In the past few months, I have been fielding calls from dealers who are looking for ways to increase revenue to offset declining car sales. Car part sales and extended warranty sales seen to be the hot topic among the dealers that I communicate with. I’ve started a number of great projects to generate revenue from these two sources but part sales are so ripe, I just had to write about it.

For genuine manufacturer car part sales, it seems that only a few choices exist for car dealers who want to compete for online dollars. The car parts website platforms that are the most popular actually score very poorly from an SEO perspective.  When I compare these website platforms to what matters in Google they fail miserably in my opinion. This creates an amazing opportunity for dealers who create their own SEO compliant parts website pages or find a work around to these flawed databases.

One of the leading website platforms for car dealer parts websites is Trade Motion who creates “skins” for dealers and then drives parts searches to their own website database.  I don’t think dealers understand that buying into this model will always require them to use Google Adwords or SEM to drive traffic and sales. The offsite hosted inventory pages in Trade Motion will never generate natural search rankings for their own main parts website let alone allow them to compete nationally via organic search.

A case in point is a site called www.directhondaparts.com which uses the Trade Motion parts database. This site was chosen at random.  As soon as you start searching for parts, you leave the site called www.directhondaparts.com and move to the Trade Motion website.  For example, the page that lists 2005 Honda Accord Brake Pads is:

http://www.trademotion.com/partlocator/index.cfm?action=getLocator&siteid=214308&chapter=APG646&appSectionid=18&groupid=10006&subgroupid=62206&make=12&model=Accord&year=2005&catalogid=1

If you look at this long and convoluted URL it obviously is not associated with the sponsoring domain. It also does not comply with Google recommendations about simplifying dynamic URL strings or to utilize a clear set of sub-directory structures. You can read Google’s recommendations in this PDF document:

http://www.paschconsulting.com/PDF/search-engine-optimization-starter-guide.pdf

The reality is that all the page views associated with paying for a consumer via SEM to shop the parts database will never be associated with the car dealer’s parts website domain.  Only www.trademotion.com gets credit for the page views and time on site.

Another example is www.infinitipartsonline.com which uses another version of Trade Motion’s database platform, which is better but not ideal.  The Infiniti 2007 FX35 brake pads come up as:

http://www.infinitipartsonline.com/partlocator/index.cfm?action=getJointLocator&siteid=214952&chapter=&sectionids=18,0&groupid=10006&subgroupid=62206&make=14&model=Fx35&year=2007&catalogid=1&displayCatalogid=0

In this example, the database pages  are tied to the main URL but the length and composition of the URL is not designed to compete for organic search listings. In addition, the META description and HTML title for this page has nothing to do with 2007 FX35 brake parts.  This is in violation of Google’s SEO guidelines.

Here are the HTML tags that are on the page for 2007 Infiniti FX35 front brake pads, which are obviously just a generic tagging system:

<META name=”description” content=”A complete line of Infiniti parts & Infiniti Accessories. OEM Infiniti Parts and Aftermarket Performance Infiniti Parts”>

<META name=”KEYWORDS” content=”NISMO, infiniti parts, infinity parts, Infiniti accessories, Infinity accessories, G35 coupe, G35 Sedan, G20 accessories, G20 performance, G35 performance, G35 parts, G20 parts, infiniti parts, infinity parts, nissan parts, nismo parts, G35 accessories ,performance parts, brake pros, stillen, stillen brakes, metal matrix, performance brakes, g35 brakes, g20 brakes, oem nissan parts, oem infiniti parts, oem infinity parts, wholesale nissan, wholesale infiniti, wholesale infinity, nissan, infiniti, infinity, g20, g35, fx35, fx45,  g35, q45, i30, j30, qx4,  350z, 300zx, datsun, infiniti factory parts, infinity factory parts,  m45, m35, m30, i35, infinity g35, infiniti g35, infiniti fx35, infiniti fx45, infinity fx35, infinity fx45″>

Dealers who want to compete nationally for parts sales need to create an SEO strategy that will build pages rankings and traffic that will not ONLY require SEM. Right now it seems like sites like www.parts.com  have an inside track on what web architecture really drives organic sales results. 

I’ve been studying parts websites for a while and have solutions to mediate the poor SEO design of many current parts website platforms.  If dealers are interested in building a better parts business on the Internet, they are encouraged to share best practices here.  Dealers are also invited to give me a call to discuss how we can help better optimize their current efforts in selling parts online.  I can be reached at 732-842-4720.

