brand consistency

To Be Successful, Stop Over Talking About Yourself!

A very interesting article published by Entrepreneur shares an analogy about how marketing is a lot like dating. The article explains that marketing is essentially about building relationships with your consumer audience. Most people would agree that it is aggravating on a first date, or when meeting someone at a social gathering for the first time if the other party simply talks about themselves the entire time. This illustrates they only have an interest in themselves and none for you or anyone else in the group.

The same philosophy can be applied to marketing. A lot of marketing revolves around concepts such as “This is what makes my product great!” or “Buy My Product!” and many consumers tend to lose interest fast – exactly like you would on a date or in a group at a party. The key isn’t to start by giving shoppers a long list of all of your product’s features, but rather to have a benefits-focused message that gets them engaged and yearning to learn more.

While in today’s Covid-stricken world people are seeking interaction, we still want to buy the things we need or want. Wouldn’t your dealership want to satisfy both of those needs? In doing so, you create a bond between the consumer and your dealership that can last far beyond the pandemic. Consumers will absolutely remember those that take the time to recognize them as individuals and not just random wallets.

How can you do this? Video email/texting and live video communication and by using your past customers to “sell” your dealership to current shoppers with video testimonials.

Cell phones are pretty much stapled to everyone’s bodies. They are the first things many people look at when they wake up, checking them constantly for all communications. Emails are fine. Text messages are better. But video messages – including personalized videos; live-streaming videos; and other forms of communication that involve targeted one on one communication with another; trump everything. Can these types of communication be combined? Sure! You can send an email or text with a video message. You can live-stream with a consumer regardless of whether you can both see each other, or they can only see you.

Additionally, one of the best ways to sell your dealership’s value to your customers is through customer testimonial videos. These videos use customers that have already purchased from your store. They explain their great experience working with your dealership. Placing these on your website is an amazing way to let potential shoppers know that they can trust you.

Using personalized videos and live streaming to communicate with the consumer more ABOUT their needs than about yourself is gold right now. Don’t just talk to them about a vehicle, inspire trust in yourself and your dealership by taking the time to truly get to know each shopper. It should also remain gold post-pandemic as this is what consumers want. Canned and templated messages are no longer very productive (not that they ever really were.)

Find tools that can assist your dealership in easily creating personalized video messages and communications. By providing your salespeople and service advisors with tools that are easy to use employees will sell more cars and service advisors will find that service recommendations are accepted more easily.

Stop being “that guy” on that date who only talks about himself. You will get much more attention, interest, and interaction by being more interested in the other person.

Three Tips for Great Live Video Conversations with Customers

By: Tim James

During these times, consumers are becoming more comfortable with online transactions and are much savvier about how they chose to communicate with businesses. As a result, dealers are having to utilize technologies they may not have previously embraced

Video, in and of itself, has proven to be a necessity for successful marketing for dealers. In today’s world, live video is even more important. But not everybody does it as well as they could!

A great article on Business2Community lays out some simple best practices dealerships can use while performing a live video for a prospective car buyer. These tips are great for salespeople or BDC agents who communicate with your customers.

Here are three of the top tips:

Pause! – When you are having a conversation with someone and they do all the talking – that quickly gets old, right? A one-sided conversation is not something many people enjoy which leads to the first tip in the article, Pause!

You have the customer’s attention. You have them on a live stream and, just like selling a car in person, you need to listen to their needs and wants. You have to listen to tailor that walkaround and your conversation to supply the information they requested. Listening is also how you find out what is important to them so that you can tailor your conversation to that specific customer.

It is much more effective to listen to your customers, answer their questions, and proceed to the sale than to dominate the conversation. Take a breath. Don’t worry about the uncomfortable pause. As long as the customer is still with you, you don’t need to fill the gap with conversation. They may be digesting what you have already told them and considering their next questions. If they don’t ask any questions, you can easily prompt them by saying something along the lines of, “Should I proceed with the other features I was going to show you or did you have specific things you would like to see?” — just like you would if they were physically on your lot.

Engage – The customer didn’t agree to a live video engagement because they weren’t interested in the vehicle. The very reason that they are on a live video call with you is that they are VERY low funnel and in the market RIGHT NOW! Think about all the Internet leads your dealership gets and how hard it is to contact the majority of these opportunities. Here you not only have a customer that engaged with you but one that agreed (or requested) to do a live video call about a specific vehicle.

Perhaps something about the vehicle which they inquired about doesn’t suit their needs. Since you have them live, you can easily ask them if you could show them similar vehicles you have in stock and, essentially, show them multiple vehicles.

What’s the other option? The customer doesn’t like the one you showed them and disengages simply to move on to the next dealership. Don’t waste the opportunity to show them more inventory. You only need to ask them — just like you would if they were physically on your lot.

Eye Contact – While you may not be able to see the customer, the customer can see you. If you aren’t looking into the camera while engaging, you lose the opportunity to build rapport. Most of our communication is physical. We typically read expressions and interpret answers by how someone is looking and/or physically gesturing. In a live video, the customer can see you. By making eye contact with them, it is much more personal.

How do you do that? By looking into the camera, itself. Not just at the phone. You can practice with another salesperson beforehand to get the hang of it. When you are talking to the customer, look directly into the camera. To them, it will seem as if you are talking to them rather than seeing your eyes focused elsewhere. — just like you would if they were physically on your lot.

Bonus Tip:

Smile – There’s magic in your smile and smiling while engaging in a video call can be one of the most important strategies for success. Smiling while on the video call will not only help you relax and improve your mood and energy, it will also help the consumer relax. Remember, it’s not only “what you say,” but “how you say it” that matters. The video call is your opportunity to build a personal relationship with the consumer and get them to truly like you. We all know that people buy from people they like, and a simple smile while engaging the consumer is scientifically proven to improve your chances of being liked — just like you would if they were physically on your lot.

