Auto Dealers Are Flying Blind Into a Wall

I encourage all managers, working at automotive dealerships, to honestly assess how they are measuring their return on ad spend (ROAS). Most dealers are guessing which online advertising investments are working and ignoring the channels that are most easily validated!

The goals of your local marketing strategy might include increasing the turn rate of your inventory, maximizing your profits in sales/service, and increasing customer retention rates. To determine which marketing investments are working to achieve your business goals, you must understand the consumer journey and online events which are considered conversions.

Since most vehicle/service transactions require an “offline” visit to the dealership, knowing all the marketing investments that influenced a consumer to visit is a challenge.

Your marketing investments drive showroom traffic without your direct ability to see which of your advertising strategies influenced that decision. From my research, approximately 10% of all website visits will result in a consumer identifying themselves through traditional conversion channels; lead forms, chat, phone calls, or text messages.

That means that 90% of all consumers influenced by your marketing dollars are in stealth mode until they step in the showroom. Dealers cannot afford to guess at which marketing investments are working, but they have been for years.

You know this to be the case. Most consumers who purchase a vehicle from your dealership are NOT in your CRM with a recent active communication with your sales team. The consumer’s decision to visit your dealership could be a result of them purchasing a vehicle in the past, but you must realize that even repeat customers are influenced by your marketing investments.

Outside of specialized software tools that provide multi-touch attribution models, mobile app shopping data from companies like Cars.com and Autotrader.com confirm inventory engagement and dealership lot visits from consumers who are not in your CRM.

Since apps know the location of the consumer’s mobile device, a stealth shopper who doesn’t convert using traditional methods, can still be attributed to your investment in third-party syndication partners. Wouldn’t you agree that getting a consumer on your physical lot is a desirable result of your marketing dollars?

Consumers visit multiple online websites during their vehicle shopping journey. Those influences include Google search, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, third-party classified websites, research websites, and online review websites. In fact, consumers spend more time on third-party research websites than dealer or OEM websites.

When the consumer's research is completed, they will visit an average of 2.4 dealerships, according to new research by TrueCar unveiled at the 8th Annual Digital Marketing Strategies Conference (DMSC).

Today, we must add mobile app data to the many touch-points that can model the consumer journey and provide attribution insights. Google and Facebook are actively working on models for auto dealers using their offline attribution software.

If a consumer comes to your website from a Google AdWords campaign, and calls your dealership, it would be foolish to think that AdWords was the only influence to trigger the phone call. What if the consumer first saw a vehicle on Cars.com or Edmunds? What if she checked out your reviews on DealerRater.com. Then, she Googled your dealership name and clicked on your AdWords SEM ad, to see if the car was still in stock.

This path is just one example why multi-touch attribution is the future of automotive marketing. There are several promising developments that will allow dealers to see more elements of the customer journey. This will allow you to reward the marketing partners that effectively influence showroom visits and sales. In the meantime, there are several must have conversion tools in place to measure the last-touch conversions that are more easily captured. I covered them in depth in my book, "Who Sold It?"

A Conference Dedicated to Advanced Analytics and Attribution

Dealers who want to move past outdated lead conversion reports from their CRM and embrace a more comprehensive approach to marketing optimization, are invited to attend the Automotive Analytics and Attribution Summit (AAAS), Nov 18-20th at the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach Florida.

This is not a 101 conference. This is a conference to move the conversation from the current "last-click-attribution" models used by dealers to a more sober conversation on what is really influencing showroom visits. This conference is perfect for dealers and dealer groups that are heavily invested in online marketing.

The conference will showcase first-to-market research from companies serving the automotive industry, including some "wow" attribution presentations from companies that include Comcast Spotlight, Contact-at-Once, CDK Global, Social Dealer, DealerInspire, and Outsell.

Dealers and members of the vendor community are invited to submit papers and case studies regarding their work on sales and marketing attribution. Send them to me for review. Dealership managers, OEM leaders, and members of the vendor community can register here: https://automotiveattributionsummit.com/

AAAS Sponsorship opportunities are available and Carrie Pasch is handling those inquiries. Call carrie at 908-601-6475.