Google Base is a classified advertising system developed by Google.  The listings can be displayed on Google related properties at the discretion of Google but most people go directly to Google Base to search and buy goods.   Google Base is currently free and allows anyone to post an item for sale.  Postings will stay in their system for up to 30 days.  All items that are posted are categorized and highly searchable through Google Base’s simple user interface.

Google Base is an ideal SEO tool for selling cars, trucks and other vehicles. Cutting edge car dealers have started to use Google Base as part of their  Automotive SEO strategy.  Because of how Google Base can be setup,  an SEO consultant can use this system to create greater visibility for their car inventory on the Internet. 

Adoption of Google Base by auto dealers has been hindered by technology and time constraints. Without special programming, car dealers have to enter their cars one at a time.  Dealers did not have off the shelf tools to take their inventory feeds and seamlessly integrate their car data and photos into Google Base until now.  Additionally,  GB Feeder is designed to maximize the SEO benefit by posting cars on Google Base; a strategy that PCG customers currently benefit from.

Pasch Consulting Group Unveils ”GB Feeder”

The Pasch Consulting Group is now offering a service to capture car dealer new and used car feeds and automatically post them into Google Base.  The PCG software called “GB Feeder” accepts over a dozen standard automotive feeds including CSV, XML, ADF and ASCII via FTP.  GB Feeder is compatible with third party car inventory management services* like:

• DealerFusion.com
• DealerSpecialties.com
• HomeNetInc.com
• SELECTQU
• AutoBase.com
• EBizAutos.com
• Dealer.com
• GetAuto.com
• InfinitiNet

The PCG software will accept daily updates from car dealer feeds and post new entries into Google base on a regular schedule.  Car dealers will be glad to know that PCG can customize any car inventory data file  into their “GB Feeder” system.

In addition to increased visibility, the GB Feeder software provides a new tool in The Pasch Consulting Group Automotive SEO toolkit to help dealers sell cars on the Internet.  The Google Base service is now available in addition to their automated listing services for Craigslist, BackPage and MerchantCircle.

For additional information on Google Base car inventory feeds, contact the Pasch Consulting Group at 732-842-4720 or email us at sales@paschconsulting.com

* The automotive vendor compatability is based on existing customers who are feeding data from these vendors into our systems.  These vendors are not endorsing or supporting compatability for GB Feeder.

It is clear that search engine optimization (SEO), social networking, and organic search marketing are tools that car dealers need to understand and utilize  to compete on the Internet. 

There are a good number of articles available to car dealers  that advocate automotive digital marketing as an important budgetary item  however for some  managers it can be difficult to quantify the actual ROI to their dealership in any given week or month.  

Short Term Digital Marketing

The work to build consistent cars leads from an SEO campaign is spread over weeks, months and even years.  So you can imagine my excitement when I had a chance to measure the short term impact of a proven set of Automotive SEO strategies on a single promotion event for an Infiniti dealer in Arizona.

The event was held December12-14th in Chandler Arizona at the Adesa Auction Grounds; a direct to public sale of used Infiniti and Nissan Cars coordinated by Nissan and a third party marketing company.  Eight area Infiniti and Nissan dealers were invited to participate in co-op advertising costs for the event which presented about 650 cars for sale over a three day weekend. 

The event was not an auction.  It was a factory direct sale of lease end cars, repossessed cars, and demo cars which dealers could sell at the event on a first come basis.   The advertising campaign from participant co-op dollars would go into radio, TV, and newspaper ads.  The company who organized the event also had a website which included the basic details on the event: date, location, and time.

Automotive Event Marketing Tactics

The marketing strategy set by my client was to secure appointments in advance of the three day weekend event.  I was given three weeks’ notice to come up with an Internet marketing plan.  We created an action plan to determine what the dealer’s staff would be doing and what my company would be doing. 

The dealer would be contacting all unsold prospects in their database as well as starting a small pay-per-click campaign that would send direct leads to a microsite that I was to create.

I was to create the automotive marketing microsite for the event which would load all of the 650 cars into an online searchable database, a concept which no other dealers participating in the event implemented.  The event site was http://www.arizonausedinfiniti.com .

An ADF feed was created from an Excel Spreadsheet provided by the event organizers.  This ADF feed was also loaded into Infiniti of  Scottsdale’s used inventory which in turn was distributed to a number of third party car marketing platforms.  This allowed the Infiniti dealer to promote the cars in the event to a very wide audience in a very short period of time.  

