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Feb 17, 2011

I love this article, well done! Jared your comment is spot on. This catastrophe would have been avoided if they had a Facebook mom. I became "friends" with my Mom on Facebook and she's like my moral content police. If any inappropriate content gets posted by myself or others I get a scolding text (almost immediately) It's a quite reliable system. Almost like Google alerts but with more shame.

Feb 17, 2011

That's a fantastic analogy Jared. I'm going to borrow it if you don't mind....full credit to you.

Feb 17, 2011

Ouch - A powerful message.

When people ask me how much social media they can outsource I tell them to think of their kids. You can hire a babysitter to lighten the load, but you would never outsource 100% of your relationship with your kids. Your relationship with your customers or "your community" is the most important thing for your dealership. Keep a close eye on it.

Its your brand. Own it and stay on top of it.

Thanks for example jeff.

Feb 15, 2011

Way Ahead As Usual...

Great Job B.W. and Elead/FB teams! 'Socialization' is the new leverage of this industry. Innovative dealers are going to appreciate what your newest service offerings will do for initiating and managing 'the conversation' with their existing and prospective customer bases.

At the perfect time, Elead should host a weekend-long "eCarSocial Carnival" just to allow the consumer and dealering communities to come together in a common virtual space where all the bright, shiny lights of these products may be put on display. And, I could help...but of course, B.W., you already know that!

bpulseadmin · Feb 14, 2011

eLead - eCarSocial Provides Auto Dealers a New Digital Marketing Platform

DALLAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Industry leading automotive CRM and marketing provider, eLEAD CRM, announced today the addition of the digital marketing platform, eCarSocial, to their flagship CRM solution. Included in the latest product release are auto Dealer search engine marketing, custom Web Sites, search engine optimization, Web Site TweetEnhancer, Social BDC and WebPush. eCarSocial gives auto Dealers the power to publish, manage, measure and engage customers with their marketing activities across key social media channels, such as Facebook and Twitter.

WebPush – an auto Dealers’ social media marketing, management and conversation hub

WebPush provides real-time, intuitive views of Dealers' most important social content, built on top of the powerful marketing platform that serves as a their reporting, permissioning, management and workflow. The platform provides live Twitter and Facebook feeds including home feed, mentions, searches, reviews, keywords, and fan page wall posts. Dealers’ benefit from the integrated team-based approach by managing smart campaigns that leverage multiple social channels to engage with customers, build their brand, and increase revenues.

Social BDC – an auto Dealers’ full-service social media management

Social BDC helps Dealers publish, manage and measure their marketing activities across key social media channels and engage with users around that content. Strategic processes and procedures are designed to function virtually utilizing WebPush. Social BDC has support for the most important social marketing channels in use by enterprises today, including foursquare, WordPress, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr and other branded online communities. Dealers’ benefit from the cross-platform integration approach by proactively monitoring targeted keywords to generate leads and reputation management.

TweetEnhancer – promotes Dealer specials and incentives

TweetEnhancer is a simple interactive tool that allows Dealers to promote specials and incentives on their Web Site via custom branded pop up or pop under coupons. Users have the ability to post and moderate content in Facebook and tweet, re-tweet, direct message, and follow in Twitter. Dealers benefit and leverage their viral marketing by gaining free advertising, a larger target audience and immediate visitors to their Web Site.

ECS Sites - Dealer/OEM Custom Designed Web Sites

ECS Web Sites encompass search engine-centric designs that are W3C compliant and customized to include image tagging, friendly URLs, easy-to-manage back-ends and Title and Meta optimization. Customized ECS Sites integrate with search engine webmaster tools and push inventory to Google Base, Twitter and other branded online communities.

For a product demo or additional information, visit eLEAD CRM at the NADA 2011 at booth 2226S in the South hall of Moscone Center, San Francisco NADA Convention and Expo.

About eLEAD:
Founded in 1985, eLEAD has steadily grown to over 700 direct employees with the number one automotive call center in the nation. eLEAD offers a bundled solution approach; a single login gives dealers access to CRM, desking, pre-owned inventory management and marketing. The company’s unique month-to-month business model fuels their sense of urgency to deliver monthly results. Along with an impressive number of recent groups that have chosen to partner with eLEAD, the company focuses heavily on maintaining their large reference list of over ten year customers. For more information visit www.eleadcrm.com, www.eleadcrmblog.com.

pcauto · Sep 19, 2011

I know I'm late chiming in here (and a newby to the forum too), so
please pardon my intrusion. Just thought I'd comment that as a local SEO
and Google Places professional, I think it warrants noting that over
the past several months, really going back to last year to be more
exact, Google has been changing maps/places and organic almost as much as I change my socks!

