News

Google has made a major upgrade to the Google Analytics Interface and I will be writing a number of articles highlighting some of the most powerful features that can be leveraged by car dealers.

If you have not taken time to work through then new interface and reports, I strongly suggest that you invest some time this month.

For this article, you will need to expand the “Conversions” menu on Google Analytics navigation bar. (shown on right)

Multi Channel Funnels

Multi-Channel Sales Funnels is a feature that visually displays your TOP CONVERSION PATHS, which is one of the most important discussions you need to have in regards to your primary website.

I wrote about Multi Channel Funnels this earlier in the year, but the new interface finally makes it easier to use and report on this feature for the average user.

Google will show you a snapshot of shopping behavior that leads up to a lead being submitted which they call “Assisted Conversion”.  See the description Google provides below:

You need to setup a conversion “goal” in analytics to have the report accurately reflect what you consider a conversion. You can setup a conversion goal for new car leads, used car leads, service leads, parts leads IF your website provider has the ability to differentiate form submissions by page source.

Of course, a conversion does not have to just be a lead, it could be having a video watched or a coupon being downloaded, so you can get very creative.

Channel Groupings

Google has setup some Basic Channel Groupings for users of Google Analytics which can be customized for the Automotive business.  I clicked on “Channel Groupings” from the menu under Multi-Channel Funnels, and used the “Copy Basic Channel Grouping Template” to create a customized automotive rules.

I called this Channel Grouping “Automotive Sales Channels“.  Once the group was created, I started to create sales channel rules that apply to car dealers.

For example, you can add a new rule called “3rd Party Classifieds” to track consumer activity on Autotrader.com, Cars.com, EveryCarLiosted.com, GetAuto.com and Craigslist.org.

The purpose of these channels is to see how consumers behavior during the Zero Moment of Truth before they submit a lead.  This will give dealers INSIGHTS into which websites consumers visited prior to visiting your website, as well as the PATTERN of their behavior.

The data will document how some consumers move back and forth between ZMOT influences and your website a number a times before submitting a lead.

Creating a Custom Rule

To Create a Custom Rule, you can copy what Google has already setup for other websites.  For example, when you look at the rules in the Social Network Channel, you can see that one of the dozens of websites listed in the channel rule is Facebook.

You can copy the syntax of what Google calls a “Matching Regular Expression” for any website.

So I created a number of entries for popular third party classified websites, and of course the list is bigger, so go at it!

This rule will allow be to see the “paths” that consumers took prior to submitting a lead or just visiting my website.  This is the start of adding CLARITY to dealers who are tired of not knowing which websites are INFLUENCING consumers during the Zero Moment of Truth. (ZMOT).

Seeing The Assisted Conversion Path

Once this is setup, you can start to see consumer behavior as it relates to your website traffic, as shown below:

Of course, you can really create as many channels and rules that you want to better document your digital marketing strategy.  So if you want to break out your “microsites” from organic traffic, you can easily do that by creating a rule called “Microsites”.

Better Visibility into Automotive ZMOT

The takeaway from this post is that for the first time Google is making it EASIER to see which investments in the Zero Moment of Truth are contributing to conversions.

Now, that is exactly what car dealers have been asking for; which online investments are helping to driving traffic and sales via my website.  This upgrade along with data tools from Dataium, which I previously wrote about, will be dramatically impacting advertyising investments and BDC strategies in the years to come.

Dealers can start using the new features in Google Analytics to create effective digital marketing investments driven by data and not a gut reaction or a smooth sales professional.

Brian

  

Brian Pasch, CEO

PCG Digital Marketing

Text PCGedu to 75674 get information on our upcoming conferences

Brian Pasch

I recently attended the 2011 Ignite Dealer Summit in Minnesota and was fortunate to hear a presentation by Jason Ezell, President and Co-Founder, Dataium LLC. 

