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HK Rides

HK Rides

Jun 30, 2024
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Hassan
#1
Hello,

We recently opened a used car dealership a few months ago in Los Angeles (near LAX) and had some questions on what is the best way to advertise our cars and just get our company out there. Along with a couple of more insights.

Our website: HK Rides

We currently use:
DealerCenter for our DMS
Have Offerup ($155) and Autotrader/KBB ($550) for our premium web postings
Use Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace
Carfax vehicle history and linking reports to our websites ($400)

We wanted to know what websites/companies are recommended to sell our vehicles?
We currently have only sold a handful of vehicles but recently started to go full time and have 4 vehicles available currently.

What company or in general can help optimize Google SEO? To get our company to populate when someone searches for "used cars"?
How can I use Google Drive to send Credit apps to potential customers? (Or is there an alternative I should be using)

And any other helpful tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
 
#2
SEO:

used cars ... this is like getting your hands on heavy metal elements. Not likely going to happen.
Maybe "used cars LAX w century blvd" might be possible.

Plus you need to have an established domain that is old, that is registered for 10 years at a time, and have an authority in what you are doing.

You also need to be heavy on social marketing, have your business listed in google business, have legit back links, have a blog.

Have a proper SEO focused website. (you are doing good here with lighthouse stats at least. I did a quick check).
The design needs some help. The black is cool but not Prius cool and lots is missing.

Lots of this can be done by you but can a SEO company who charges you 5 digits get you there?

Ask me questions, I'll be glad to help.
 
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Dominion DMS
#4
Hey,

I'm 17 years old, and I'm starting a Social Media Agency Business for Automotive Businesses, specifically dealers.

Social Media won't directly impact your SEO, but it will help in building a presence for yourself. It's also an amazing form of advertising. For Half the Cost.

I'm young and I understand social media better than any other agency would be able to with older individuals.

A lot of people get confused on what's a key factor of making a certain post/video get more views and likes. As a youngster, I know exactly how. Young Kids (yes, kids) get thousands of views on reels - but it's often overcomplicated when managed on the business side of things.

To make it simple: good content + good timing/relations with ongoing trends across the platform AND world events + some small technical hashtag stuff = viral video.

You don't have to be an influencer, a celebrity, or have a million followers. Anyone can get thousands of views on social media, especially Instagram.

If your interested, you can message me privately. I can send you some examples and we can go from there. I've also got some other suggestions which I'll give to you then; I don't want to spam other readers.
 
#5
Congrats on your new dealership.

I have been doing automotive SEO for about 8 years. I suggest doing SEO but it takes awhile - especially in your market! Can you invest in some PPC? You'll get some faster wins there.

For SEO strategy - reviews, reviews, reviews. That's my top suggestion for building a new brand in organic search. Try to get every customer to leave a review. And reply to each one. You have three 5-star ones at the moment. I suggest replying to them.

Some high-quality exterior and interior photos will help give your profile a good first impression. So will writing a business description.

There are tons of other on-page and off-page elements to gain a solid presence in organic search. I'm not going to overwhelm you. But if you start by optimizing that GBP, you'll be heading in a good direction.
 
#6
My 2 cents, get a good website before you start worrying about SEO. Here is a fantastic vendor for dealers just starting out, very affordable and will give you a good looking site that covers the basics, they should be able to take an inventory feed from Dealer Center: https://kgidealersolutions.com/car-dealer-websites/

Speaking of Dealer Center, check with your rep if you can embed their credit app on your site. That will make it much easier to send an app to Westlake, which I presume is your main lender. It should be if you have Dealer Center. That and/or Western Funding. That's great you're on OfferUp, CL, and FB. I would say check out CarGurus, they are a must-have in Southern California. With 4 cars, you might be able to get away with private party listings with them but it can leave a poor first impression with customers.
 
Dominion DMS
#7
not sure about KGI ... their lighthouse scores ...
If you can't do your own website solid ...
but to be fair, I wouldn't mind seeing one of their dealerwebsites.


@HK Rides
This isn't my work, but here's a solid site: https://www.rightway.com/

The biggest thing with your site is that you have lots of photos but nothing to click into to get more detail.
People have developed habits so following some patterns isn't a bad thing.
I don't know why you have a login unless it's to inquiry about a car but i don't know how to do that.
How do I put a car into the cart?
why a hamburger click icon to show me sold cars?

That other SEO expert didn't bother checking out your site. I did yesterday and that's why I know it has good performance and SEO practices.

Do reviews help seo? depends who is your source? BBB? TrustPilot? These sites also happen to be legit links.
I can get 4.9 star ratings if I ask my friends and family to write me up but you really would need 600+ reviews on yelp to start really making a dent.

Yes, SEO takes time. your company is new and that is a ding to your ranking.

Ads? hmmm ... maybe postcards are better. Postcards are 1000% open rate! Pay attention rate is also higher than paid ads. But you'd be better off

You can do a lot for SEO before you need to drop 4-5 digits on it.
 
#8
One random point: if I were you, I'd invest in a better website. It doesn't really look legit. Outsource it on UpWork or something.

Dealer websites may look complicated, but as someone who's build web apps before, they're really not. Just some simple data handling. If you want me to verify a price someone gives you, let me know.

For reference, I built a Library Check-In and Check-Out system as well as a Social Media website for my school, all in 6th grade for free. (The Social Media one got me in trouble...kids across 3-4 schools were using it, at any time you'd have maybe 100 kids on it. Kids were using it during class. Oops. lol)

If I could do it 5 years ago, at a young age, for free, you can 100% get a dealer website that's nice for less than $200, maybe even $100.


If you're a fast learner and/or have time on your hands, try using Bubble.io. (Web App Builder, No Code)
You can make one in $27/month + domain price/month. The learning curve is steep, however.

Whatever you do, don't hire a web dev company. Focus on Freelancers or CS College Students who may want some small work experience. Web Dev company will probably just outsource to India and charge 5x the price for you.
 
#9
HK Rides said:
Hello,

We recently opened a used car dealership a few months ago in Los Angeles (near LAX) and had some questions on what is the best way to advertise our cars and just get our company out there. Along with a couple of more insights.

Our website: HK Rides

We currently use:
DealerCenter for our DMS
Have Offerup ($155) and Autotrader/KBB ($550) for our premium web postings
Use Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace
Carfax vehicle history and linking reports to our websites ($400)

We wanted to know what websites/companies are recommended to sell our vehicles?
We currently have only sold a handful of vehicles but recently started to go full time and have 4 vehicles available currently.

What company or in general can help optimize Google SEO? To get our company to populate when someone searches for "used cars"?
How can I use Google Drive to send Credit apps to potential customers? (Or is there an alternative I should be using)

And any other helpful tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
Click to expand...
For an independent store website, I'd recommend going with Overfuel.

Then I'd recommend dynamic inventory ads with Facebook AIA and Google VLA - this will drive a ton of guaranteed traffic to your website. SEO can be a bit of a gamble and long-term play.

For listing sites, look into TrueCar and Edmunds - they are cheaper than AutoTraders, Cars, and CarGurus but can still drive meaningful results for independents.
 
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Dominion DMS
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