. Make sure to reach out to existing customers and ask for their reviews after they visit your dealership or online store. And even if what you get is a bad review, don’t lose hope – and, no matter what, don’t ignore it. Check your customers’ reviews, and in case you come across a negative one, respond to it as quickly and effectively as possible. That way, consumers see your business cares about its clients’ opinions and take proactive steps to turn a bad impression into a positive one.
Wrapping Up
Among automotive businesses worldwide, some of the most common objectives include generating qualified leads and increasing their online visibility. And since most vehicle buyers are already online, that’s where to find and engage them. An automotive digital marketing strategy ensures that users come across your dealership multiple times during their customer lifecycle.
Whether we are talking about reading your blog posts, customer reviews on your social media, or engaging newsletters, automotive digital marketing helps you bring hesitant shoppers to your doorstep. By implementing the tactics shared in this guide, you have all the necessary tools to reach the right audience groups and gain traction!