Live video has never been more important in the sales world. Buying a car is a big decision for most customers, typically the second-largest purchase any consumer makes. Regardless of whether you are open for business completely, or only online, consumers are getting more comfortable with online shopping. If you are a veteran in the automotive industry, think about how different your communication strategy was in 2010 versus 2020. Now imagine how different it will be in 2030. Trust me, the next ten years are going to fly by, so make sure you stay ahead of the competition and are prepared for the acceleration and adoption of this technology by consumers. Great conversations certainly lead to more sales. And live video is a highly effective way to have great conversations with your customers.

Five Critical Micro-Moments for a Successful Video Marketing Strategy

In a recent study titled “Winning the Moments Before Your Dealership,” Google outlined five critical moments buyers encounter on their online journey to your dealership. For any marketing strategy, ensuring that you are in front of potential customers is imperative to maximizing its effectiveness. The same goes for video marketing. In video marketing you have to ensure that you don’t fall into the trap of simply creating videos that are ineffective, which nobody will ever watch, or which are irrelevant to what you do. Knowing the type of video, along with the correct message that will attract customers and continue to guide them along the path which ends at your dealership, is what matters and will bring sales.

Google’s five critical micro-moments are decision-based and centered on where that buyer is in the car buying funnel.

They are:

Which car is best?
Is it right for me?
Can I afford it?
Where should I buy it?
Am I getting a deal?

Understanding these micro-moments and applying them to broadcast video content so it engages customers, is something every dealership should do — not just for your video marketing, but for every digital marketing channel you participate in.

If you can tailor video to those moments you’re much more likely to guide customers down the “yellow brick road” that ends at your dealership, avoiding any encounters with the Wicked Witch (your competition), which could end badly for you (meaning your customer ends up at your competition).

For those of you that haven’t yet taken the plunge into video marketing, knowing HOW and WHAT TYPE of video content to produce, along with WHERE to put it, and WHY it’s important, will get you dealership off to a great start.

Of course, you won’t know what’s working and what’s not without the data to show you. We’re in an era of data-driven marketing and now have the information to make decisions based on real-time actions — to then take that data and entice and convince customers that, in each micro-moment, your dealership is the one they should choose.

And believe me, folks… it works.

Consumers today are far more likely to watch a video than they are to read or look at the 40 or more pictures a dealership has on its VDPs, whether that’s a vehicle walk-around, dealership introduction, or a personal branding video message. By simply HAVING video, you are ahead of the game. Through learning and embracing these micro-moments, along with producing relevant videos that are part of a larger video strategy designed to capitalize on these decision-making moments, you’ll be leaps and bounds in front of your competition.

Join me at the 22^nd Digital Dealer Conference & Exposition on Wednesday, April 12^th from 2:30-3:20 pm for my session, “Mastering Google’s Five Critical Micro-Moments with Video – Creating a “Video Marketing Strategy to Maximize the Effectiveness of ALL of Your Video Content and Deliver Measurable ROI through an Increase in Leads, Appointments, Shows and Sales.” I will show you how easy and inexpensive it is to enter the realm of video marketing. You will learn how to create a strategy and how to measure the results through accurate data while being relevant and engaging by incorporating Google’s five critical micro-moments. I look forward to seeing you in Tampa, FL.

KiNETiQ™ Mobile 1.0 – Platform Updates

Mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets, now account for over 10% of all web browsing. With the growing demand for mobile content in mind, we have completely rethought, redesigned and re-engineered our mobile sites to provide users the best way to view your content and inventory.

Design Refresh

Our layouts have been retooled based on usability standards and real-time user data. Our mobile sites now offer the best experience both for our clients and their customers. New features include:

Modernized Layout and design
Quicker load time
Decreased user bounce rate
Clean and simple user interface for faster browsing and effortless decision making

Increased Customization

Our new mobile layout gives you more power to customize your mobile site. The design offers several ways to completely personalize your site:

Brand mobile sites with custom logos and color schemes
Automatically include custom links and navigation items on all content pages
Easily add inventory items, specials and promotions
Create custom content across all pages

Promotion Slider

Our PASS system is now available for mobile. Your promotions can now be shared across all mobile devices with our new mobile PASS system. Our mobile PASS system offers users a touch-friendly way to view offers and specials right from their mobile device.

Information: http://dealerimpact.com/mobile-website.php

Demo: http://dealerimpactmotors.di-mobi.com/

New Formatting for Text Lead Emails Released

Text-based lead emails have been updated to provide a more structured output of the lead data that is submitted to you through the forms on your website. The lead data has been organized into sections to help you quickly view your lead information in a consistent fashion.

The first two lines of your lead emails will state what Form was submitted, and what Website it was submitted from. The customer data will populate the sections according to which Form was submitted, with common Contact Information and Comments first, followed by Lead-type sections.

We hope this new consistent format will make it easier to read and manage your text-based leads.

Other Platform 2.0 Features and Fixes
Now that migration to our new system is complete, we are working hard to improve and expand the system on a daily basis. We love to hear your new ideas AND constructive criticism. It is your requests and feedback that will determine our future enhancements, so keep those suggestions coming!

Here is Just a Small Sample…

Addition of several new data exports – to get your inventory out to more places!
Secure Employment Apps viewable within VOCC
Improved decoding to provide more details automatically as they become available
Improved Listing Subtype filters adds more possibilities for inventory grouping
Improved Listing Subtype processing to auto add and remove vehicles on every import
Increased types of pre-configured inventory groups for display in vehicle feature widget
Added Pending status for manual temporary override of inventory auto-processing
Hundreds of bug fixes and minor system and customer-facing tweaks