A simple truth: There’s no such thing as a car that sells itself. As you strive to move inventory at your used car dealership, you’ve got to invest in marketing and promotion—but choosing just how you’ll market can be something of a minefield.
After all, your dealership only has so many marketing dollars at its disposal, and it’s critical to funnel them into activities that yield real results—but with so many marketing channels to choose from, how can you determine how best to allocate those limited resources?
Get My Auto is a dealer marketing/software company, and we know firsthand what works and what doesn’t. In this post, we’re simply going to list the five marketing techniques that we believe offer the best return on investment.
Here goes:
5 Dealer Marketing Investments That Pay Off
1. Dealer website.
This is ground zero for effective dealer marketing. Your website is how most of your customers are going to find you. It’s what establishes first impressions, and it’s also what helps you generate leads. It’s worth every penny to develop a fast, responsive, user-friendly, and fully optimized site—something Get My Auto’s SaaS/website-building tools can help with!
2. Craigslist.
A lot of people think Craigslist is old hat—but dealers know better. Simply put, this is where the truly motived buyers come to shop. Studies show over and over that Craigslist users are more likely to convert than any other audience; that they move quicker and pay more for used cars. For dealerships, then, it’s a no-brainer—the best way to connect with the buyers you need.
3. Facebook ads.
An organic social media presence can certainly be advantageous but paid Facebook ads are more useful still. They allow you to take a data-driven approach and hone in on the local buyers who are actively looking for vehicles. When done strategically, Facebook ads can really pay off.
4. Instagram ads.
The Instagram ads platform is basically the same as Facebook’s, and for that reason, we’d say it’s also worth your consideration. (Again, strategic ad-buying and targeting are required, but the ROI can be immense.)
5. Email marketing.
Finally, we’d recommend that dealerships take advantage of their email subscription lists—reaching out to past buyers and leads to foster brand loyalty, and create more opportunities for conversion. Email marketing can be very low-cost, and it’s still one of the best ways to directly reach out to your audience.
Make the Most of Your Advertising Budget
As you can tell, there are a number of ways for your dealership to use its marketing dollars—and if you start with the five items we’ve listed here, we think you’ll be in good shape.
One way you can make efficient use of your resources is to invest in Get My Auto’s robust, dealer-centric SaaS package. We’d love to tell you all about it. Reach out to Get My Auto today to ask about our breadth of dealer marketing services.