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Knowledge, news, and more about Automotive SEO, SEM, and dealership websites
acacia.grant@dealeron.com'
In Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Dealership Long-Tail SEO Searches

A recent study by Comscore finds that the “average” search term entered into Google continues to get longer and longer.  As it stands, the average search term contains just over 3 words, and this increase in the length of search terms doesn’t appear to be slowing.

This makes search engine optimization (SEO) even more important than ever for your auto dealer website.  Since Google uses “best-fit” guidelines to match search terms to relevant web pages, if a long-tail search doesn’t fit something exactly, Google will try to fit a web page to the search.  The better optimized your auto dealership site is, the more of these searches your website will rank for, even if you don’t have the exact words that were searched for.

While the increase in long-tail search terms is great for SEO effectiveness, it’s not as great of news for car dealerships that rely solely on pay-per-click advertising (PPC).  Many dealerships set up their paid ad campaigns so that their ads only appear for an “exact match” of keywords.  This means that your dealership ad will only show if the search term is the exact same as a keyword you bid on.  With search terms getting longer and more specific, the chances of getting an “exact match” to a keyword your dealership is bidding on gets more unlikely.  Slight differences in the way your account is set-up can make huge differences in your results, so it’s important that your dealership either has someone in-house who fully understands and devotes time to managing your PPC campaigns, or that you partner with an expert vendor.

Combining your auto dealership’s PPC campaign with an effective SEO campaign will increase the chances that your dealer website will be found in Google’s search engine results.  Simply relying on pay-per-click will make your dealership website show in search engine results less and less often as time goes on.

acacia.grant@dealeron.com'
In Web Analytics

Car Dealer Radio Advertising

Radio advertising has just been dealt another blow–even Google can’t find a way to track ad spend.  A few years back, Google decided to try to automate radio advertising much as they do Internet advertising (PPC).  However, even the King of Analytics couldn’t figure out how to effectively track the success of radio ad campaigns.

According to the Wall Street Journal, “Google never came up with a good way to measure listener response.”  After trying for over three years, Google’s engineers were unable to develop the technology needed to track ads as well as they were able to do with the online advertising model.  Google’s Chief Executive, Eric Schmidt, explained that “in the audio case, there wasn’t a good signal back to us about which ads performed.”

If Google can’t figure out a way to effectively measure and track the necessary analytics to prove the ROI of an ad campaign (directly related visits, leads, sales), your auto dealership or an ad agency isn’t going to be able to prove these analytics.

Traditional media advertising (like radio) can’t be measured in the same way that online advertising can, plain and simple.  Your dealership has no way of knowing whether or not your radio spend is bringing sales into your dealer showroom, and Google just showed that.  Given the ever-present threat of dealerships closing these days, it’s more imperative now than ever that your dealership knows which marketing spend is bringing in which sales.  With the right tools, this is only possible with your online marketing campaigns.

acacia.grant@dealeron.com'
In Search Engine Marketing (PPC)

Google PPC Quality Score

Google assigns (and continually tweaks) Quality Scores to the websites and landing pages used by customers who purchase ads on their search results pages.  Quality Scores are a frequent topic of conversation in the search engine marketing circle, but are they really that important?

The short answer is definitively YES!  Quality Scores affect how much you pay per click as well as where your ad shows on the page.  Your ad rank (ad position) is determined by a combination of your Quality Score, your Click-Through-Rate (CTR), and the Maximum Cost Per Click (CPC) you’ve bid. This means that a higher Quality Score combined with a lower Max CPC could place your ad above a higher-spending competitor.

Also, your Quality Score (along with your competitor’s Ad Rank) helps to determine how much each click will cost your dealership.  Essentially, the higher your Quality Score, the lower your CPC, and the higher the ROI on your ad spend.

It’s pretty clear that the Quality Score of your landing page is very important if your dealership is participating in a PPC campaign.  So what are the driving factors that Google uses to assign Quality Scores?

