Like so many other Americans, I gathered up my snacks and beverages to sit down in front of a television to catch the NFL Big Event.  Having a career in marketing and sales, I paid curious attention to the messages conveyed in the 60 second spots aired between plays.  This year, I heard it loud and clear from the Automotive Industry. 

One third of all advertisements aired during The Big…

by Motyka Johnson

A few weeks ago I wrote about how Google was going to include items from Google+ in their regular search results when users were signed in, calling it “Search Plus Your World”. Now that users have had some time to get accustomed to it, I wanted to touch on how this new way of searching could benefit your car dealership’s local search…

How much money do we let slip through our fingers by not insisting on a "front end" sales process for the service drive? We know customers that service in our stores will more likely than not shop for a new/used car at the servicing dealer. Are the service drive and the sales department battling each other or working with each other? Both play a vital role in customer retention and dealership profitability, but somehow the service drive customer doesn't get the same attention by the front…

The Data War is raging.

Automotive dealers are becoming more enlightened daily as they are being exposed at NADA and through forums such as DealerElite to the very serious matter of consumer and dealer data leakage. By data leakage, I am referring to the unrestricted polling or scraping of their dealership DMS (computer systems) by vendors providing software "solutions" that are suppose to be helping dealers organize and maximize sales. Typically, these vendors have inserted…

The 23,000 NADA Convention attendees in Las Vegas had over 1,000 booths to visit in the exhibitor hall.  The 2012 Convention broke all attendance records according to Stephen Wade, NADA Chairman.  The automotive industry is healthy and the diversity of exhibitors and products on display this year has never been greater.

At the NADA Convention I take time…

The 2012 NADA Convention exhibitor hall was very active this year making the selection of the PCG SpotLight Award winners even more challenging.

This year five companies that attended the 2012 NADA Convention were selected by PCG as having outstanding products that will benefit the dealer community.

Dominion Be Back…

I knew there were a lot of unhappy Yelp business owners, but I wasn't quite sure how many. Seems there is a decent bunch willing to complain about it. It looks like similar issues cross industry lines when it comes to disappearing reviews, accusations of false negative reviews, review shuffling, algo filter a joke, and more. Makes for some entertaining reading and…

Is Selling Service to Women Really Different?

Statistics show that over  65% of the clients coming in for service on most drives are women. They will tell you they want to be treated the same as your male clients but this simply isn't…

This one is a huge game changer. Too long did you hear left and right that Cobalt's website design was antique and close to a cookie cutter design (even so you could still configure a website of their in 1700+ different ways - but only a few knew). With the new "FLEX WEBSITE" design the dealer, eCommerce Director or webmaster will be in charge on how he wants to see his virtual store, and how she/he can differentiate the dealer website from the competition.…

QUEST MOTOR GROUP IS DELIGHTED TO REVEAL DETAILS OF THEIR SECOND CITROEN DEALERSHIP LOCATED AT BRAINTREE. OUR NEW SHOWROOM BRINGS CITROEN'S ETHOS OF CREATIVE TECHNOLOGIE AND EXCITING VEHICLE RANGE TO THE BRAINTREE AREA COVERING CHELMSFORD AND THE NORTH OF THE COUNTY.

Scroll across the photo to reveal our state of the art Citroen Dealer Essex Braintree On Tuesday 2nd April 2012, Quest Motor Group will cut…

Summary NADA Ford Franchise Dealer meeting

February 5, 2012

• Average Ford Dealer Net Profit in 2011 was $642,000
• • Up 34 percent from 2010…

We all want to have a better opportunity to take care of ourselves and our needs in life. Where do we start? How do we get the ball rolling? First and foremost, we need to be honest with ourselves. We need to write down, what we want, why we want it and what we are willing to do to accomplish our goals. This must be everywhere you go for 90 days. I mean…

Auto dealers continued to generate profits from accessories sales in 2011; average dealership generated over $260,000 for the year, with 45% average gross profit margin

Las Vegas, Feb. 4, 2012-- izmocars (www.izmocars.com) today released its annual AOA Auto Accessories Trend Report in conjunction with the 2012…

NextGen Professional Automotive Sales and Service, is more than just making certain technologies available.  Having all of the technology in the world will not help you when it comes to the human touch, communicating and connecting with customers in a way that not only builds commonality but gives the customer the “I gotta guy” feeling.  The biggest buzz that I have heard in…

DMEautomotive's "The Changing Service Loyalty Landscape" Reveals:

- Independent Shops Aren't Dealerships' Biggest Threat, Aftermarket Chains Are

- Dealer Loyalists Aren't the Highest-Value Service Customers

LAS VEGAS, Feb. 4, 2012 --  DMEautomotive (DMEa), the science-inspired, results-based automotive marketing leader, today released key findings at the 2012 NADA Convention from its forthcoming white paper, "The Changing Service…

This Friday's social media tip comes from the old expression......

"It's all about the 3 L's: Location, Location, Location."



The real estate industry has used this expression for eons as a way of putting a value on a piece of property. "Prime real estate" is dependent largely upon where it is located, and the kind of person who buys it is…