Automotive advertising agencies are being asked to deliver more for less by a consolidating auto industry in response to reduced sales volume, profit margins and automotive advertising budgets. The solution, as is often the case, lies in the leveraged use of technology applied to a constant in automotive advertising and the auto industry that it serves -- change. Another constant that can be found in automotive advertising is human nature. These two constants, change and human nature, power the explosive growth of the use of social media by automotive advertising agencies. Unfortunately, the change is happening at warp speed on the Internet Super Highway and automotive advertising agencies don't know what they don't know when it comes to new automotive advertising technologies and applications being developed to monetize social media.

Attempts by automotive advertising agencies to provide a presence for automobile dealers on social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter fall short for the same reasons that these online communities of friends are so successful with consumers. People hate car dealers and they often turn to advice from likeminded consumers on social networking sites to get away from them. Automotive advertising agencies that impose on these personal conversations with self serving sales messages are often ostracized and even virally attacked as an intruder. The potential damage to the online reputation of their auto dealer clients represents a risk to reward formula that has forced many automotive advertising agencies to abandon social media as a viable channel to deliver a retail sales or service message.

Fortunately, the same social media that teaches consumers how to buy a vehicle can provide automobile dealers with the information and the tools that they need to sell them one. Social networking portals developed by likeminded automotive advertising agencies, automotive advertising vendors and auto dealers allow their members to share best practices with the common philosophy that a rising tide floats all boats.

Philip Zelinger, the President of Ad Agency Online, L.L.C. and the host of the automotive advertising resource / networking portal AdAgencyOnline.net, discussed a number of auto industry focused social networking sites on the blog talk radio station WAAOL - All Automotive Advertising News All The Time featured on AdAgencyOnline.Net. "I host a network of networker in a special section hosted on AdAgencyOnline.Net titled Auto Industry Insiders. Contributing member sites include Ralph Paglia's AutomotiveDigitalMarketing.Com, Jared Hamilton's DrivingSales.Com, Brian Pasch's InternetSalesmanager.Org, Chris Saraceno's DealerElite.Net, Jody Devere's AskPatty.Com, Keith Whann's Auttr.Com and Scott Monty's ScottMonty.Com. Each online community boasts its own personality and rules of the road to keep members in their lane. The temptation to sell to each other is controlled by the same social pressures that exist on consumer facing social networks for those that forget why they are there -- to listen and learn so they can presume to teach their auto dealers how they can sell cars and service to their online friends."

In addition to sharing best practices, many automotive advertising agencies use social media to discover new automotive advertising technologies and vendor applications that have not yet been discovered by the mainstream automotive advertising industry. New automotive advertising platforms and vendor clients that Philip Zelinger sourced from his searches on social media include SiSTeR Technologies Video CarLot -- an automated video production platform that produces scalable interactive videos from pictures using human voice to narrate them that are placed on the auto dealer's website and pushed through a dedicated API with You Tube onto the WWW. An equally revolutionary discovery claimed by Philip was ronsmap.com -- a consumer centric inventory marketing platforms that offers auto dealers free listings and free leads with the ability to purchase real time market analytics and social networking profiles that empower the salesperson to answer the customer's questions even before they ask them.

Each of these vendor applications were introduced to the market through automotive advertising social networking communities that enabled them to listen and learn from their members about how they can improve their products and services before they introduced them to the general market. Philip claimed that his access to these automotive advertising solutions and new vendor clients of Ad Agency Online was only possible as a result of the time he invested on social media looking for them so that he could stay one step ahead of the competition.

