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A lot of good points made here, and there is certainly a time and place to use software to solve simple problems...That said, when it comes to paid search say no to Automation! It makes too many assumptions about complex situations. Additionally it puts WAY too much trust in the hand's of Google and Bing. You can find a lot of qualified individuals/companies that will manually manage your campaigns...and you'll be a lot happier that you did.

I agree with this. Automation lacks common sense.
I've found many times dealers spend fruitless money on:
  • "Premium" models. Buying keywords that aren't transaction based for vehicles like Mustangs, etc often just buy fanboy traffic
  • As Is / Junk - surprising number of companies don't filter the junk out and can spend over $100 advertising something with no gross value
  • Dealership Name - yes, protect your brand. No, don't spend 75% of your adwords budget on your own name. Unless your dealership name is too geographical, I try and avoid these keywords because they're already looking for you
  • Company Demos - automation also often fails to marketing things like demos properly - the message for them is entirely different
etc
 
Joe's approach of Vendor first DIY second I think is a solid one.

It will shorten the learning curve a by a lot. It's basically a building block to learning what it takes to get the job done.
If you find that you can and want to take on that task you'll feel a lot better about allocating the time to do so.
 
Looks like you can do some things through native Google technology / DoubleClick
https://www.doubleclickbygoogle.com/articles/doubleclick-search-inventory-management-automobiles/
This is pretty cool, I wonder if they will branch out and add the inventory in the same way they do for shopping now

http://prntscr.com/k59fs3 like that when you search for nike shoes.

I have always gone with a strategy of casting a wide net (lots of keywords, lots of ads) and then rapidly revising it down to the ones that are converting, because at the end of the day the only thing that matters is your cost per conversion- clicks are useless without the attached enquiry.
 
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This is pretty cool, I wonder if they will branch out and add the inventory in the same way they do for shopping now

http://prntscr.com/k59fs3 like that when you search for nike shoes.

I have always gone with a strategy of casting a wide net (lots of keywords, lots of ads) and then rapidly revising it down to the ones that are converting, because at the end of the day the only thing that matters is your cost per conversion- clicks are useless without the attached enquiry.
There's an INVENTORY option in their interface. I'm sure that's their thoughts. They're not stupid, they see the ads flying into AW. Why not react to it?
 
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