Let’s say that you’re an auto dealer with a successful social media aspect of your digital marketing campaign – you have tons of Facebook fans, a healthy community that provides feedback and applause, and an online presence that grows every day. But the point of any marketing endeavor is to eventually convert your fans into loyal customers, and you determine that your Facebook page just isn’t bringing in sales –  despite all the positive metrics that indicate otherwise. What went wrong?

Location has a significant impact on automotive dealerships because of the very nature of the business. It is not economically viable to ship a 4,000-pound vehicle across the country, so you depend on sales within your jurisdiction. Therefore, you reach out to local media. When you purchased that billboard space on the interstate, you did it because you knew that drivers in the area would view it. When you filmed that goofy ad and broadcast it on Channel 12, you did it because you knew that all viewers would be local.

Your Facebook page is very different from these media. After all, what good are fans and followers if they will never buy a car from you? This very question keeps auto dealers from utilizing social media platforms and sticking to the tried-and-true marketing methods of the past. However, you are in luck! Facebook has a built-in feature that allows you to deliver relevant content to the regional audience that can most benefit from your messages. This digital marketing strategy is known as geotargeting.

When you update your followers about your promotions using a Facebook status update, explore the Audience button underneath the entry field. From there you can select what regions can view your status, and with a few clicks, you can customize your posts for different cities, states, countries, and languages. So how can you use this to localize your Facebook page?

If you have a lot of Spanish-speaking customers, use the language filter to connect to them and customize their messages in español! If you have a local promotional event, don’t bother your entire following - send invitations to only those in the area! You could even use this functionality to send different messages to different regions and A/B test them by comparing their conversion rates. But, the most effective way for auto dealers to localize their digital marketing efforts is an analytics tool that can report the exact location of all website visitors in real time!

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Need help making your Facebook content relevant to your region? Leave a comment at our blog and our marketing staff can help!