Consistency is Key: Branding with Purpose

Bruce Springsteen once said, “Sustaining an audience is hard. It demands a consistency of thought, of purpose, and of action over a long…

Quick Quiz: If you’re part of an automotive dealer group comprised of anywhere between 2 and 290 stores and you do not run a centralized sales BDC, then you’re:

• A) Wasting Money
• B) Losing Sales
• C) At a Competitive Disadvantage
• D) Not Leveraging Your Economies of Scale
• E) All of the Above

If you answered E, congratulations! You’ve recognized the downside of sending your inbound leads and phones to those black holes…

With every year that passes, we’ve seen consumers increase their research and online activity exponentially and it has become increasingly difficult to discover true attribution when analyzing exactly what drove a specific customer into a dealership.

Marketing today mandates an omni-channel approach. No longer can you simply rely on a website and traditional…

This Week in Social Media and What it Means to You

News for the Week of July 13, 2015

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MotoFuze Strategy Team Roundtable: the Evolution of Communication

Communication strategies have evolved drastically over the years, and have been moving at the speed of light over the last decade.  In this episode of the FuzeCast show, MotoFuze VP of Social Strategy, Joey Little, Content and Marketing Director, Kristin Huntley and Director of Product, Cody Garnett…

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This newsletter will help improve your quality of life. It might be you’re in the position of a father, mother, manager, service advisor, technician or anything else listening is essential. It should be considered a talent or skill that we all need to improve. I’ve heard it said that if you want to be considered a…

Black Book is proud to announce that Ricky Beggs, previously Senior Vice President, was honored as the newest member of the prestigious Ring of Honor for the National Independent Automobile Dealers Association (NIADA). The award is presented annually to an executive who has exemplified outstanding performance, leadership and has added to the growth of the automotive industry.



Beggs served Black Book for 34 years before retiring in April earlier this year. During his time with the…

It has often been said that if you don’t know where you are going the chances of getting there are not very good.  This is certainly true for someone who is seeking to set goals for their life and to make a plan on how to achieve them.  Unless you have a vision for what you want to accomplish in this business, you will probably follow a path that leads to the status quo.  This is often the cause of failure; not the lack of ability, but failure to formulate a…

 “Lead Loyalty and Intent to Buy Online” white paper from CarStory tracks used car shoppers’ brand loyalty path from online search to lead submission

• Ford shoppers have greatest lead brand stickiness
• Honda/Toyota shoppers have greatest reciprocal lead brand switching
• Luxury brand searchers least likely to submit online…

The July 4th weekend has passed, and summertime travel is in full swing. It’s a busy time for your women customers, but also the best time for them to have a safety and service check-up. Here are 4 tips for bringing your women customers into your service center.

Did You Know?

The #1 requested item from women in the service drive is a courtesy vehicle? Be sure to provide this and delight your…

Follow These Tips to Find Out If Your Digital Strategy Is Working

Is your business keeping you up at night? We want to offer ways to uncover some great opportunities in your strategy, including:

• Focusing on the handling of phone calls
• Generating more content for your website
• Emphasizing the value…

Welcome to this week's edition of Black Book Market Insights, with in-depth analysis of used car and truck valuation trends and insights straight from the auction lanes. Click here to download the full report.

In this week’s report, the Black Book editors saw data that showed a brief change in car retention in early July before car patterns quickly returned to a more “summer normal” rate of depreciation this past week.…

In a recent press release, Amazon announced that, in celebration of its 20^th birthday, July 15 will be “Prime Day” – a day on which Amazon claims it will offer more deals to its loyal Prime members than Black Friday. Amazon promises, “new deals starting as often…

Auto dealer marketing efforts will continue to be successful if you are the right way. Dealer marketing is more important aspects of the sales. There are many specialty mailing lists are available in the automotive industry to get the no. of the clients.

For training to be effective three elements need to be present; you need to have:

1. Education

2. Simulation

3. Accountability

Education, simulation, and accountability! Let me just expand on this. If I want to train in golf, I don’t just watch golf on TV. While watching golf on TV I may become educated in golf, but then I need to train through simulation. I would need to go out and hit bucket after bucket after bucket of balls to get…

Swapalease.com, the nation’s largest car lease marketplace, released results of its latest survey asking how interested consumers are to Tesla’s manufacturer-direct model when car shopping. According to the survey results, 67.4% of women and 75.0% of men are “all in favor of it”.



The online survey was presented to more than 2,500 consumers across the U.S. from May 10 – May 30, and the purpose was the find out if car shoppers are interested in buying or leasing a car directly from…

Urbandale, IA--July 13th, 2015--Flick Fusion Video Marketing (www.flickfusion.com) announced today a new partnership with Cargigi (www.cargigi.com), a provider of vehicle syndication, marketing and advertising services to auto dealers nationwide. Cargigi selected Flick Fusion's live Human Voiceover Videos (HVO) to provide audio voiceovers for the Full Motion video listings it produces for its auto dealer…

Digital Marketing plays such an important role in a business’s success today that it is easy to forget how young this medium truly is.  It has, in fact, experienced a growth explosion that is historically unparalleled.  A new innovative marketing product seems to emerge almost on a daily basis. And everyone promises that if you use this new “insert buzz word here,” then you…