Since Infiniti of Scottsdale was the only dealer that displayed the event inventory in advance of the sale, they had a distinct advantage on capturing and confirming pre-event interest.  The sales staff could walk people through the site on the phone to find cars that met their budget and then book an appointment to see the car.

As part our Internet Marketing strategy, we emailed their entire customer database with a simple text email designed to get in under the spam filters and direct people to the event website. We issued a series of Internet press releases that directed consumer traffic to the site organically.  This helped to compliment the buzz that was being created on radio, TV, and newspapers.  

The Power of Automotive Press Releases

Since we knew that the traditional marketing campaign would generate online interest, we made sure that our site would come up in Google searches for a few variations of the event name.  If you go into Google and type “Chandler Surplus Sale”  or  “Arizona car surplus sale” you can see that we dominate the first page of Google which lead to over 300 visits per day in advance of the car event.   

In the three week prior to the event, we unleashed the Internet marketing “hounds” at a very reasonable cost to the dealership.  We utilized social networking platforms, Craigslist, Google Base, and a few proprietary marketing models.  The event site was getting over 300 hits a day from interested parties which were not generated by any of the co-cop advertising dollars for this event.

The results?  Infiniti of Scotstdale had the most appointments of all Infiniti dealers at the event and they sold more cars to consumers than any other Infiniti dealer .  The bottom line is that the event was very profitable and the ROI on the Internet marketing costs was very high.   When the event was over, the General Manager clearly understood that the success at the event was a great partnership between his outstanding sales team and aggressive internet marketing strategies.

The residual benefits are that the 150+ leadsthat came into our marketing microsite are still being pursued and matched up with used cars from their used car inventory.  The event created a fresh list of leads of  Arizona car shoppers looking for used car values. The ISM is confident that he can turn these unsold event leads into sales this month.

The event marketing website will be repurposed for selling Infiniti used cars in Arizona year round. It has already started to gain some organic ranking for Infiniti used car searches in Arizona.  It’s great to know that when the pressure is on, organic search marketing and Automotive digital marketing techniques can make a short term difference and return a fantastic ROI.  The long term benefits of SEO have been discussed on this forum at great lengths. In this case, a short term Internet marketing campaign outside of Pay-Per-Click, resulted in outstanding results.

Looking For New Automotive Marketing Stratgies?

Contact Brian Pasch, CEO to discuss how the Pasch Consulting Group can help energize your new and used cars sales in the year ahead.

Owners of ANY business need to be checking Google and Yahoo on a regular basis for posts on their company that are positive or negative.  This can be automated by using a free service called “Google Alerts” or by manually searching for your company name.  Postive posts can be leveraged in company newsletter and also added to your company website.  Negative posts have to be delt with immediately.

There are a number of popular websites where consumers go to post complaints. The most popular being: www.ripoffreport.com , www.dealerrater.com, and www.complaintsboard.com.  In addition to dedicated complaints websites, you should be checking consumer review sites like www.yelp.com , www.merchantcircle.com and www.insider-pages.com  on a regular basis.

We recommend that you periodically check these three websites for posts about your company. Keep in mind that most dedicated “complaints” websites allow you to post a balanced commentary.  Depending on the post and the motivation of the person who created the post, different responses are suggested by PCG. The staff at www.RipOffReport.com is responsive to the concerns of businesses that are being accused on their website. They will however avoid getting in the middle of disputes and encourage people to post responses for all to see.

Internet reputation management is one of the specialty services offered by the Pasch Consulting Group.  When a client contracts us to review negative posts, we will do a thorough job of researching the complaint and try to reach out to the person who is upset. The best course of action is to resolve the matter directly but that is not always reasonable or possible.  If the matter gets resolved, the person who posted the negative commentary has the best chance of having it removed or edited.

In cases where the posts are misleading or just plain lies, we will contact the websites where these posts are made and seek a retraction.  We have had success with removing or editing posts where there are valid misrepresentations. There is no guarantee that posts can be deleted so you have to have alternative plans, which we can provide.  Keep in mind that these consumer complaint websites want to represent the facts and they do not want to hurt any specific company from slanderous or false accusations.

If your company needs help with negative posts on the Internet, please give us a call at 732-842-4720.  We will review your situation and discuss our plan to help remediate and mitigate these negative posts.

