Great opportunity, Alex, for you and Dealer.com! Your talent, experience and work ethic that led you to this pivotal moment in your career are admirable. What an exciting time for you! Congratulations on your career change!!

Great place to live, you will be very happy there, and the team at Dealer.com is first class. An all-around great decision Alex - we are proud of you, you will do fantastic!

Alex,

Congratulations and best of luck. I look forward to making a trip up to Vermont to see you and the rest of the great crew at Dealer.com!

Congrats Alex!!

Very exciting opportunity....Vermont is steller.

Thanks everyone - I'm very excited!

It is going to be tough switching from surfing to snowboarding, but I've been told it is more about leaning on your forward foot than back foot.

Mike - we can catch lunch before I move.

Congrats Alex! Be sure to let us know how you're liking it, and I'm pleased to see you haven't given up on your goal for world domination!

Congrats Alex! Not sure if you are a skier or not but definitely you should check out Killington Mountain in Vermont - Home

If ever you are in Wisconsin we have our own mountains to tackle.. - Homepage | Sunburst Ski Hill over 100 FT. of Vertical!!

Alex,

Congrats and I'm happy to hear that you will still play a huge role in the Dealer Refresh community. I'm actually really happy for you, this type of change in your life will inspire you and motivate you to continue your success. Dealer.com is very lucky to have you. Lets do lunch before you take off up north?

Alex

Congratulations. I know how hard it is to move from a job where family was involved. I wish you nothing but continued success and Dealer.com will be lucky to have you on their team.

Dealer.com is very lucky to have you, congratulations Alex!

WOW.

Awesome...huge congrats to you Alex. What a great match; Dealer.com is lucky to have you.

I look forward to seeing the new ideas & changes you can bring to the table for them.

Please keep us posted - would love to be among the 1st to try out whatever you have up your sleeve!

Best of luck man!

Alex-

That is terrific news. I am sure you had long thoughts about the change, and I hope it is for the best. I know you will be wildly successful there.

In the mean time, I for one am glad to hear you will still be on the staff here at DealerRefresh.

All the best!

Congratulations and best of luck Alex!

Here's another blog I stumbled across. Looks new, but interesting.

Car dealers are people too! As social networking expands into the habit of our daily lives the foundations that were built by DealerRefresh, DrivingSales.Com, InternetSalesManager.Com, Auttr.Com, DealerElite.Net,ADM,DealerAdvisorNation, AskPatty.Com and even by OEM representatives like Scott Monty from Ford Motors -- you get the point -- will be referenced in the history that they helped to create.

The ability to "network the networkers" by linking their indiviual content in a communal site with reciprocal links creditting each for their contributions to the communal good is a concept that was recently experimented with that will be born again in a soon to be announced site; but I don't want to focus on it as much as the people that will surely support it. The rising tide that floats all boats is powered by the information and best practices that are shared on the referenced auto industry and automotive advertising resource / networking portals that create and nurture it.

After all, what are friends for!

I find it interesting that not many ISM's participate.There is a wealth of knowledge and you can keep a pulse on business.

Along with tyring to learn things by visiting DR, I decided to subscribe to autonews. I just like to keep up with the auto industry. After the 1st autonews showed up my wife said "what did you do that for, it's $89 a year for heavens sake. I get my PEOPLE mag every week for alot less".

Maybe DR needs to be free in order for people to participate? Oh, that's right, it is free.

DR should be a no brainer and I think I am getting smarter.

Thank you Jeff & Alex.

WOW! As a DDC client it's great to have another talented resource with Dealer.com!

And someone else to ride glades at Stowe this winter.....some surf sets with http://www.wakesurfvt.com/WakeSurfVT.com/Wakesurf...

DEALER REFRESH stands for (DR), with that being said thanks DR for helping fix my issues and looking after all of us. Jeff and Alex and all of the moderators have done a great job, brought insight to all of us and keeps me coming back to gain more knowledge on a daily basis.

Dealer Refresh is one of a few websites I check daily. There is always something new and different available. I may not always agree with what is posted, but it does start me thinking in new directions.

However, there is a disturbing trend going on in Central Ohio. Virtually all dealerships feel they have the internet figured out. Yet 95% don't have a clue. I have seen dealerships change websites for the sake of change, and never monitor any metrics. Follow up processes are still stuck with what was good 5 years ago. Some stores are even increasing their print advertising. And the dealer I work for is as guilty as anybody.

So, keep doing what you are doing, we'll keep learning and someday somebody will listen to me!

You asked 3 questions here 1. Have these resources helped & how? No Brainer YES! How? The generosity of an online community that shares best practices, ideas,etc. That was the easy question. Your best question and the one maybe I'm glad you had to ask. Why aren’t more people participating? I don't know but that sure gives those of us that do frequent these forums a definite advantage in this competitive marketplace. So I can't answer that but I can say Thanks to everyone who participates as it has no doubt helped me in my career as a Internet Car Guy!Good Stuff!

Being a Canadian with little to no resources this site has been my bible.

All the best,

Ryan

Car Chat 24 - Canada

Eric - sorry it has taken me so long to give you feedback.

I have to admit that I was put-off by the length of Ryan's plugs. I timed him, and it was well over 10 minutes before we got to anything beyond an advertisement. I don't mind the plugs, but I would suggest he limit his time spent doing that for future webinars to 2 minutes or less. Both Christine and I had a hard time listening to your opening because we were so put-off by the infomercial.

It was good to see foursquare being acknowledged with a webinar. I agreed with everything you said, and recognize location-based "social medias" as potential advertising platforms. They are far from main-stream, but they're good for building fans and buzz.

Recently, I had a long conversation with my dad who is working to help promote a local concert venue. They get bands like The Who, Stone Temple Pilots, and Ringo Starr - these shows are easy to sell tickets for. However, it is a struggle to get some of the lesser-known shows promoted because the regular ticket sales media channels are so dead: radio, newspaper, and TV. TicketMaster's website is the strongest one that is left, but they only promote their own stuff. How do you find out what concerts are coming?

We talked about facebook, SEM, MySpace, and even iPhone apps ads. When you put all of this together you reach an audience the size of say what the radio used to reach, but it is very hard to track exactly which medium did what. It got me thinking about the true difficulties of advertising today. There is really no way to know what triggered a customer to seek out your brand. So, foursquare becomes another arrow in a larger quiver of numerous advertising medias. Except your bow doesn't shoot one arrow at a time - it is a machine gun. In order to reach your old audiences, you have to blanket the world in your arrows knowing that most won't hit, but the few that do need to go straight for the kill.

Webinars like this, very media-specific (talking about just one arrow) are so valuable today. You did a great job helping people understand how to use foursquare. It would be great if you continued the series: Google Buzz, Whrrl, Yelp!, etc. People need to know how to aim each arrow for the kill.

It went well! I have been procrastinating setting up foursquare and now I have! Just like the other Social Media it will be a long term process!