Jason discussed the benefits that dealers can realize today from business intelligence tools based on consumer shopping behavior on the Internet.

The level of detail of each Internet consumer varies based on Dataium’s relationship with the websites the consumer visits.  Dataium has partnered with OEM’s, dealers, social media platforms, and automotive website providers to place their tracking code on their websites.  

Google on the other hand provides free data on “assisting websites” as part of Google Analytics Multi Channel Sales Funnels, which I will discuss in greater detail in a minute.   The data that Google Analytics would provide is at a basic level, like “consumer A” visited YouTube and then Craigslist prior to hitting a dealer website. The software can then help you define the top Conversion Paths taken by consumers which is very valuable information for prioritzing your advertising investments. 

The Dataium code is designed to identify and track consumer behavior at a higher level of detail.   Dataium tracking would know which specific pages on a website were viewed.  Tapping this data to create automated actionable business rules in a dealer’s CRM system will change the face of sale sales, service, and digital marketing.

Recovering Leads In Your CRM System 

One application of cloud based business intelligence tools I considered was helping dealers recover value in the thousands of leads that their sales staff have marked  “unworkable” or “dead” in their CRM system.  This ia a major CRM challenge for dealer principals since their BDC has such power over marking leads.

Each month dealers receive new leads to work directly from their website or through 3^rd party providers. I don’t have to remind dealers that sales professionals love to cherry pick leads. Consumer leads that are past their “prime” are left alone for more promising, current month leads. 

If human labor was not involved, wouldn’t it be powerful to be notified that when your “unworkable consumers” are back online shopping for a car somewhere else?

How Big Is The Potential Network?

Imagine if this network of websites included Autotrader.com, KBB.com, Cars.com, Ebay.com, Edmunds.com, Motortrend.com, OEM websites, automotive chat communities, and website that could provide actionable data like banking or credit websites.   

Imagine a day when your sales team is notified that former customer Ms. Jones, that was marked unworkable in your CRM, took 3 minutes to view the product pages for a 2012 Jeep Wrangler on Jeep.com today.  Imagine how the sales process will change if the notification also reported that Ms. Jones had also visited Autotrader.com today and viewed nine Vehicle Detail Pages (VDP) on 2010 and 2011 used Jeep Wrangler. 

What would your chance of reconnecting with this in-market shopper prior to this new type of automated tracking and business intelligence tools?  Slim to none. 

Imagine the power of a phone call that comes from your sales team, triggered by this data, that starts with, “Ms. Jones, I know you contacted our dealership a few months back about a Jeep and I was just calling you back to see if you are still in the market and if we can assist you?”

Smart Data Warehousing Powers Dataium Model

The key to making this concept work is to connect thousands of websites that collect consumer information.  As consumers submit lead forms, their IP address is associated with a data record.  Most lead forms have basic contact information, phone numbers and email addresses.

If you have access to enough consumer data you can start matching this data back to consumer records and activity on other websites.

In addition to lead forms, cookies left on the consumer’s browser can provide websites with a rich data stream of which websites the consumer previously visited.  This concept creates a data warehouse that will change the face of online sales.  Read ahead and let’s see how this may play out.

Changing The Costs Of Customer Engagement and Retention 

Dealers can’t afford to call their aged leads with the hope they will find the 2-3% of the list that are still in the market for a car.  Dealers can’t afford to call their existing customers back every month asking if they are in the market for a car.

The day is quickly coming when dealers will be notified when their customers and prospects are engaging in automotive shopping behavior. This alert will allow them to insert their business back into the sales cycle.

Automotive sales professionals attempt a timely and compelling response to a consumer who submits a lead form on their website.  Imagine the quality of initial engagement that could be achieved if the lead came with the consumer’s previous online shopping behavior. 

In the near future, a lead coming into the CRM system will include rich data.  For example, it could report that the consumer had visited Chevrolet.com and looked at a 2011 Chevrolet Silverado.  It could inform the dealer that the same consumer visited Kelly Blue Book and requested a trade-in estimate for a 2003 Silverado.

