Highline Franchise Marketing

[mcampo2501]

Wow. Thanks for all the feedback everybody. Sorry for the delayed response on my end, as I thought I prompted DR to email me when someone responded, and upon not getting an email I thought no one had an opinion. My situation here is complex, so let me try and explain my confusion a little better. I'm working a cradle to the grave internet program here where I report to the GM. I'm getting about 70-80 leads each month and am only closing about 7-10% of these leads. At Toyota I was working the same system and closing 12-15% of my leads and handling more leads. What's worse is that the leads I'm getting here come strictly from autotrader, cars.com, and the manufacturer. My thoughts originally were that the close ratio would be stronger with fewer leads to address and those leads coming from just the primary lead sources. I'm not taking incoming phone calls and I'm not taking web chats (sales floor complained heavy on these points).

What's interesting is this. Of the leads I get, I'm contacting around 70% (up from what I'm used to). Of the appointments I get, I have about 90% showing. Of my appointments that show, I close a little over 60%. The huge deficiency is in getting the people I contact to commit to an appointment. While I expect about 36% of my leads to result in a set appointment, I'm lucky to do half that here.

What I'm trying to do is attract quality leads (I know...who's not trying to do that), and at the moment we are doing nothing with facebook, twitter, dealer rater, etc. Does anyone think that a focused effort in any of these mediums brings qualified buyers to our website, and in turn improves closing ratios?

 

[bzweifel]

DELETED

 

[yagoparamo]

Affluent buyers most cherish their TIME; moreso than bargains, option packages, etc. That's why, theoretically, "Social" plays an expanded role, in 2 ways.

1. Their "experience" while in your presence. Promise a Red Carpet, and they'll respond.
2. Status (actual, not FB). Affluent people want the newest Benz in their driveway not because of the newest fuel injection system, but because of how it looks in their driveway.

Its my experience that while their is more "actual" social engagement with the affluent, there is less "digital social."

Regardless of the medium, it's the messaging that matters most.

Yes BUT,

Money still money, and most people with some money (not the .5% top but the rest of people earning good money) don't just throw it away. Biggest conversation piece at the high end dealers close to Microsoft, Google, etc here is Seattle is how hard is to deal with these guys when it comes to money.

But to illustrate, let me show these:

2008 Porsche 911 Carrera 4S Cabriolet	2 Dr Convertible	8K	$79,950
Ext.Color: Black Engine: 3.8L H6 VIN: WP0CB29908S777279
2008 Porsche 911 Carrera S Cabriolet	Cabriolet	8K	$79,995
Ext.Color: Blue Engine: Gas Flat 6-cyl VIN: WP0CB29968S775391

Priced the same, but one if a 4S instead of just an S. I don't know much about Porsches but it seems that one is a better deal than the other. I'm sure Porsche buyers will be looking at that just like we look at a Accord LX VS. EX if they are priced similarly.

So while I agree that I higher end buyer may have a different expectation of service and attention than a regular customer I think that the laws of marketing apply to all the same.

From my small world perspective, some of the most successful campaigns in Craigslist have been high end cars specially Cadillac dealers with $30K-40K inventory (some people may not consider that high end though).

Just look at a Porsche search in Seattle in CL seattle cars & trucks - all classifieds "porsche" - craigslist

I would suggest that you create a simple ad and have your local company give that a shoot: 2011 Porsche 911 Carrera S Cabriolet

 

[joe.pistell]

Yago,

top 2 links do not work, not sure why. Your CL ad was slow to populate for me, so I tested it, takes 40secs to DL Pingdom Tools

You may want to give that a look.

 

[yagoparamo]

Yago,

top 2 links do not work, not sure why. Your CL ad was slow to populate for me, so I tested it, takes 40secs to DL Pingdom Tools

You may want to give that a look.

Thank you for checking Joe,

These are the Porsche's

2008 Porsche 911 - Stadium Nissan of Seattle, Seattle, WA

2008 Porsche 911 - Park Place LTD, Bellevue, WA

as for CL the load times are all over the place for no rime or reason, that particular ad's photos are hosted in a cloud with plenty of horse power...

but I hope my examples helped illustrate my belief that to a certain point, we all shop fairly similar and in the same websites.

 

[bzweifel]

Pulled from the disclaimer in the Porsche AD:

"Advertised price is for cash purchase. Prices good for today only."

Yago, does this really fly with customers in Seattle? I'm pretty sure I would get cussed out on the phone by 15 soccer moms, who aren't even in the market for a car, if I ran an ad like this.

 

[yagoparamo]

Pulled from the disclaimer in the Porsche AD:




Yago, does this really fly with customers in Seattle? I'm pretty sure I would get cussed out on the phone by 15 soccer moms, who aren't even in the market for a car, if I ran an ad like this.

I don't coach dealers on strategy we are more of a production company type for the dealers; you tell us what you need/want and our job is to make it happen. That was added by the dealer as an individual comment in the vehicle.

Remember though that a lot of times those stupid disclaimers have a lot to do with stupid local advertising rules. In this case, in WA you must disclose that the price ends today on an ad or otherwise is valid until you sell the car even though you may have changed it in another source. So even if someone prints the ad and comes back next month when 911 are-lets say--in higher demand they can't demand the price printed in their paper. The cash disclaimer has to do with WA law where the final price including finance charges must be that, so by stating that this is a cash price you can then provide a different quote should the customer have a trade, bad score, etc.

In other occasions the dealer will add those from a previous experience, a deal going south because after negotiating a price the customer brought in a trade or some screwed up financial situation and when the dealer sees that they can't put the numbers together the customers now pulls a "my friend is a lawyer and he says you must honer this price".

The more you spend in the car biz the more you learn that there is a reason for every cause and reaction.

 

[bzweifel]

I don't coach dealers on strategy we are more of a production company type for the dealers; you tell us what you need/want and our job is to make it happen. That was added by the dealer as an individual comment in the vehicle.

Remember though that a lot of times those stupid disclaimers have a lot to do with stupid local advertising rules. In this case, in WA you must disclose that the price ends today on an ad or otherwise is valid until you sell the car even though you may have changed it in another source. So even if someone prints the ad and comes back next month when 911 are-lets say--in higher demand they can't demand the price printed in their paper. The cash disclaimer has to do with WA law where the final price including finance charges must be that, so by stating that this is a cash price you can then provide a different quote should the customer have a trade, bad score, etc.

In other occasions the dealer will add those from a previous experience, a deal going south because after negotiating a price the customer brought in a trade or some screwed up financial situation and when the dealer sees that they can't put the numbers together the customers now pulls a "my friend is a lawyer and he says you must honer this price".

The more you spend in the car biz the more you learn that there is a reason for every cause and reaction.

Its wasn't a shot at you, it just seemed very Odd. Thanks for the explanation.

 

[yagoparamo]

Its wasn't a shot at you, it just seemed very Odd. Thanks for the explanation.

I didn't take it as a shoot but just wanted to give you an idea of why these things happen. If the DOL would pay attention and understand the dealers things would be different.

 

[Jeff Kershner]

Hey gentlemen, for the better of the community lets please try and keep our comments on target with the actual discussion.

If you find your comments could possibly take the thread in a direction that's not relevant to the discussion, please start a new thread.

Now let's get back to the original conversation....