Automotive retailers utilize Internet advertising campaigns as part of their Automotive SEO strategy on Google, Yahoo and MSN. This is not a revelation. What is disturbing is that many car dealers are committed to large monthly PPC budgets without analyzing their campaign data.

Since car dealer sales managers have a very full plate, it is not uncommon to outsource the management of their pay-per-click campaigns. This in itself is not a problem since we offer similar services. What was alarming was at some of our client shops, no one was taking the time to review the PPC data. The campaigns were in an auto-pilot mode, just being funded each month.

As SEO/SEM consultants, we have reviewed client campaigns and found ads running outside of their feasible marketing area. We have found ads that were going to wrong pages. We have seen ads running with expired offers. You name it and we have seen it!

One experience that left us uninspired was our review of a PPC campaign that was setup by a company with the initials R.L. My client that used this firm was convinced that R.L. were PPC experts and did not need that much oversight. They felt that the R.L. proprietary marketing system, which was displaying ads on multiple platforms, was optimized. It took me all of just a few minutes to disagree with my clients and show them a better way to run their ads.

R.L. is a big company with many account managers so this experience may not be typical. However, my clients who have asked us to manage their PPC are very pleased with the results and communication. Our clients feel that they have a much better handle on actual PPC costs. We create an account for each client that they own so they can monitor actual click costs without management fees added.

In our opinion, automotive PPC campaigns need to be updated at least on a monthly basis. Every month new car prices, programs and offers should be tested online. Having generic ads going to generic landing pages is a waste of advertising money and creates lost opportunities.
Don’t forget that some PPC campaigns or tests could be going to outdated pages, so someone inside the dealership needs has to be checking your ads. If you are outsourcing your PPC campaigns and are not having a conference call each month with your marketing consultant, you are wasting money. It’s that simple.

The competitive landscape in the automotive retail world changes every month. Google Adwords is not the Holy Grail. It is not a “set once” and run forever marketing tool, unless you have money to waste. No serious business owner has money to waste. If you are not pleased with the communications you have with a third party management company, give the Pasch Consulting Group a call at 732-842-4720.

We have been recommending to customers that they add video to their websites to further enhance their brand message and to add a connection with web visitors that text alone cannot create. 

A number of our clients have taken the lead. Two companies have completed filming and we have published their videos.  I’m creating a mid-month abbreviated newsletter because I am very excited about the potential these videos can have in improving the impression of first time visitors to a website.  It applies to everyone. 

In both of these cases, the consumers considering LASIK surgery or Gastric Bypass surgery have to feel comfortable with the doctor’s skills and reputation.  I think that both videos tackle the issue head on.  They help build confidence in the doctor’s ability prior to meeting them in their office. 

Take a peek and consider what a video could do to welcome first time visitors to your website.

	Dr. Dan Goldberg is a LASIK surgery pioneer in New Jersey.  Dr. Goldberg hired PCG to get his website back at the top of Google rankings and promote is new iLASIK offerings.Part of our plan was to create a new video and super-charge the first impressions for web visitors.View: www.paschconsulting.com/video
	Dr. Ajay Goyal is a leader in Gastric Bypass and Lap Band surgery in New Jersey. Dr. Goyal was also one of the first doctors in New Jersey to offer the new REALIZE Band® from Johnson & Johnson.Dr. Goyal decided that a patient testimonial would best address the concerns of people struggling with significant weight problems. View: www.paschconsulting.com/video

	This video is a great simple piece that is using a celebrity endorsement to sell a product.  We are advising the investors of IBG on the national marketing campaign for a new line of Nutraceutical products. The video, when placed on a landing page for pay-per-click campaigns to sports enthusiast would be very compelling.   View: www.paschconsulting.com/video
	All videos don’t have to have a massive budget.  This is a short video that is targeted to car dealers.If you want to try to create short clips like this to “speak to” web visitors on different topics, you can create video segments rather inexpensively. View: www.paschconsulting.com/video

Getting Started With Video         

If you would like to get a budget prepared for a website video, give us a call.  If the video is prepared carefully, it can have years of payback as it attracts new customers to your website and/or assist in the sales process.

Is video for everyone? No.

In our opinion, video is ideal for businesses that: 

• - have complex services that need explanation
• - need to establish trust for a person to do business with them
• - have a product that is best show in images and film (think cars, jewelry)
• - are highly competitive and differentiation is easily demonstrated on film

For example, if you are renting a home in St. John or Mexico, a video of the property and its panoramic view can add extra marketing strength to complement static website photos.   Then you load the video on YouTube and travel blogs!

We received a letter from BMW North America last week from their legal department requesting that we change the name of our SEO blog since www.bmwseo.com had their trademark letters in the name.  I was a bit taken back by the letter since this website offers advice and services to BMW dealers which will help them sell more cars.  And since we have BMW dealers as clients, the name was chosen to attract BMW dealers looking for help with their Internet marketing.   So much for that plan, but we have a backup in mind.

I thought about the hundreds of websites that existing that use the letters “BMW” in their domain.  So, I called back the person who wrote the letter and chatted about this matter.  It seems that the letters BMW can be in a sub-directory structure of a URL but not in the URL.  So, www.cars.com/bmw is valid but www.newjerseybmwcars.com is not possible to own unless you are an authorized BMW dealer.   It is not clear whether http://bmw.carsales.com, which is a sub-domain, is permissible.  The letter of the law would indicate it is permissible since it really points to www.carsales.com/bmw

So, I asked about the sheer number of sites on the Internet that use the BMW name that still operate today.  The staff response was that as long as the site was not making profit off the BMW trademark that those sites were tolerated. 

So I brought up and example, a BMW forums called www.bmwzine.com.  Forum websites may look like a non-commercial enterprise but in fact this website is running banner ads and must be collecting advertising revenue.  When I brought this up, I was told that this was a gray area under consideration. 

Without any effort I was able to pull up sites that use the BMW trademark in the URL that are collecting revenue from Google Adwords, Contextual Ads or direct banner ads.  Some were direct retail sites that had no clear relationship to an authorized BMW dealer.  My search revealed sites like:

• www.bmwdirectory.org
• www.ultimate-bmw.com
• www.bmw-forums.net
• www.bmwproblems.com
• www.alloembmwparts.com
• www.advancebmwparts.com

I’m a business owner and I understand the need to protect trademarks so I immediately complied with the request after I did some research on the matter.  The interesting this about this whole matter is that having the letters “BMW” in the URL strong but so is a sub-domain or sub-directory that uses the name BMW.

If you go to Google and search for “2008 BMW cars” you will see that the top placement goes to sites that use BMW in their directory structure.  Examples on Google page one are: 

• www.motortrend.com/new_cars/01/bmw/index.html
• autos.yahoo.com/bmw  
• www.automotive.com/new-cars/01/bmw/index.html
• cars.about.com/od/bmw/a/BMW_new08.htm

BMW is standing firm that having BMW in the URL will confuse the public into thinking that the site is related to BMW.  The good news is that Internet marketers can use the name in directory structures to help consumers find their articles and related goods for BMW cars.

So, it now is very clear why so many BMW forums sites called themselves “bimmer” sites.  I guess they got the letter before me or were better advised.   There are some other interesting consequences that I see in the future for people marketing BMW related services.  This is a big can of worms.  I’ll share more thoughts on this topic soon.

For now, my Google PageRank took a hit from 3 to Zero.  I’ll have to build new links to www.dealer-seo.com and hope that soon the site will be back up in the search rankings for automotive SEO topics.