Would you change the way you initially greeted a consumer if a richer dataset was available?  I bet all dealers would shout affirmatively: yes!

To some degree it is here today and greater advances will be announced in the coming years.  Dataium co-founder Jason Ezell stated that approximately 5,000 dealers have their tracking code installed on their websites. 

Although he did not include all the data partners in the Dataium network, his model immediately triggered a thought about Autotrader.com and their recent acquisitions.  Could they build a powerful competing business intelligence model exclusive to their customers? 

The Future of Automotive Digital Marketing

As automotive websites become standardized and commoditized by OEM regulations, it will be more important for dealers to have a rich set of business intelligence tools and automated CRM that assist them with communicating with consumers more effectively.

A well designed website with a compliant SEO structure and the ability to easily update photos, specials, and content will be the norm and no longer cutting edge.  This year, the number of website platforms that are Google SEO compliant have significantly increased.  Dealers have demanded better websites and the vendors have responded, but as you will read, that conversation is last year’s news.

Companies who offer only website platforms to dealers should take note of the massive changes that are coming.  I predict more consolidation will occur in 2012, which will narrow the field of companies providing websites to dealers.  Reason will be simple.  Data analytics and smarter CRM processes will be the key focus for car dealers and not the shiny object of a “compliant” website.

The Appeal of OEM Website Contracts

I finally understand why companies like Cobalt, ClickMotive, and Dealer.com are so motivated to obtain long term OEM website contracts that mandate their technology for franchise dealers.  

These contracts enabled the contracted companies to offer business intelligence tools that the OEM’s could use to measure and compare dealers and understand consumer online shopping behavior. 

The unique advantage that OEM platform providers have is that they can track on-site inventory searches, page views, and see which paths led to a form being submitted or a call being made.  The internal site data and lead tracking is not available to outside analytics companies like Google.

Having access to data across a network of thousands of individual OEM dealer websites is powerful. Access to OEM franchise data is not golden ticket it once was.  The real win for vendors and dealers will come from aggregated data from dealer websites and third party sites that influence automotive sales and service decisions.    

The automotive industry in the coming years will be extremely focused on developing alerts and CRM event triggers during the Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT).  Google defines ZMOT as any websites that consumers visit prior to contacting a dealer that influence their buying decision are included in the ZMOT.

The second part of this article will discuss the players that may be seeking to claim bragging rights to being the first to deliver a rich set of data and business processes for dealer CRM systems based on ZMOT behaviors. 

Is there a competitor lurking in the shadows that is ready to take a bit out of Dataium’s lunch?  Maybe…but that will have to wait for Part II of this article.

Brian

  

Brian Pasch, CEO

PCG Digital Marketing

Text PCGedu to 75674 get information on our upcoming conferences

Brian Pasch

I just recently conducted a 20 Group workshop and it reminded me that the more I speak and connect with dealer principals the more I am excited about being in the automotive industry.

I am very passionate about helping dealer principals lead their business with effective digital marketing and social media strategies. That’s right, dealer principals as leaders.

Having the privilege to educate and share my passion for digital marketing to hundreds of dealers each year, it is clear to me that many dealer principals cannot effectively lead their digital marketing strategies and inspect their advertising investments.

They would like to but they don’t know the right questions to ask.

All of the dealers in attendance at this meeting said that they would like more leads from their main website because those leads convert the best. Yet NONE of the dealers could recite any important data points about their website:

• How many unique visitors a month
• How many page views per visit
• How much time were they spending the their site
• Bounce Rate
• Top referring sources

For many of these dealers, they are investing thousands of dollars each month to maintain and market their website. Some advanced dealers may also be adding fresh content, videos, photos, and specials to “improve” the website experience. Yet in spite of these significant investments, they had no clear report on their desk to say whether these investments were moving the needle. Increased visitors? Reduced bounce rate? More leads?

