Best Practices

It is so frustrating when trying to send a legitimate, valuable email to a customer (future or current), and have it be blocked by a spam filter.  While there are some auto dealers that do send emails that might be properly classified as spam, most dealers who have spam issues are sending real emails to real customers.  Their email campaigns are being inappropriately blocked by various spam filters.

Here are some tips to avoid the dreaded spam filter in your customer’s email inbox:

Avoid Sending Spam-Like Emails (Obviously): Using words like “Free” multiple times, having large images or tons of links are more likely to make your email be stopped by a spam filter.  Also, watch the ratio of text to images.  For example, try linking to your inventory instead of pasting images in the actual email.

Ask Customers to Add You to Address Book: When customers add you to their address book, your emails will get delivered to their inbox.  Add a line to your email signature or above your opt-out message that asks people to help ensure they get your emails by adding your email address to their address book.  This little step will go a long way.

Follow CAN-SPAM Guidelines: Following CAN-SPAM (which by law you should be doing anyway) will greatly reduce the chances your email gets flagged as spam.  This includes having an opt-out (that is honored), listing your physical location, and using an accurate subject line.  You can find more information on the FTC website.

What is designed to be a way for users to let Google know when a business has been closed is, in some cases, being abused by local competitors.  Since it is so easy to mark a business closed in Google Places, some business are being tagged as closed when they aren’t.  When enough people mark a business as closed, Google will review whether or not this is true, though their review process isn’t public.

Google seems to be doing what they can to address the issue.  In the past, an interim notification would appear on the Google Places page, “Reported to Be Closed”, which users could mark as “Not True”.  However, imagine if someone came looking for your dealership online and was greeted with that message.  The chances of them investigating whether or not that was actually true are slim–they would just head to the next dealership.  Luckily, Google no longer shows this interim message, and will only show a business as closed once reviewed.

To help protect your business from having this happen, make sure your dealership follows Google Local Places best practices like:

Claim Your Google Places Page: This ensures your dealership has control over their own listing.  If you haven’t, go to your Places Page, and in the top right corner you’ll see a link that says “business owner?”.  Follow the steps to claim your page.

Check the Email Listed: Google will attempt to verify with the email address listed with the Places Page when a business is marked as closed.  If you don’t respond, you may just be out of luck.

Update Your Listing Often: The more often you’re adding reviews, keeping products and hours up to date, etc, the less likely someone will be able to get away with marking your business as closed without it looking suspicious.

Has anyone had trouble with your dealership being marked as closed?  What did you do to fix the issue?

I try to spend at least a little time each day reading forums and blogs from outside the auto industry because I think there is a lot to learn from other business communities.  Today, I found an interesting question up for discussion, and would like to pose the same to you.

What would it take for you to leave the auto industry?

More money? More interesting work? Better benefits, or hours?

And reversely (and I think I’ll get more responses to this question than the previous),

What are the reasons you wouldn’t leave the auto industry?

The community?  Your love of cars?  The thrill of the sale?

Regardless of how you initially got into the industry, I would argue that those that stay do so because they truly love something about their job.  Working in a car dealership isn’t for just anyone, so what is it about the auto industry that you wouldn’t give up for the world, and what could a different industry offer you that you just wouldn’t be able to turn down?

Google has just bought Zagat, a company that provides ratings and reviews of restaurants, entertainment venues, and travel locations.  Known primarily for their yearly restaurant book guides, they have been doing quite well with their online subscription based site and community.

Google plans for Zagat to be the “cornerstone of our local offering”, helping them  to compete directly with Yelp and other online review sites.  Think it was a coincidence that Google recently removed these other review sites from their Google Local pages and search results?

While Zagat doesn’t have a history of rating small businesses, like car dealerships, this only adds to the credibility that Google Reviews will continue to have.  Google seems to realize that online reviews are becoming more and more important to consumers, and doing all they can to make their offering the most trusted, reliable, and complete place to find review information.

So, what is your dealership doing to make sure your customers looking for dealer reviews will find your dealership on Google?

Google is at it again.  According to the Google Operating System Blog, an unofficial source of news and tips about Google, the search engine giant will soon be launching Google Trusted Stores.  This new service is designed to make it “easy for online shoppers to identify stores that provide an excellent online shopping experience.”

I have to wonder how closely this will be tied to the reviews a business receives.  Or perhaps, it will be a reflection of a business’ AdWord spend or a completely separate offering.  There is a lot of speculation on what this new feature will really entail since the landing page google.com/trustedstores isn’t live.

If I had to guess, I’d say Trusted Stores will be similar to what already exists in the automotive industry: all businesses will be a part of the offering, using reviews to help rank which are more “trusted” than others.  And of course, an option for businesses to pay to be a highlighted trusted source.

What do you think?  Is this another way to force businesses to focus on Google Reviews, or could this be a valuable way to differentiate your auto dealership from those around you?