Hiring a Full-Time SEO and Internet Marketing Manager for your Dealership

[Jennifer Schrader (blog)]

Oh one more thing.....!

Being on the cover of the Digital Dealer Magazine is a great accomplishment of a dealership in a whole! I applaud & give high fives for the Internet Manager / E Commerce Director etc success for doing that and such a job well done.

"One last stab at Internet Managers- Get over yourself! Being on the cover of Digital Dealer magazine is a JOKE! So stop embarrassing yourself and just put up regular pictures of yourselves. ANYONE can be on the cover of Digital Dealer Magazine"

Anyone?? Why have you not been on there?

Being on the cover (success stories) gives hope to other ISM's, GM's, SM's etc. that they can improve from that magazine & other viable sources.

Just my $0.02

 

[Tony Weaver (blog)]

Man I am just messing around. I got it. I will just post positive things for now on. I am not worried about what has been said about me. I just always just read, and "observed" in the past. I suppose when you have so many people backing up each other, I can seem like I am drinking spiked Cool-Aid!

Observer was absolutely right- and I was served. I will hang back, put together less of a rant and explain myself in the near future.

I really do appreciate your comments. And to Observer, you are right about my site, to a point. I will forward this thread to my web provider though...

Honestly, I do not need a blog, I do not need Web 2.0, I do not need to be on MySpace and Facebook, and I "do" need to clean up my site. Regardless, no matter how my peers out there see me right now, my Internet Department in this store is still selling the same as always (1/3 of the sales for this store); Christmas is going to be great! You just have to realize that many of the things you guys blog about has nothing to do with your success! I just went about saying it wrong.

I have no excuses or complaints about my dealer; I don't care if my dealer has zero PPC budget, or SEO. We are killing it, always have, and always will. I just do not understand why people focus on so many things that have NOTHING to do with selling cars on these blogs (there are exceptions for needing these things).

I promise only positive feedback for now on! Again, I will write something up and send it to Jeff.

 

[Jennifer Schrader (blog)]

Tony- Now you are talking!

I am glad you see. We all come togethor and back each other up and most important help others out.

Ok Ok I will take a gander at your site. What is the URL address? I would be more than happy to give you a few pointers if you have not all ready received enough.

Have a great day and sell many cars!

 

[Mike Keesee]

Jennifer,

How can I get on the Digital Dealer Magazine?

Do you think that SEO / SEM should be highlighted and have 1 expert in the dealership for such a reason? Or do you think 1 person can handle it all with the help of course with a good website vendor?

 

[Jennifer Schrader (blog)]

Mike

You are more than welcome to shoot me over an email with your contact information. I can absolutely give you a bit of advice!

No sales pitch intended

 

[Tony Weaver (blog)]

Mike,
Just email the editor, it is that easy!

 

[Tony Weaver (blog)]

www.berglundtoyota.com

 

[Alex Snyder (blog)]

I don't think it works like that Tony. I believe the magazines contact the person they want to feature. There aren't applications or try-outs.

 

[Jeff Larsen (blog)]

I think a great summary to this blog would be to hear from some of the other respected, successful professionals in the business that do not normally post on here, yet converse and consult everyday with multiple dealership's management and owners across the country on this topic.

Rafi Hamid, Alex Snyder, Corey Mosely... just to name a few that come to mind quickly.

If the dealerships embrace the technology and processes the top consultants suggest, are they adequately staffing positions to maximize their ROI from these tools and processes?

 

[Mat Koenig (blog)]

I know I'm jumping into the dialogue a little late but there are some great points shared by all that have caught my attention.

I need to clarify one thing first that I saw in a post above. Cars.com does not charge anything for the dealer training sessions that we host.

They're held all over the country and you can contact your local Cars.com Sales Manager to find out when we will be hosting one near you.

I wanted to share a few comments regarding the main topic of hiring someone full time for SEO/SEM.

After visiting dealerships everywhere from Kalamazoo, Michigan to Las Vegas I have witnessed a few things that I will share with you as you decide what works best in your stores.

From what I've seen many dealerships would see more benefit by investing in other areas like: training for their staff, taking the time to prospect in their service department since those customers already have a level of trust with them, or even by tuning up their website.

Until those processes are in place, many will continue to blow customers out faster than they will sell them and this causes long term damage to what could be a great consumer relationship.

Let's say that you do invest in a full time person to manage SEO/SEM.

Let's assume a consumer does end up at your website. What will they see? Is the website going to inspire the consumer to make contact? If they make contact will the sales person have the skills needed to get them in the door? If they do purchase will your team continue to follow up and prospect so that the consumer is loyal to you and your store?

If the answer to all of that isn't a resounding yes...perhaps you should consider investing time and money in those areas first.

Finally I want to bring up something that I hear more and more from Dealers. I have met hundreds of Owners and General Managers this year who have spent oodles of dollars on SEM. When I ask them why they have invested so much in SEM the typical dialogue looks like this:

Why are you investing so much in SEM?
"To get them to my website."

And the goal of getting them to your website is what: "To get them to email or call us."

For the $5,500 you spent last month on it how many people came to your website?:
"Um, I'm not totally sure but it looks like about (X)"

Ok, so how many of them called or emailed?:
"I don't know but I'm sure a good number did because we track things really well."

--------------------
Gang, we all know that this is a numbers game and getting more people to your website should increase contacts which should increase sales.

The toughest part about SEM is that we're investing in the "HOPE" system. I 'hope' they come to my site and I 'hope' they will contact me and I 'hope' my sales person will get an appointment where I 'hope' they will close a deal.

In today's economy we need to stop throwing dollars toward things that we 'hope' will work.

While many pay-per-lead providers offer low quality I would argue one thing (without talking about specific providers): Pay-per-lead fulfills the goal of SEM by skipping the 'hope' steps. The end goal for SEM is a contact which is what you get with Pay-per-lead services isn't it?

Hiring a dedicated staff person for SEO/SEM may be the best plan for your dealership if you have a rock solid website, and a great process in place for tracking the referring sources for your website traffic.

Hiring a dedicated staff person for SEO/SEM may be a good idea if you have solid processes in place for sales, follow up and prospecting. However, if you don't have those in place, you may be better off investing a few dollars in training your team before spending it on any additional advertising.

That way, when you are ready to invest in advertising, you know you will get great results and you don't have sit back and 'hope' for the best.

Congratulations in advance on a great close to November!

Helping the best get better,
Mat Koenig
Sales Training Manager
Cars.com