None of the dealers had ever tested and measured the impact of changing their home page design. Frankly, they did not know that they could ask for those types of test. None had tested different landing page designs for their pay-per-click advertising campaigns.

Larry Bruce has been like John the Baptist on this topic, as he has been trying to get dealers to do more with what traffic they are already getting. A/B Testing and conversion is surely a timely message from Larry Bruce, which can save dealers significant money if they invest in education and testing in 2011.

Ironically, the dealer principal proudly admitted to testing different radio, TV, and print ads to find the right message that worked. Yet, when it came to digital marketing they never thought they could test that medium as well.  The good news is that they can.

Digital Marketing Education is NOT Sexy

Spending the dollars to educate your staff may not be sexy, but it is critical for leadership in today’s automotive retailing model.

I’m not sharing this story to put down dealer principals. I’m writing to challenge the automotive industry and dealer principals to make 2011 the year of empowerment. A year where investments in digital marketing education are a priority.  A year where dealer principals see the importance of leading and INSPECTING their digital marketing investments.

If dealer principals can’t inspect the work of their eCommerce team, vendors, and automotive advertising partners they cannot effectively leverage the opportunities that the Internet and social media offer. If dealer principals can’t speak the language associated with SEO, SEM, IRM, and social media they will not feel confident in vendor meetings.

Automotive Digital Marketing Education

In 2011 PCG Digital Marketing is committing significant resources to dealer education. The commitment started with the 2011 Digital Marketing Strategies Conference (DMSC). In 2011 PCG will be announcing a series of initiatives and partnerships to assist car dealers with educating their team to master the skills needed to be successful with automotive retailing.

At DMSC, attendees will be empowered to lead their dealership with effective digital marketing and social media strategies. The curriculum, speakers, and educational format will deliver solutions and processes to take back to the dealership that will move the needle in 2011. The conference diet is high protein and no junk carbs.

Does education really work?  In just three hours with this 20 Group, I was able to review a series of simple spreadsheets that I created to allow them to inspect their digital marketing investments. All of the dealer principals committed to having their reports on their desk each month and said that they would review them.  They have the ability to inspect now, where a few hours earlier they did not.  They were empowered to lead, from a 3 hour class.

A Budgeting Paradox

These dealers expressed their gratitude that I came out to their 20 Group.  I’m not sure how many dealers, if any, would sign-up for a conference on digital marketing without having this face to face experience with me. I find it ironic that a dealer will try a new “advertising” idea (shiny object) for $1,000 and yet they won’t INVEST $1,000 to send an employee to a great educational conference. These same employees may manage hundreds of thousands of dollars of advertising and marketing investments.

It’s odd that dealers’ use an excuse that the conference “is a busy time to be out of the dealership” like they don’t control workload and have backup resources in case someone is sick.

When I inspect a Google Adwords campaign for a dealer, it is not uncommon that in 75% of dealers I can save them thousands of dollars a year in wasted clicks or improved conversion. Why wouldn’t a dealership want this as an internal skill?

When I inspect a dealership website, it is not uncommon that 85% of website are not tagged properly for Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Why wouldn’t a dealership want this as an internal skill?

When surveyed, over 35% of car dealers said that they had no formal budget line item for staff education in digital marketing and social media.  So it is no surprise why this important area of growth for car dealers is not being fully leveraged.

Who Will Lead in 2011?

I can go on with more examples but it is clear to me that the tools and strategies dealer principals need to succeed have changed and education has lagged.

That will change when dealer principals decide to lead ALL profit centers in their business. That gap is getting wider and I hope that we can provide the education and resources to close the gap between the haves and have-nots.

I hope dealer principals reading this article will be inspired to take action and invest in education in 2011.

It’s really not an option but dealer principals can deny reality as long as they want which will allow their competitors to gain a strategic advantage.