I’m a diehard internet guy.  If anyone ever wondered where my prejudices lie this should clear it up.

I was the Internet Director at a metro import store.  The department was responsible for 70% of the new and used car sales utilizing 30% of the sales force and 20% of the budget. 

Looking at NADA Data from 2011, the percentage of our advertising budget was actually pretty low:

I doubt that anyone, on this forum, will debate that the internet is the most effective and efficient form of advertising ever made available to the automotive dealership.  My question is why; doesn’t the internet demand a higher percentage of the budget?  Maybe, why are we continually having to fight for our share?

I think the three major reasons:

Comfort Level.  Dealerships understand how to use print and electronic media.  Over the years, they feel comfortable with it.  I’m sure that most understand  that TV advertising has become less effective with recording devices, NetFlix, and a thousand channel choices.  Radio advertising is also less effective.  We now have satellite radio, CD players, that hold 5 disks, and  iPods.  Dealers still have a love affair with print. It is pretty simple.  Have a picture of a car, a simple description and a price or payment.  It is pretty hard to mess this up.  I don’t know anyone that still subscribes to a newspaper. If newspapers hadn’t gone online, there might not be any left.  Even the New York Times is in financial trouble. 

ROI Reporting.  I doubt anyone pays any more attention to the internet ROI report than I did.  Like they say in the bayou, “if that dog don’t hunt, it don’t eat”.   I had a reputation for being tight with the dealership’s money but are the other advertising sources being put to the same level of scrutiny?  We’ve all heard the old saying, “half of my advertising budget is being wasted but I don’t know which half”.  My experience has been, any time you question other advertising sources, you hear “branding”.  If the majority of customers are doing their research, online, won’t your internet marketing positively affect the store’s branding?  Is it time that we approached ROI the same way for all forms of advertising?  

Marketing and Processes.   I spend a lot of time looking at dealership websites and their placement on third party display sites.  I’m convinced that I can tell you who is selling cars and who isn’t.   They say in internet circles, “Who gets it”. 

I amazed to see “Call for Price” on dealer websites and third party display sites.  Do people actually think someone is going to call?  If you have your cars listed at MSRP, do you think customers are going to get to the 5^th page on AutoTrader or Cars.com to see it?  I was looking at some Chevy dealerships on AutoTrader.   Only two stores, out of about six, had the price reduced by the rebate.  If the customer sorts, by price, that puts most of the competition on the back pages.  I’m convinced that most customers sort by price and many will check the box that excludes vehicles without pictures.  I saw a dealer that was an Alpha store on AutoTrader but his listings were in the featured section.  If a customer sorts by price, there were enough premium dealers to put his vehicles on the fourth and fifth pages.  This store had one actual picture and no descriptions.  How much more would it cost to have multiple pictures?  How much more effort? Descriptions only take some time, effort and a little creativity.  A VIN explosion is not a description.  

At least once a year, I see the same statistics when it comes to internet processes.  We see that response times are still being measured in hours and even days.  ISMs are more likely to send an email than to pick up the phone.  If they do contact the customer, it is often “one and they’re done”.   Few dealerships monitor their phone calls on a daily basis.   Long term follow-up is until the end of the month.

If dealerships aren’t marketing their products and they don’t have tight processes, they are not going to have very successful internet departments. 

A dealership that does actually “get it”, could cut their total advertising budget and sell as many, or more, cars and dramatically improve the bottom line.