Click-Through-Rates (CTR) — Your ad copy needs to the best it can be.  This means that your ad text needs to be continually tested, measured, and tweaked to attract as many clicks as possible.  Use the keywords you are purchasing in the headline copy and ad copy to convey relevancy to searchers.  Any keywords in the search that match your ad copy will result in them being bolded in your ad, which has been proven to increase CTR.

Landing Pages — Deceptive and non-relevant landing pages will lower your Quality Score.  Sending your click-through traffic to pages that reflect the keywords that were actually searched for will not only help with your Quality Score, but also help build trust with your future customers.  Additionally, it will lower the bounce rate of your landing page and increase your conversion—which again increases the ROI on your spend.

Targeted, relevant copy in both the ad and the landing page has a huge multiplying effect on your ROI.

  1. You pay less for the ad to get the same position if you have a higher CTR.
  2. You will get more clicks because of the higher CTR
  3. You will have a higher conversion off of your landing page because of the relevant content.

You’re actually leveraging 3 different factors that ultimately impact your PPC ads’ ROI when you optimize your ad and landing page copy.  If you increase the effectiveness of each factor by 10%, you can actually increase your ad’s ROI by 33%, which may be the difference between your PPC having a positive or negative ROI.

acacia.grant@dealeron.com'
In Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Google Profiles takes advantage of Identity Searches

When you meet someone new and you want to find out more information about them, what do you do?  If you’re like a lot of people, you’ll head straight to Google and search for their name.  I would bet that a large number of potential customers perform an Internet search on your dealership after they’ve decided to purchase from you.  How often do you think they do the same on the name of the salesperson they are considering purchasing their vehicle from?

Typical search results are your social media accounts (Facebook, LinkedIn), as well as website on which your name appears (dealership site, news articles, etc).  Google is now allowing users to create “profiles” in which you can upload images, link to websites and write a personal bio.  This tool is available to anyone who creates an account on Google after you go through a screening routine to verify your identity.

What’s great about this tool is that, from a business standpoint, you can have full control over an entry in the search results pages.  Those who have completed the verification process have found that this “profile” is being shown on the first page of search results very quickly (though this isn’t much of a surprise since Google will of course want to promote their own products).

To start the process, go to Google Profiles.   It looks as though this could be another great way to manage your online reputation as well as increase the search engine optimization results for your personal brand as well as your dealership.  Let us know how it works out!

acacia.grant@dealeron.com'
In

Reputation Management using Social Media

Social media just seems to keep growing and growing in popularity.  Websites like Twitter and Facebook are continuing to see an increase in both users and businesses that use these websites to market their business.  Unfortunately, with this increase in marketing use comes an increase in imposters.  More and more user accounts are being set up claiming to be the “official” Facebook pages or Twitter accounts; it’s difficult sometimes to establish which one is actually the real one.

So how can your dealership combat this trend in social media?  Search Engine Land suggests three steps to take in order to keep a handle on your dealership’s online presence.

First, you must create, maintain, and monitor your brand online.  Your dealership needs to be present in social media.  This is the only way you can monitor your brand name.  Even if you aren’t ready to actually participate, your dealership should have accounts to see what other users are writing about your dealership and the brand(s) that you sell.  In the case of Twitter, your dealership should make sure you grab the usernames that you may want to use in the future.

Monitor these media outlets for any attempts to sabotage your brand and react swiftly.  To demonstrate to other users that your account is the real one (and the others are imposters), you can make special offers to those who are “fans” on Facebook or follow your dealership on Twitter.  If you do find an account that is “impersonating” your dealership, address it in a respectful tone.  If people are following that account, chances are they’d be willing to follow the “real” account, so ask them to.

Finally, push forward with new ideas for your brand.  Continue to innovate your social media efforts online.  Use the online community to gauge new specials (in the service or parts department) or promotional events.  Advertise community sponsorships you’re involved in, and above all, direct traffic back to your dealership website.

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