Month: January 2017

Video Marketing: The Death of Boring

by Tim James

While I often talk about “basics”, that’s simply because many dealers are still not reaping the benefits of video marketing. But let’s say your dealership is doing video marketing. Perhaps you’ve made a commitment to conduct live video walkarounds for every vehicle. Maybe you’re engaging your customers via personal video e-mail. And perhaps it’s working well. Most people would advise a marketer that is having success to follow the old saying “If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.” Well, sometimes that may not be the right answer.

Consider the “Red Bull” brand. They are widely known for producing some of the most successful viral video marketing pieces ever – including setting a record for the most live concurrent video views, with 9.5 million users watching their space diving video. The brand focused on creating video content that illustrated daring and astonishing feats of athleticism. As a result, it earned the respect and attention of many major brands across the country. But then… they changed their strategy. And everyone gasped.

Why would any company change a video marketing strategy that is considered (and measured) as the bar to achieve? Why change something that is working so well?

We may never know why Red Bull decided to change their strategy away from big time, exciting event videos that consistently went viral. What we do know is what they changed it to: Consistency.

Red Bull decided that producing regular, consistent video content (more quantity) would pay off over producing less video content — even if the videos as a group are not as “epic.” And what did this achieve? In the last year, Red Bull has created 639 videos that each have more than a million views, with a combined total of 1.7 BILLION views, and almost 33 million engagements.

While each individual video itself gets less engagement than one of the EPIC videos, overall the brand is achieving more views and engagement at less expense. Red Bull’s gamble on a consistent stream of video content, over occasional highly produced epic videos payed off.

What does that mean for your dealership?

Creating consistent content – walkaround videos, creative commercials, etc. – will absolutely engage consumers. But it’s not all about following some straight line on the road to your destination. Creativity will pay dividends – it’s a matter of regular content but also doing something to catch attention and set you dealership apart from the competition.

Take a step off the line and be a little adventurous.

Take for example a dealership in Minnesota, White Bear Mitsubishi. They adopted a white bear as their mascot and have created countless commercials and content including a person dressed in a giant white bear outfit. (If you’ve never seen them, they’re great!) But it isn’t the commercial that shot them to stardom, it is the OUTTAKES from the commercial. On their Facebook page alone, these commercial outtakes have had 6.9 million views, over 35,000 likes and over 100,000 shares!

It’s also been syndicated, made into memes and featured on television news reports! Did they expect this kind of exposure by simply posting some silly outtakes from a commercial they did to support their local hockey team? No!

The point is that they continued to produce content. They stepped outside the box. And because of that, the world is now talking about them. Had they never tried, they’d never have succeeded.

Wouldn’t you like to have those kind of results and exposure for your dealership? The only way that’s ever going to happen is to go out and start making video – and never stop.

Video Marketing: Sell, Don’t Tell.

by Tim James

Why are we obsessed with television and movies? Because, just like books, they have the ability to capture our attention and transport us into fictional situations and universes.

Regardless of whether the movie or television show is fiction or non-fiction, this is an engaging way to tell a story that we’re interested in hearing and also seeing. TV, movies and video make stories come alive in ways that connect with our emotions – whether through fear, sympathy, action or drama.

But what if you went to a movie and rather than watching the story of a young farm boy transforming into a hero by blowing up a huge space station, you were presented with only the facts. Just an outline or bullet-points. That wouldn’t be very engaging, would it?

Video marketing is no different. It’s really easy to forget that in order to engage the viewer, you need to connect with them. Telling them how great your product is with facts alone would be like doing a walkaround for a customer, simply reading the information on the window sticker.

That is certainly not very interesting, engaging or creative.

In car sales, salespeople are trained to do vehicle walkarounds by first identifying any attributes of importance to that particular customer. The salesperson then shows and explains any features and benefits in the vehicle which fulfill that individual customer’s interest. To put it plainly, great salespeople tell stories about their products that put their audience “in the story.” They don’t just present facts, they generate a desired emotional response by focusing on “why” a product is needed, not just what the product is, (sell “why,” not “what”).