Add to that... with more frequency they are demanding re-confirmations
and even have been known to remove listings until meeting with approval
in what is their effort to eventually clean up the Places mess they've
created.

So I would agree with the others to NOT put in a tracking number for
Places page, as tempting as it may be. I'm sure you would regret it. I
wouldn't be surprised if your page got totally de-indexed for a while
(weeks even) by making any major changes to your citation.

Before coming on board with the dealership I now work at, I did
freelance work for local businesses and a large part of the work was in G
Places. If I had to go back to freelancing, I would not even touch GP
for the money I used to charge. I would triple the fee and give scant
guarantee, thanks to that uncertainty principle known as Google.

Jun 4, 2011

Eley,

We're all in the same boat. Here's my work-around.

#1). Use images for toll free numbers. New and Used Chevrolet Dealer McMurray | Sun Chevrolet (see top right) Google does not read images.

#2). Footer of New and Used Chevrolet Dealer McMurray | Sun Chevrolet I took the risk and used Toll Free numbers on footer.

#3). "About Us" page is letter perfect: http://www.usedcarking.com/aboutus.asp I point the Google Places to the about us page in the hopes that google will associate the 2.

#3a). We have multi-roofs, so rather than point to the about us page, I make an landing page for each store and point the Google Places page to it.

Store#1 landing page.

http://www.usedcarking.com/SunChevroletInc/

Google Places for Store#1.

Google Maps

Find local businesses, view maps and get driving directions in Google Maps.

maps.google.com

All 3rd party sites that are intended to be the "dealership contact page" get the local land line #. In the merchandise presentations, I use the toll free numbers.

It's not perfect, but I get to keep both needs alive.

Eley Duke · Jun 4, 2011

Stephen, we are a Centuray Interactive client, just started 60 days ago and like it. We just started dealer Rater 20 days ago, using the same 8XX tracking number for Dealer rater as we use in our 2 Google Places account (Duke Automotive & Duke Chevy Buick GMC Cadillac). We have a dynamic number on our web site. But the web numbers and Google Places and all other 3rd party web numbers do not match, all are tracking numbers. All other 3rd party sites that I have claimed our info on so far I am placing tracking numbers.

As a dealer I want to know where my traffic is coming from and where I need to market, as well we use Phone Ninja's for phone training and its well worth it so I really dont want to give that up.

I am hearing a lot of things; that I should NOT use different 8XX tracking numbers for all my 3rd party, yp.com, bing, yahoo, yelp, etc. and use 1 number for all. And for my web?

Then Stephen says its ok to use a dynamic tracking number ,which we do.

Then I hear I should be using my local number that I have had for 40 years for everything (that would eliminate any tracking and call recording we use for training purposes)

So Stephen, let me know, or call me, what we should be doing. Because I want Google Places and all these 3rd party sites linking correctly and matching up our info as close to 100% as possible. I still want to see my traffic, and record calls for training.

I guess one simple way to solve this is to know if you have the ability to track and record our main number that we have had for 40 years?

Apr 26, 2011

Every Local SEO consultant will talk about consistency of local number across all sites. Google takes data from other sites to determine ranking on local listings in Places with more matches giving higher value.

The recommendation to use local numbers that differ across the many local portals is majorly flawed. The data you are recommending to altered is often distributed by Aggregators using one number. Changing it to a different number is where people get into problems of not only poor rank but incorrect data rendering. Stick with your main local number is the only recommendation.

JCollins · Apr 21, 2011

Uncle Joe does it again.

Apr 10, 2011

I do Google Places for a living and I would never, ever use a tracking number on my place page, whether it's local or 800. It will absolutely kill your signal strength ... not only on Google, but on every other site that ranks your listing based on distance, relevance and prominence.

If you're using a tracking number on your Google Place Page, dump it. Get in the habit of asking every customers how they found you. Yes, I mean every customer. If you disagree with me, I can tell you that you have no idea how much business you're loosing from trying to outsmart the local search engines. Dump the tracking number.

Alex Jefferson · Apr 5, 2011

Does anyone else have a latency issue when forwarding call tracking numbers to cell phones? Have anyone figured out how to resolve this issue?

Feb 17, 2011

Nicely said and way to cap off a great discussion! I hope we get a chance to work together sometime soon.

joe.pistell · Feb 17, 2011

Stephen,

I'll say it again: "...IMO, your core product is not to track calls, so much as it's your ability to improve dealers decision making..."

Surely, we agree with this, that's what your reply is all about.