Car Dealer Websites

US car dealers who are looking for more cost effective ways to market their car inventory now have an ideal solution for a challenging automotive marketplace.  The Pasch Consulting Group (PCG) is offering US car dealers with a search marketing friendly and Google SEO compliant car marketing platform that is custom branded for the car dealer’s business.  The web marketing platform is a low cost and efficient way to market cars on their internet and take advantage or the power of organic search marketing.

Large car dealer groups can benefit even more from PCG’s offering by combining all brands into one massive used car marketing portal in their state.  The added bonus is that each dealership, in a dealer group, can still retain their own identity. 

Used Cars Sales in Kentucky

For example, Quantrell Auto Group in Kentucky has hired PCG to create a destination used car sales website for their four brands: Saab, Volvo, Cadillac and Saturn. Quantrell‘s used car marketing website will have one main destination URL and one unique sub-domain for each brand.  This architecture has a dual SEO benefit for search optimization. 

Car dealers using the PCG platform to create their own used car marketing website leverage their combined inventory which can attract more local consumers to their dealership group.  The platform can be used for standalone dealerships or dealer group so its flexibility is unmatched.

Brian Pasch, CEO of the Pasch Consulting Group, commented “The PCG car marketing platform is just what car dealer’s need in this economy.  With the cost of pay-per-click advertising on the rise, dealers are realizing they need to invest in their own lead generation and sales platform.  Unlike other car dealer platforms, our platform employs the best in search engine optimization architecture.”

The PCG marketing platform works equally as well with new car sales and is currently being utilized in dealerships around the country representing car brands such as BMW, Acura, Audi, Nissan, Infiniti, Honda and Jaguar. 

In addition to their inventory platform, the Pasch Consulting Group offers a service to car dealers post their used car inventory on popular free sites like Craigslist, Backpage and Google Base.  Since PCG has their used car inventory feed, many of these tasks can be semi or fully automated which saves the dealer significant time and resources.

For additional information, contact Brian Pasch, CEO of the Pasch Consulting Group at 732-842-4720.

The Pasch Consulting Group offers car dealers with the opportunity to promote their car inventory on a number of social networking websites including: 

• Craigslist
• BackPage
• MerchantCircle
• Google Base

The advantage of using these tools is simple; you sell more cars.  You sell more cars because your inventory is displayed in more places where consumers research car prices or local car sales.  A second advantage is that for some of these website, you can create inbound links to your website from a high quality website.  If done properly, if you post your used car inventory with a dedicated page link per car, you can simply the shopping experience as well as create power direct inner links to your website.

For example this link: www.usednissancars.net/MA/2006/Nissan/Altima/Used-2006-Nissan-Altima-589.html directly points to a used Nissan Altima for sale in Massachusetts.  By having this direct link “live” in Craigslist, consumers can them go directly to the photos and the specific details on the car with one click.  With our optimized car inventory module, the benefits of individual SEO optimized landing pages are further leveraged on Craigslist.

As sites like www.Craigslist.org get more popular, consumers will start directly searching for cars that may be posted on Craigslist.  Yes, they can go and search Craigslist on their site but I believe consumers will also start searching Google with a search phrase like “Boston craigslist 2005 BMW x5″.

The process of loading your inventory on Craigslist can be often as you like since we can accept your car inventory feed and post cars in the geo-areas on Craigslist that are local to you. Our fees for posting are changed by the hour so you get efficient posting on social networks without a set fee.  This will reduce you costs on months when new car inventory is lighter than normal.

If you are interested in discussing how Social Networking sites can benefit your Internet visibility, give us a call.  Ask to speak with our founder, Brian Pasch.  732-842-4720

I strongly believe in the long term ROI of SEO and the great “annuity” it offers car dealers to deliver low cost consumer direct leads year after year. I’m an advocate for organic search marketing but I’m often asked where Google Adwords (SEM) fits into my digital marketing strategy..

If I were asked to choose between SEO or SEM, I would choose SEO because of the long term benefits it offers and its higher ROI.  I’m also well aware that many General Managers are confused about what SEO really means so they often take the easy route and go with SEM

Despite my efforts to educate the car dealers on how to change the face of automotive digital marketing with some very simple SEO techniques, there are few early adopters. 

Frustrating? Yes.  Hopeless. No. There are many car dealers who have become believers in what PCG can offer with our SEO microsites and Google compliant automotive inventory modules. 

It’s All About Balance

That said, effective automotive lead generation strategies are not just about SEO.

I’m not about to drink the SEO “Kool-Aid” and tell dealers that PPC is a waste of time. Google Adwords is an important “tool” when used properly and car dealers should not avoid Adwords because of a perception that it is costly or has a lower ROI than SEO. Like many things in life, it is how the tool is used that makes it good or bad.

