• Stop being a LURKER - join our dealer community and get involved. Sign up and start a conversation.

Engaging the mobile car shopper with GEO-Targeting

Speaking of privacy... did you know that if you have an android or iPhone you're letting the phone record the most frequent locations that you visit every day? I was surprised to find this out. I checked my iPhone under Settings>Privacy>Location Services> all the way to the bottom to System Services > and then Frequent Locations.

If you have this setting turned ON it basically stores a history of every location you visit, how many times you go there, what times during the day and even shows the place on a map. This is very precise data. The phone tells you "Allow your iPhone to learn places you frequently visit in order to provide useful location-related information." So far I can't think of how this has come in handy for me... decide for yourselves if you'd like to keep this turned on. They claim they don't share your data with anyone unless you consent. The problem is how do I know that I haven't consented already when I click "agree" on one of those long policy pages?
 
  • Like
Reactions: joe.pistell
Seems to me as if it's becoming or will become common practice. We are already seeing several large retailers utilizing geo/iBeacon features within their mobile apps.

Consumers demand fast and easy obtainable content and mobile apps with geo take advantage of the ability to understand the customers location in order to create a relevant (hopefully) interaction.

Target launches iBeacons in Stores and App
American Airlines undertakes industry’s biggest deployment of iBeacons at DFW Airport
San Francisco Giants (and most of MLB) adopt Apple's iBeacon for an enhanced ballpark experience

One of my favorite apps is CardStar. It houses all my loyalty cards and when I'm at a particular store that I have a loyalty card for, not only does it remind me but it's at the top of list as soon as I open the app for easy access.

You could use geofencing to know when a customer is standing in front of a particular vehicle on your lot or showroom while instantly delivering them the specs, data, pricing, incentives, for that exact vehicle... making for a much easier experience.

I work with a few dealers using AutoMotion's app to provide information to consumers while they are on their lot, inside of their showroom, service department or even on the lot of a competitor. It gets fun! :)

Apps now being indexed within the SERPS.

Do you what the impact was, if any, on sales?

I definitely see the potential for this to influence sales. How many is yet to be determined. What I'm really curious about is the marginal ROI derived from this form of marketing. Can a dealer actually make any extra money from this at the end of the day? Or is the vendor the only one making a profit from it?
 
Caution, random thoughts ahead....

New keyword...Geo PRECISE Targeting. Differs from the typical radius targeting/fencing in that rather than a generic circle it dynamically targets intenders around said location. I'm still smh over this. I started to think, if I did this, who/where would I fence? Hmmm, vendors want me to target competitors. Ok, well think of the bigger players....wait a tic....sheezus louweezus how many dealers are targeting that same store?

Confirmed that thought as a vendor recently swung in to f/u and tells me X dealer (smaller player in the market) is targeting Y dealer (market leader) and seeing blah blah blah results. Well that's fine but anyone who jumps into this is going to target Y dealer because they dominate the market. First thought is, that's some expensive real estate! Second thought is, welp, every dealer's digital 'fence' is now being bid on by competitors. Third thought is, these m***********s (I counted the asterisks!) found yet another way to make money off of us without even buying into their service. The more people we bring in, the more successful we are, the more we're mentioned in these fencing pitches as a potential target. So now what, target myself and out bid everyone?

Back up a second, does it even matter? Let's walk through the showroom and see if aside from service waiters, are there people sitting and really soaking in content on their phones? BRB....

Nope. Mostly Service waiters and a others that are waiting to get to into Finance. Everyone else is actively involved in a conversation. So, does that mean the only hope is to hit people that are walking out of Y dealer without buying because of car/payment/not approved?

Not convinced just yet....
o7x1oEZ.gif
 
I'm not convinced simply based on the fact that I have not once been geo targeted (aside from browser ads) and I have an iPhone and the latest Nexus phone with all the default settings ON. The first time it happens to me I'll be finding those options and disabling them.