In your reply, you've mixed 2 different topics.

#1). Ad source measurement
#2). Sales operations (namely sale processes)

re: Ad source measurement
Sorry Stephen, I am aok with not knowing how many calls a FREE white pages based search is sending to me. Would I like it tracked? Sure, I love to measure everything! But as Dennis Galbraith from Cars.com said, I'll us my own words... not if the tracking number presents risk to my "Yellow Pages" traffic (i.e. "Chevrolet Dealer").

re: Sales operations (namely sale processes)
If Google Places gave me 25% of all incoming phone traffic, I still have 75% of the traffic from which to optimize sales processes from. Thats a truck load of calls to listen to. Heck, we ALL know that we can only listen to a fraction of the incoming calls anyway! (unless you have callrevu.com

.

If I were to drill into what I am missing the most from not tracking Google Places listing, it's probably service calls (ala white pages calls). Stephen, you track these calls specifically, am I correct? what are your thoughts?

Lastly, if I may address on last line you wrote:

"...one thing I've observed that successful dealerships have in common is they track every call coming into their store...."

From my seat, this is how I feel about your company:

"...one thing I've observed that dealerships that use Century Interactive have in common is they are very successful...."

Century's reputation is best of class in this arena and i've never laid eyes on your platform!

Feb 17, 2011

Joe, are you sure your last name isn't spelled "Pistol?" ha.

If you're a dealer, are you okay being in the dark on where 20% of your phone leads are coming from? Oh, it's not 20%, how would you even know? Say it's only 10%; 1 in 10 calls into your dealership aren't being tracked, so you don't know which employee handled the call, what the prospect was calling about, or how long it took to answer the call. Did your receptionist make a prospect hold for 2 minutes?

Call tracking is more than ad effectiveness. Yes, I'm biased, Joe, but one thing I've observed that successful dealerships have in common is they track every call coming into their store. The GM has the best view on what's working because he's standing at the top of the mountain.

Feb 16, 2011

@Joe Pistell,

If that was "hardened by fire" you used a Birthday candle. Why didn't you bring the HellFire and Volcano plumes like you did with Lightnup?

Feb 16, 2011

I really like your logic Joe, with the caveat that Places does need some form of lead tracking if you are paying for Local SEO management. We provide that to all the dealers we work with through a combination of a) Google Place Page Impression + Action Reporting b) Google Analytics Goal Reports c) Call Tracking via Dynamic Javascript.

joe.pistell · Feb 16, 2011

Stephen, You're a vendor, you track phone calls for a living, so I can understand how tracking every call makes sense to you. But... IMO, your core product is not to track calls, so much as it's your ability to improve dealers decision making. Based on that, I'll challenge you on a few fronts.

I see little need track calls made from Google Places for 2 reasons.

#1). It costs us next to nothing to use it.
#2). Free= No need to measure against another platform to choose one over the other.

Ok.. If it's free, then I have little to worry about. But, on the other hand, the ability to track the call counts and call quality of the referrals to my website from Google Places, now you've got my attention!

Google Places has 2 different visitors that parallel the old phone books, White pages & Yellow pages. The real opportunity in Google Places is not it's "white pages" traffic, it's from the "yellow pages" like traffic (white pages = dealer name, where as "Used Trucks" is a yellow pages like request). The competition for these Yellow Pages like Google Places SERPs is very strong, few dealers make it onto the maps and to those that do make it, have no idea how they got there, yet, it's a very very rich source of income for them. Lastly, trying to insert tracking numbers into Google Places could ruin your position or make you invisible for ...gulp... months & months. It's possible it could take you years to re-gain that 3-6 months of lost revenue.

My $0.02
Dealers should be working with Local SEO experts like Dev Beasu to optimize their Google Places visibility and they should track this investment with Stephen's Century Interactive!

p.s. Welcome to Dealer Refresh Stephen, you're now "hardened by fire"

joe.pistell · Feb 16, 2011

Stephen, You're a vendor, you track phone calls for a living, so I can understand how tracking every call makes sense to you. But... IMO, your core product is not to track calls, so much as it's your ability to improve dealers decision making. Based on that, I'll challenge you on a few fronts.

I see little need track calls made from Google Places for 2 reasons.

#1). It costs us next to nothing to use it.
#2). Free= No need to measure against another platform to choose one over the other.

Ok.. If it's free, then I have little to worry about. But, on the other hand, the ability to track the call counts and call quality of the referrals to my website from Google Places, now you've got my attention!

