Urbandale, IA—March 5, 2018—Flick Fusion today revealed the three biggest misconceptions that auto dealers have about video marketing. The three reasons auto dealers are not implementing video marketing strategies based on Flick Fusion’s internal research are: (1) videos are expensive, (2) videos are time consuming and (3) videos provide little to no marketing ROI or attribution.

“Video marketing is actually one of the cheapest forms of content and the least time-consuming for dealerships to create, because most of the process can be automated,” said Tim James, COO of Flick Fusion. “In addition, there’s no other media out there that gives dealers more insight into what customers are interested in, and the touchpoints they are viewing on, than video.”

To change these misconceptions, James offers auto dealers three tips to implement an affordable, successful video marketing strategy.

To keep expense and time at a minimum, look for a video marketing solution that automates the entire video production process. Libraries of stock videos offer choices that require little time or investment, and can be customized to a dealership’s brand by adding logos and photos.

To ensure maximum exposure for videos, dealers need to make sure they are getting seen on multiple touchpoints. “Many dealers post videos on their website and YouTube and that’s it,” said James. “Videos can and should be used in email marketing, display ads, social media, third-party auto shopping sites and in the lead follow-up process with customers.”

To measure video ROI and attribution, it’s necessary to host videos on a platform that can track viewer data and use the data to enhance the video content in real-time based upon each shopper’s individual viewing data. Many dealerships use YouTube as a primary hosting platform for their videos, which hurts them in several ways. 

First, YouTube-hosted videos offer no Video SEO (VSEO) value for a dealership’s actual website.  Even though a YouTube video may be embedded on a webpage, once the video is found on Google, the shopper is directed to YouTube to view the video and not the dealer’s website where it is embedded.  This is because YouTube claims all the SEO value for that video. The dealership’s website gets none.

Second, videos that are hosted on YouTube are at risk of being flagged by AdRev if they have any kind of music associated with them. AdRev is a company that leverages YouTube’s copyright polices to open a video up to the YouTube Ad Network by filing a copyright claim against virtually any video that has music.

The Copyright claim is often filed “on behalf of” the copyright holder even though the copyright holder may not have authorized AdRev to file claims on their behalf and may not even be aware that a claim has been filed. If the owner of the video has a legal license to utilize the music, they can easily have the Copyright Claim dismissed. Unfortunately, the video is immediately opened up to the YouTube Ad Network the instant that the claim is filed and other companies (including a dealership’s competitors) can run ads on their videos until the claim is released.   

Third, dealers have no control over which "Recommended videos to watch" YouTube will show to their viewers. After a car shopper finishes watching a dealership video, YouTube may recommend a series of other videos that fit that viewer’s viewing history, including video ads of a competitor.

Finally, YouTube doesn't offer a dealership the ability to easily access and utilize their viewer’s data outside of the YouTube platform. 

“This video viewer data is necessary to enhance the informational and emotional value of a video by updating a video’s content in real-time across multiple touch-points,” said James. “Relevant content attracts and engages more customers, increases time spent on a dealer’s website, boosts search engine rankings, improves CTRs and other metrics, and produces higher quality leads. This is really the name of the game when it comes to using video in your marketing successfully. Most dealerships just focus on the creation of video content and then they’re done. To use the power of video marketing successfully, you need a strategy that gets the right video content in front of the right shopper at the right time of the buying cycle. This takes a combination of content, exposure, and data and without all three your videos are simply enforcing these common misconceptions.“

For information about Flick Fusion Video Marketing, visit Booth #2032C at the NADA Convention & Expo in Las Vegas, NV. Schedule an appointment by emailing sales@flickfusion.com, or call 515-333-4337.

About Flick Fusion

Flick Fusion offers a full-solution video hosting, marketing and distribution platform to automotive and other inventory-based industries. The platform delivers automated, integrated and rule/behavior-based, including geo-targeted, video content in real-time, across multiple touchpoints and throughout the entire purchase cycle.

Flick Fusion makes it easy for dealers to create desktop and mobile-friendly vehicle inventory videos, video email and customer engagement videos such as testimonials, service department overviews and more. Videos are proven to capture more buyers' attention, advance organic SEO rankings, generate leads and increase conversion rates. The Flick Fusion system builds emotional value and customer loyalty for more than 3,500 brands and preferred partners.