Balancing customer engagement and the cost of advertising is your key to increasing your marketing return on investment (ROI). Sounds simple, right? It is – and it starts with a digital-first strategy. This variation on multi-channel marketing uses digital media channels (such as email, SMS, or social media) to initiate engagement with customers. Once you’ve…

Search engine optimization can be a confusing thing. As search engine algorithms frequently change many find it hard to keep up with the latest trends and best-practices in order to maintain high website rankings.

Well, the 800-pound gorilla in the room is Google which, according to the 2018 Search Market Share report by SparkToro, commands…

I’m sure that most managers are familiar with the frustration that comes with discovering a salesperson decided a sale was not to be made without really working the lead, letting a perfectly good customer leave the lot. Perhaps the salesperson pre-qualified them and decided they…

As dealers face mounting pressure to exceed sales and service quotas for the year, the ability to find new customers is key to reaching goals. But conquesting is never easy, primarily because you have to rely on third-party data instead of the first-party customer data in your DMS.

Partnering with the right marketing vendor is the first step.…

Besides producing industry-leading automotive software, the company has also created a unique workplace that recognizes and incorporates the value of play

CLEARWATER, FL – November 14, 2018 – AutoLoop LLC, the leading provider of auto industry marketing, sales, and service solutions, announced today that the company has received the 2018 “Workplace Culture Program of the Year” award from Tampa Bay Tech, Florida’s largest…

In the first part of this series, I shared why Facebook Marketplace can help dealers sell more cars, the ways in which they can get started, and the questions they should be asking their vendors when getting this set…

It’s a common scenario: drivers eating, texting, talking on the phone, taking care of personal grooming, or even reading while on the road. Loosely termed “distracted driving,” it includes any activity drivers engage in when they’re behind the wheel, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

A recent AutoLoop study identified the most common of those activities among morning commuters while driving. With a remarkable 48% of…

It’s a foregone conclusion that to be successful in any particular skill takes time. A lot of time! Doctors must go to college for decades, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that those graduates enter the medical field after college as an “expert” physician. Ask yourself this question: How much time do I need to invest in myself to master a particular skill?…

A recent national report “Women Car Buyers Rate Women Consultants Higher in Dealer…

PACIFIC PALISADES, Calf., November 5, 2018 - fusionZONE Automotive, LLC, the automotive industry’s highest-performing dealer website solution, today announced that company founder and popular speaker, Brett Sutherlin, will present a session titled, Increasing Online Conversion is not as Hard as You Think!”  at the upcoming…

In the race to make a sale, dealerships often rely on templates in CRMs. These templates – including autoresponders – can hurt a dealership’s chances of communicating effectively -- or at all.

The response rate for leads is very low in the automotive industry. How much time do your salespeople or BDC agents spend calling a new lead, or sending an email, fail…

Are you using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) to grow your business? I’ve spent my career connecting advances in technology to business, and partner with dealers every day to help them use today’s tech to increase revenue and decrease wasteful ad spend. These dealers have figured out that AI and ML can help them identify people in their markets who are…

Auto Dealers can now turn anonymous website shoppers into named shoppers and lackluster leads into intelligent leads for frictionless engagement

Columbus, OH (October 30, 2018) - Clarivoy today announced the launch of…

There you are, working on your to-do list, trying to create content for your dealership. You sit there and contemplate what you can write that will be relevant and interesting to your customers. But no ideas come to you. The more you think about it, the more frustrated you get, until you simply give up trying and move on.

Content marketing can be frustrating.…

Facebook Marketplace, while new on the scene, has quickly turned into a valuable sales channel for dealerships. Many dealers are finding great success in engagement as well as sales with consumers. Not just another third-party listing site, Facebook Marketplace has capabilities many other platforms don’t have. Chief among them is the ability for interested car buyers…

In our industry, conversion rates are horrible. A great dealer “might” convert at a higher rate, but many are missing the boat on the majority of their website visitors. There are many reasons why this is true. However, the sad fact remains that it is.

Imagine making some simple tweaks to your website which produce an immediate increase in the number of…

I think it’s fair to say that automotive technicians are getting harder to find. These days, less people are choosing a career in automotive repair, even though technicians make great money and many need little or no formal college education or previous experience. Look at independent repair facility employment ads and you’ll no doubt find plenty of messages stating, “no…

The good news? To date, automotive sales have remained stronger than many analysts originally predicted, with customers of all ages continuing to buy both new and pre-owned vehicles. Considering some of the earlier ominous forecasts, it’s no wonder numerous retailers are breathing a collective sigh of relief.

The not-quite-so-good news, at least for those…

I actually wanted to flip the title of this blog to “why use one word when a hundred will do?” People tend to use FAR too many words these days in PR and marketing material – they simply don’t know how to keep it short and relevant. And, in my experience, most audiences find long cluttered sentences a frustrating read.  A great slogan to go by really is KISS – Keep It Simple…

Have you ever noticed how the market values dealerships versus how it values Software as a Service (SaaS) businesses that derive income from the same automotive revenue stream? SaaS businesses such as CDK trade at mid-20x P/E ratios while dealers trade at 4-6x operating profit.

One major reason for this disparity is because SaaS business revenues are…