Online blog talk radio stations hosted on automotive advertising networking portals -- such as AAOL featured on AdAgencyOnline.Net -- provide a another social media forum for finding and reviewing new automotive advertising solutions. Regularly scheduled blog talk radio shows with live interviews of the developers of bleeding edge automotive advertising applications allow their online audience to ask vendors questions in an open forum. These open exchanges of ideas in a problem solution format help the vendors as much as the automotive advertising decision makers that follow the shows. A new mobile sales presentation platform with an integrated training component -- IntellaCar by Hughes Hunter -- was recently discussed on a blog talk radio show hosted by Philip Zelinger to solicit feedback from the audience. Their insights were used to modify the platform before IntellaCar began their beta test it in the real world saving thousands of wasted dollars and man hours that would normally be required to mature their application.

The opportunity for automotive advertising agencies and auto dealers to listen, learn and contribute to social networking communities allows them to discover what they don't know while allowing them the opportunity to share what they do know. Auto dealers are people too! The same efficiencies and extended resources that attract consumers to social media to research their next vehicle purchase is sourced by automotive advertising agencies who need to stay one step ahead of the competition in a consolidating auto industry that demands more for less. Automotive advertising agencies don't know what they don't know but they can definitely find out on auto industry focused social media. After all, what are friends for!

About Philip Zelinger

Philip Zelinger is the President of Ad Agency Online, L.L.C. and host of a nationally respected automotive advertising social networking portal, AdAgencyOnline.Net. Philip invested 25 years as a General Manager and Dealer Principal followed by his last ten years in the automotive advertising industry representing auto dealers and technology vendors focused on the automotive advertising industry.

His role as a “Dealer Coach” is enhanced by his hosting a nationally recognized auto industry social networking portal and blog talk radio station – WAAOL, All Automotive Advertising News All The Time. As the author of two books on the auto industry, including “How To Sell A Car – a Career Guide to The Automobile Industry,” he is a recognized authority on market trends and developing technologies with the responsibility of selecting key vendors and applications for his dealer clients as well as forming strategic partnerships for his vendor clients to leverage their shared resources to help them bring their products and services to market.

About AdAgencyOnline.Net and Ad Agency Online, L.L.C.

AdAgencyOnline.Net reviews automotive advertising vendors and new technologies on several blog talk radio shows in addition to the Lunch With Phil Discussing Automotive Advertising. Other shows include “Lunch With Ralph Discussing Automotive Advertising” and “Automotive Advertising Experts.” The shows attract automotive advertising agencies, auto dealers, auto industry vendors and O.E.M. representatives that listen to WAAOL to find vendors, applications and technologies to maximize the R.O.I. for their automotive advertising dollars.

AAOL is a national network of independent affiliated automotive advertising agencies linked by an online communication / distribution system developed by Philip Zelinger. The proprietary operating system that powers AAOL was designed to reduce fixed and semi-variable expenses for full service automotive advertising agencies. The developing technologies that enhanced the performance of the independent automotive advertising agencies linked by AAOL has served as the role model for the solutions suggested on AdAgencyOnline.Net and represented by AAOL to their affiliated automotive advertising agencies when serving their auto dealer clients.

Ad Agency Online L.L.C is focused on discovering and representing new automotive advertising vendors not yet recognized by the mainstream automotive advertising industry. Automotive advertising vendors represented by AAOL include; ronsmap.com, DealerMouth, TeleTextSolutions, GetAutoAppraise, Argistics - AutoTransaXion, DealMaker.Com, CityTwist.Com, Bulldog Marketing Technologies, Kihon Media, CarFolks.Com, Ai Dealer, Laser Stream Video, IntellaCar and SiSTeR Technologies - Video CarLot; to name a few.

For more information on Philip Zelinger, Ad Agency Online, L.L.C., Social Media or any of the vendor clients represented by Ad Agency Online contact Philip at 888-796-2228 or email him at pzads@bellsouth.net. Automotive advertising vendors, automotive advertising agencies and auto dealers that would like to be considered as a “preferred automotive advertising vendor” on AdAgencyOnline.Net and/or to hire/join Ad Agency Online, L.L.C. to represent them can contact Philip Zelinger at http://adagencyonline.net. To quote Philip Zelinger, “Help is only a click away! After all, what are friends for!” ###