Drop in Referral traffic from Ford.com to DDC Websites?

[Alexander Lau]

In Canada they picked 1 vendor and made it optional to use the site, but not optional to pay for it.
Every Ford dealer in Canada had to pay into the new Digital Marketing program, which had a 2-3 year contract with the vendor.
Before the first year was up it fell apart and they had to rescind the mandatory payment requirement because it wasn't working.

Be thankful you have more than 1 choice.

that sucks...

 

[Ryan Everson]

In Canada they picked 1 vendor and made it optional to use the site, but not optional to pay for it.
Every Ford dealer in Canada had to pay into the new Digital Marketing program, which had a 2-3 year contract with the vendor.
Before the first year was up it fell apart and they had to rescind the mandatory payment requirement because it wasn't working.

Be thankful you have more than 1 choice.

SearchOptics?

 

[George Nenni]

My Ford dealer finally heard back from Ford.com, though the answer is kind of strange. Let me know what you think of it:

"We have migrated to Adobe Analytics to be more in-line with our suppliers. Each reporting platform measures visits and referrals a bit differently."

We're not talking about what analytics tool they're using, just how they code the external links. Right?

 

[Ryan Everson]

My Ford dealer finally heard back from Ford.com, though the answer is kind of strange. Let me know what you think of it:

"We have migrated to Adobe Analytics to be more in-line with our suppliers. Each reporting platform measures visits and referrals a bit differently."

We're not talking about what analytics tool they're using, just how they code the external links. Right?

Yeah it has nothing to do with what analytics platform they use, it has to do with the limitations of tracking https to non-https referrals.

Ford would either need to do one of two things:

1) Add a UTM tag to each dealer's website link. (Best option)
http://www.abcford.com/?utm_source=ford.com&utm_medium=referral

or

2) Add a meta referrer tag on Ford's website. (Not ideal as it isn't supported by all browsers)
<meta name="referrer" content="always" />

 

[Ryan Everson]

Or option 3: approve forward thinking website vendors like DealerInspire who use SSL certificates on their dealership client sites

 

[George Nenni]

Received a forwarded note from a Ford Dealer last night, Ford.com is aware of the global issue, and should have a fix next week. Stay tuned.

 

[craigh]

Or option 3: approve forward thinking website vendors like DealerInspire who use SSL certificates on their dealership client sites

Google all but mandated these certificates - it has gone from "forward thinking" to "commonplace".
I don't know how I would explain to a client that we can't offer them something Google has been recommending for years and borderline requiring now.

 

[Alexander Lau]

Google all but mandated these certificates - it has gone from "forward thinking" to "commonplace".
I don't know how I would explain to a client that we can't offer them something Google has been recommending for years and borderline requiring now.

Exactly, if you're a dealer and your platform provider hasn't yet offered them, look elsewhere. I've already said this here and was disagreed with, which I find funny...

 

[craigh]

Exactly, if you're a dealer and your platform provider hasn't yet offered them, look elsewhere. I've already said this here and was disagreed with, which I find funny...

With LetsEncrypt you can offer free certificates, they auto-renew and coming up this year they'll be offering wildcard certificates as well.
It's braindead simple if you're on linux boxes and not that complicated in a Windows environment.
I've seen most vendors jump onboard already and I've started getting the warnings on some other sites that have form inputs and no SSL.