Consumer behavior dictates much of why PPC needs to be a part of car dealer marketing budgets. For this example, let’s see what a consumer may type into Google when looking for a Honda Civic in New Jersey.

When you look at data from Google searches, consumers are typing in search phrases WITHOUT a geo-locator. (state, county or town). They are typing in very short phrases like:

• “Honda”
• “Honda Civic”
• “Honda Civic Prices”
•  “Honda Civic Reviews”

Since these are national phrases, the third party lead collection sites like www.edmunds.com, Yahoo Autos and www.motortrend.com come up on Google page one. These third party lead collectors are optimized for every year make and model, unlike car dealer sites. They also have tremendous traffic which further supports their rankings.

Every day these third party lead collectors capture local buyer leads and sell them to dealers. The only practical short term way to get in front of consumers for broad phrases, without any geo-targets, is PPC. So, you can decide to buy leads or you can attempt to capture the local leads yourself.

It would take a significant investment in time and money to show on organically on Google page one for the search phrase “Honda Civic”. There are no Honda dealers shown in the first two pages (20 listings) of Google for that phrase. You will see all the major lead collector sites on those first two pages.

There are exceptions. I was able to get national Google Page 1 ranking for “Infiniti G37 Convertible” and “Infiniti G37” searches, but it would be very hard to get on Google page one for “Infiniti G35” or “Infiniti dealer”.

Google Adwords campaigns have a geo-based advertising radius so that if you decide to buy broad words, you can limit the radius to a practical driving area for potential buyers. If I only want to target Monmouth County residents,
because my dealership is in that county, I can advertise to local car shoppers typing in the phrase “Honda Civic” or “Honda Civic Prices”.

This is not to say that PPC works for all dealers and marketing strategies. Dealers have to evaluate the costs and ROI for all lead sources; SEO and SEM. They need to compare the conversion rates for “broad search” leads versus long-tail searches like “Monmouth County Honda dealer”. If both methods are profitable and sell cars, both should be continued.

SEO should have a better ROI but you cannot capture all of potential buyers via SEO. You have to have more than one tool in the chest. There is a limit at what SEO can do in any one month. Doubling a SEO budget in any given month does not significantly change the lead flow in the same month.

Since dealers are often rewarded on monthly or quarterly goals, SEM may be needed to hit short term sales targets. Also, if a car dealer is trying to boost extended warranty sales PPC is very effective since consumers normally just type
“Infiniti warranty” or “Infiniti extended warranty” into Google.

We can create a microsite to attract organic car warranty leads. We did that successfully with www.infinitiwarranty.net and it is ranked #2 in the USA for that phrase. My client also gets highly qualified leads from buying a few selected warranty keywords in Google Adwords. So, in this case, the balance of SEO and SEM is generating a steady flow of warranty leads.

In summary, car dealers need both SEO and SEM to effectively compete on the  Internet to catch the eye of local car shoppers. The Pasch Consulting Group has effective strategies to help car dealers implement competitive SEO campaigns as well as structure effective Google Adwords campaigns.

Call us to discuss your needs: 732-842-4720 or email sales@paschconsulting.com

More souring news on the automotive industry as the 2009 Detroit Auto Show fades from its former glory.

This week, Nissan and Infiniti are the latest to announce that they are not going to participate in the North American International Auto Show in Detroit next January. This news increases the count to seven car companies that will skip the 2009 Detroit Auto Show.

Nissan and Infiniti, which normally have large displays at the show, will not have a public display of vehicles. Earlier this year, Mitsubishi, Rolls-Royce, Ferrari, Suzuki and Land Rover all said they would not attend the 2009 Detroit show.  This seems like additional anecdotal evidence of how fear and panic have spread into the overall economy.

Where I live in New Jersey, local restaurants that were once thriving are now 25% full on weekends. I visited the Borgota Casino two weeks ago on a Friday night and at 6:00 PM, there were two people on line to check. On a Friday the line is normally 15-20 people deep.

Local car dealerships are very concerned and many are drastically cutting back on spending.  This new announcement from Infiniti and Nissan sends another wave of panic to the markets. This decision begs the question; what comes next for the auto industry?

Pulling out of any major industry venue may be knee jerk reaction compared to just cutting down the budget with a smaller footprint. I don’t understand the politics of the show but it seems like the baby is being thrown out with the bath water.