Effective video marketing – including walkarounds, personal video messages and any other kind of video you can think of – is no different. That’s why so many consumers love Super Bowl commercials. It is also why some commercials make us smile, laugh out loud, or even bring a tear to our eyes. They are effective because, in most cases, they manipulate our emotions to connect those products and services with us on a personal level and make us want to engage.

You can do the same thing with your video marketing efforts and, by so doing, establish more of a bond with the customer. Show your customers that you are interested in helping them with THEIR needs (not just selling them a car) and it will increase the likelihood they will engage with you, or reach out to you, should they simply come across a video on a VDP.

Video marketing isn’t rocket science. BUT you still need to have a strategy to do it effectively. Try changing your focus from trying to talk to everyone, to talking to a single person. Tell your story, the vehicle’s story, or whatever story you wish to relay with your video, as if that person is standing right in front of you. These types of videos resonate with individuals more than any other tactic. Why? Because the viewer feels as if you’re talking directly to them, rather than to some generic mass audience. And those are the types of videos that both engage and connect with the viewer.

Most advertising attempts to connect with as many people as possible. Sure, it may be segmented so that the message is demographically or geographically targeted. But, in the end, people can tell the difference between if you are speaking to them directly, or to a generic, random group of people. Yes, they may intuitively know that some video on some random VDP page wasn’t made specifically for them. But, EMOTIONALLY those videos will have a more impactful influence on them. And that’s the whole point of video marketing. Facts may provide details about your product, but an emotional story will sell it.

Video Isn’t Only for Marketing

When it comes to video, most dealerships tend to think of it for purely sales department use, and sometimes in service. From communicating with customers via personalized emails, to live video walkarounds, video is certainly an excellent way to engage customers and increase VDP views. It is also a great tool for the service department to better explain and illustrate service recommendations and educate customers on the necessity for any needed repairs.

However, there are a couple of other powerful uses for video that tend to be overlooked when implementing a video strategy.

Human Resources – Every time your dealership hires an employee, a typical onboarding process likely involves lots of paperwork and a significant amount of time spent reviewing manuals or other materials that tend to be rather dry, boring and hard to get through. Video can be a highly effective tool in these instances. Use it to pre-record important company policies and other onboarding information in a more engaging manner that new employees will find easier to remember and will tend to pay more attention to.
Video can also be used by your human resources department in recruiting and hiring. Video resumes have become increasingly popular. They are much easier for human resources to review and get a real feel for an applicant. They also offer more insight into the personality of the applicant. This works especially well when considering a salesperson. If you think about it, a video resume is simply a candidate selling themselves to you. In addition, it shows effort on the part of the applicant and weeds out those that may be applying but have no real interest in a career in retail automotive. This saves human resources and management staff time in the selection process and can bring in better potential candidates for interviews.
General Questions / FAQ – Another great use for video is to identify general questions that customers ask and then create video content for your website. Examples could include: “Why does it take so long to buy a car?” or “Why an extended warranty or service contract should be considered.” These videos provide rich content that engages your customers. It also serves to show those visitors that are on your website – but who have not yet contacted the dealership – that you are helpful and willing to provide information.

This type of information is exactly what customers search for during their journey along the many touchpoints in the car buying process. Ask your salespeople, service advisors, F&I managers and receptionists which questions tend to be asked repeatedly. The customer probably already tried to find the answer on your website and, had you offered the content, it could have swayed that customer towards choosing your dealership over your competitors. By providing this content, it helps keep customers on your website longer, engages them, and has the hidden benefit of increasing search engine optimization.

We live in a society with short attention spans. These days, for the majority of consumers video is THE preferred method of communication. Regardless of generation, most people simply would rather watch a video than read a long article, blog post, or technical description.

Save your dealership time, increase exposure, recruit more efficiently and make the onboarding process more engaging by making your video strategy more comprehensive… I promise you it will soon pay dividends.