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How to Do Digital Marketing for Automobile Dealers?
The business world is shifting from traditional marketing techniques to digital marketing techniques. Digital marketing techniques help the business target the consumer throughout the entire purchasing cycle at a minimum cost. Consumers are always glued to a screen, be it their phone screens, laptop screens, or television screens. Companies, through digital marketing, are taking advantage of this situation and bombarding consumers with ads. The automobile industry is also jumping into digital marketing techniques to ensure a wider reach and a higher conversion ratio.
In this article, we will be understanding the basic concept of digital marketing, the features of the automobile industry, and how companies can create digital marketing plans for the automobile industry.
The Concept of Digital Marketing and Why It is Gaining Popularity
Any marketing initiative done by businesses through digital platforms is known as "digital marketing." Companies today are engaging in a digital marketing mix. By "digital marketing mix," we mean a mixture of content marketing, social media marketing, email marketing, search engine marketing, search engine optimization, and affiliate marketing. Companies are analyzing their target consumers and the types of products that they are selling to decide on a purposeful digital marketing mix for the company. For example, a B2B company will choose more email marketing, website marketing, and affiliate marketing through experts.
Features of the Automobile Industry
The automobile industry provides consumers with vehicles of their choice, through which they can easily commute from one place to another. We have new variants coming up in the automobile industry every day, and consumers making the purchase decision are active on digital platforms. Hence, it has become critical for automobile dealers to have a digital marketing mix of their own. Some features of the automobile industry are −
Cost will play a major factor in deciding whether to purchase or not.
Consumers are going to compare the different product categories and the similar offerings of the competitors.
The automobile confers social status on the consumer.
Consumers will also care about the aesthetic appeal of the product.
Consumers would want salespeople to be present while closing the deal.
Consumers will be willing to pay an extra price for quality products, good servicing after purchase, and a good customer experience.
Tata Nano, a car model launched by Tata, failed terribly just because of one wrong move by the company. In its advertising strategy, the company sold the car by saying it was a car for middle-class people. Middle-class families or higher-ups would want to purchase a vehicle that would act as an addition to their social status and would not want to spend lakhs of rupees on a car that has already been declared a car for the middle class. The company relaunched the advertisement but the damage was already done.
Digital Marketing Techniques Can Be Used in the Automobile Industry
Companies can't rely on just one digital marketing technique. They have to have a mix. In this section, we will discuss the various digital marketing initiatives that a company can implement, as well as the data to demonstrate their effectiveness. Some of the techniques are −
Affiliate Marketing − According to the Think with Google survey, 93% of consumers conduct an online search for the automobile product on YouTube before making the purchase decision. The consumer generally prefers collaborations with affiliate marketers in the sense that consumers do not trust videos posted by the company on YouTube but will believe the local affiliate marketer or other famous content creators. Companies can have affiliate marketers associated with them, and they can have some guidelines to ensure quality content is there regarding the product. As it was found out, consumers prefer a 360-degree video of the car, they prefer the person recording themselves while on the test drive, and they would want the content creator to speak about the major positives of the car but some negatives as well as others.
Search Engine Marketing − Automobile dealers can use the pay-per-click model to ensure more website traffic and a higher conversion ratio. When companies are targeting keywords, they should use long-tail keywords and keywords that are going to narrow the consumer search. This will ensure that the company is not just paying for visitors to the website and that the ROI of digital marketing, as well as the conversion ratio, are high. One simple example might be the best SUVs in Kolkata under Rs. 1000,000.
Search Engine Optimization − Automobile dealers also have to ensure that their content is well-displayed and in-depth. Since the consumer would have to pay a large amount to acquire the product, they would want to study every piece of information about it. They can even have a comparison table to help the consumer understand the upgraded product. Companies can even attach backlinks to other websites where they see product comparisons between different brands being done and their product having an advantage. They can ask automobile experts to conduct this survey for comparison. Companies have to play well in their SEO and organic marketing games because this will help increase brand awareness and get organic traffic on the website.
Presence on Social Media − Companies do not have to heavily invest in their social media, but they should ensure an active presence on the social media platforms. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and other social media platforms are available. The company should always post the latest model and customer testimonials on its social media accounts. 4.7 billion people out of the total population of 8 billion people in this world are on social media, and companies can bypass the reach of digital marketing. If the company believes it has a strong social media presence, it can even buy ads and sponsor content on the social media platforms and review the same to understand its ROI and conversion ratio.
Email Marketing − The company can use the data collected from all the sales that they have made in the past to send them reminder emails regarding the new product launch, the better servicing that you have provided, the discounts that they can avail of, and others. It is always more economical to retain your current consumers than to find new ones in the market, and companies should leverage this opportunity. Companies can even send mail to strangers or prospective buyers by buying data from other firms, but the conversion ratio may be low.
Online Reviews − companies can buy them, ask their employees to write reviews, or wait for them to happen organically, but online reviews matter a lot for the consumer. Since consumer is spending so much money, they would want to purchase the best of the best.
86% of automobile consumers conduct online research regarding automobiles before actually visiting the showroom. For every 7 customers out of 10, online reviews play a vital role in deciding which brand and automobile to purchase. Along with the average of 15 hours that a consumer spends researching the product or interacting with the dealers, approximately 10 hours of it are spent online. Hence, now we have the data to understand why automobile dealers should enter the digital marketing game. Companies have to understand that the consumers that they want to target are online, and for them, the online presence of the company matters a lot before making the purchase decision. Consumers are the kings of the market, and they will dictate what products to manufacture, how to promote them, what price the brand and the product are worth, and what distribution channel they prefer.
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