If you would like more information on the show, use the website link below:

http://www.naias.com

January 17-25, 2009

Cabo Center, Detroit Michigan

Automotive advertising agencies – you are being called to task.  It is very common for car dealers to have their ad agency create a sheet of monthly specials like the one shown for Audi cars. These ads are used in local newspapers but they are also being used for dealer websites.

Unfortunately, the ad agencies are not telling automotive sales managers that these graphical contribute practically NOTHING to attractive car shoppers via Google and Yahoo search. Most traditional automotive advertising agencies don’t understand search engine optimization (SEO).  They didn’t grow up with SEO.  Their job is to produce auto ads every month, on schedule, and they are happy for the business.

Well, if I was the owner of a car dealership, I would not be happy how these ads are being used on the web. You see, these ads have text that Google cannot index.  Google cannot read the text on a photo.  They are in effect a blank page to the search engine spiders.  If car dealers expect for consumers to find their monthly specials online, they have to take the time to type the details in plain text.

You may think this is a simple task and one that should be commonplace on dealer websites.  But take a look at 20 car dealer websites by clicking on their “Specials” page and you’ll find that most are graphical ads with the pertinent information on an image. 

So should dealers login into their website administrative panel and add their car specials in text?  This is where things get interesting.  Creating a good looking text page on most automotive website platforms is not easy.  Yes, most platforms claim that they have easy to use HTML editors but in common practice, they are not easy to use.

I have worked with a number of HTML editors on car dealer websites and they all are tricky at best.  The skills to create “tables” or aligned text requires skills that are beyond the average Internet sales manager. Copying preformatted text into these embedded editors can cause more trouble that it’s worth.

So, Sales Managers take the least path of resistance and drop in a graphic advertisement on their specials page so it’s not blank.   Just keep in mind that these graphical ads do ZERO for drawing new customer via search. Even worse, pages that only contain one image will most likely never even get indexed by Google.

If car dealers take the time to create car specials and incentives, they should also take the time to publicize them on the web.  In an ideal world, you would have a dedicated web page for each car you have on special that month.  This way the HTML Title, META Description and content can be optimized for the offer. In addition to their own websites, specials can be posted on free services like Craigslist, MerchantCircle and social networking sites.  The dealers, who make the effort to give Google what they expect, will be rewarded with better search visibility.

Automotive SEM Competition is on the rise and car dealers will be paying more for targeted keywords in Google Adwords .

As the economy weakens and the stock market fails to provide emotional support for a stunned consumer market, automotive dealers are digging in their heels and fighting back.  Recent data indicates that US car dealers are diverting monies from traditional advertising channels and increasing their spending on Google and Yahoo. From our customer surveys, monies once allocated to print, radio and cable TV are being reduced and moved to internet advertising platforms.

This shift in spending has many implications. The cost per click on many common automotive search phrases has been steadily rising in October and November of 2008.  This is a clear indication that car dealers are embracing the fact that 85% of new car buyers are researching their cars on the Internet prior to a purchase.  With cash flow tight, Automotive Sales Managers are increasing their bids for the top positions in Google Adwords.

The increased competition poses some interesting challenges for Automotive Marketing companies due to the risk of a bidding war erupting, and everyone involved being hurt.  Search Engine Marketing (SEM) or Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising is an important part of any car dealer’s digital marketing strategy.  However, SEM alone can be very costly in the long term.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategies can provide car dealers with sustainable, low-cost lead flow to supplement leads purchased through SEM.  Automotive microsites are another tool which provide car dealers with a highly ranked website designed to capture local car buyer information.  As PPC costs continue to rise, SEO strategies look increasingly attractive.

One SEO strategy example is a microsite designed for the release of the 2009 Infiniti G37 Convertible.  We created a microsite on the domain www.infinitig37convertible.com for Infiniti of Santa Monica. It ranks #1 in the USA for the search phrase “Infiniti G37 Convertible” and is on Google page one for other search phrases like “2009 G37 convertible” or simply “g37 convertible”.  The site had a low, on-time cost to create and has generated hundreds of consumer leads located in California who want to purchase this car.  When the Infiniti G37 convertible finally is released in the spring of 2009, Infiniti of Santa Monica will be the West Coast sales leader for this car.

As car dealers look for effective marketing strategies, SEO and SEM will continue to rise to the top of a list of  channels that produce the best ROI for local consumer car leads.  If you are interested in additional articles on Automotive SEO, you can visit www.dealer-seo.com.