Google Places has 2 different visitors that parallel the old phone books, White pages & Yellow pages. The real opportunity in Google Places is not it's "white pages" traffic, it's from the "yellow pages" like traffic (white pages = dealer name, where as "Used Trucks" is a yellow pages like request). The competition for these Yellow Pages like Google Places SERPs is very strong, few dealers make it onto the maps and to those that do make it, have no idea how they got there, yet, it's a very very rich source of income for them. Lastly, trying to insert tracking numbers into Google Places could ruin your position or make you invisible for ...gulp... months & months. It's possible it could take you years to re-gain that 3-6 months of lost revenue.

My $0.02
Dealers should be working with Local SEO experts like Dev Beasu to optimize their Google Places visibility and they should track this investment with Stephen's Century Interactive!

p.s. Welcome to Dealer Refresh Stephen, you're now "hardened by fire"

Feb 16, 2011

Hey Stephen - Nice to meet you too. The workaround you're suggesting is good for the long run but does cause some pretty harsh short term pain in the rankings. Effectively, a dealer would need to use the call tracking # in their Places profile and rebuild or edit any existing citation data they have to get the records in order. Even after building new citations or editing existing ones, we've seen Places take up to 3 months to adjust to the new data.

It's a double-edged sword for the first 6 months or so of undertaking a call tracking # in your places profile.

1) The major pro is that you know where your leads are coming from.

2) The major con is that if you depend on search engines for the majority of your leads, a loss in rankings could result in less overall calls than before using a call tracking #.

Feb 16, 2011

The only way around the problem of calls coming from places itself is to start using a trackable local phone number from the start, similar to those offered by RingCentral or Grasshopper. Then build citation data around this new phone number and try to close the gap between calls from places alone and calls from your javascript tracking solution. This is only possible if your front desk monitors the source of the calls.

Feb 16, 2011

Thanks for weighing in, Dev, and nice to meet you. Yes, we absolutely do use the smart JavaScript for displaying dynamic phone numbers on the dealer's *website*, which works wonderfully for a number of reasons, including those laid out here Centuryinteractive: Unleashing the Future of Marketing Today

As far as Google Places goes, it's a best practice to set up the entry with the actual NAP (name, address, phone). Ok, then what?! The listing is established and calls start rolling in. This is the point when our clients swap the number to a local tracking number (i.e. after the Places entry has been created and validated).

We're getting past the point where businesses are just starting to set up their Places entry. Most already have. I'm asserting that the act of taking your existing Places entry and swapping in a local tracking number is a calculated risk many dealers have taken.

Of course, the world can change tomorrow, but so far, these dealers are pleased with the combined benefit of Google Places phone tracking and acceptable findability on the Map.

From a philosophical standpoint, I believe that Google's intention is to make sure you have a physical presence where you say you do. Since that is the case in these examples, we haven't seen any indication of a witch hunt if the phone number changes in Places.

An SEO specialist will never endorse the practice of putting a trackable phone number in Google Places, but I think it's okay to look at the dealer's operational needs in a balanced way (rather than isolating just SEO). As such, weighing the benefits of tracking calls from a significant lead source (Places) against the risks of upsetting Google is something that should be on the table for consideration.

Feb 16, 2011

Dev - if you place javascript on your website, to get around a tracking number on your places page, how do you account for the people calling from the phone number listed on your Google Places page that don't visit your website?

Feb 15, 2011

Jeff Kershner asked me to weigh in on the topic of using Call Tracking #'s in one's Google Places profile, and I'm happy to help where I can:

As a Local Search Expert who devotes a lot of time to testing local search ranking factors, I can definitely attest to the fact that it is NOT a good idea to use call tracking numbers in your Places listing.

I understand where Stephen is coming from though, as an advocate of call tracking myself. However, there's a better way to do it.

If you use a smart javascript on your dealer site, then you can configure it to auto-replace your main phone # with a tracking phone number IF AND ONLY IF the referring traffic source happens to be Google.com. This way you will know exactly how many calls you are getting off Google or any other search engine or any other website for that matter. The kicker is that you get to get all that juicy data without compromising or fragmenting your Place page citations.

Just to be clear, the reason having your REAL phone # in your Places listing is important is because Google Places uses 3 data points at the very minimum to 'anchor' your business as a distinct entity. These are the NAP or Name, Address, Phone #. Joe's done a great job at demonstrating how to represent the NAP across the web.

If y'all have anymore questions, please feel free to post here as I'm following this comment thread.

Feb 15, 2011

I'm not in charge of their places pages anymore. I know they're struggling with those pages right now. When I was there I switched back and forth between local and tracking 8xx numbers. As long as the numbers matched Google didn't have any issues.

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