Reputation Management For Dealership - The Beginning

More and more dealerships are concerned with Reputation Management but the vast majority don't understand the difference between true Reputation Management and damage control. I am not a Reputation Management expert by any stretch of the imagination but this is what I have learned in months of research. I am sharing this in hopes that we can learn how to avoid disasters together. It's always more fun when we can learn together isn't it? If you want to read about this from an expert I highly recommend Andy Beal's new book (mine is on pre order).

First let's take the definition of Reputation Management from Wikipedia. They define it as "the process of tracking an entity's actions and other entities' opinions about those actions; reporting on those actions and opinions; and reacting to that report creating a feedback loop. All entities involved are generally people, but that need not always be the case".

Some SEO providers sell their reputation management services saying " for every negative post we find we will create 10 positive posts.". My fear is what they really mean is that they will go to wherever that negative post is and create 10 fictional user ids so they can make "not me" posts. This tactic was probably fine in 1984 but today's Internet users are far to savvy to fall for this. (In the spirit of full disclosure I don't know if this is how they would handle things or not, but that is what the ad implies.)

High quality reputation management starts long before that angry person starts blogging about how they have been wronged. It starts with creating a positive online presence in a wide variety of online channels. This takes time, it takes hard work and to really be effective long term I feel you should become a quality member of a couple of online communities (Subaru enthusiasts site maybe? Or your local chamber of commerce if they have an online form, and always posting positive customer feedback on all of your websites). The more positive references to your name or your dealership the harder it will be for those negative things to get to the front page of Google and the easier it will be to get rid of them if you do.

No one can guarantee that if something negative is said about you that it will ever leave the front page of the search engines, and trying to bury it is going to cost you thousands of dollars just to try. Isn't it better to hedge your bets and start filling the search engines with positive things today?

Open Ended Questions and Your Dealership

Some people who read this blog regularly have noted that I often ask a question in the title but I don't really answer the questions asked. The reason I do this is because I want you to answer the question for yourselves because ultimately only you can decide what the best answer is for your dealership. Let's be honest, even though I spend countless hours every week testing, researching and screwing things up I don't know anything, and quite frankly I never will (now you have to pinky swear you will *never* tell my husband I admitted to being wrong).

The reality is that in the world of SEO and PPC marketing there are no constants, and no definite right answers. The best service a good SEM firm offers is that they are willing to try new angles to improve your online presence, they have to be willing to test, to try and boldly go where no social network has ever gone before. Conversely you have to be willing to accept that they are going to try things that simply don't work, or maybe they don't work the way you had expected. The scary thing about the SEM landscape is that the idea of absolute ROI has to be abandoned (but we will save that for another day).

~Image from the http://icanhascheezburger.com/ site

Ad Words: Revenge is Cheap in 2007

First off let me say that I do not condone this sort of activity, however it is rapidly becoming more common place. In the spirit of the season I am going to tell you about a scary new way that people can be destroying your reputation for a couple of bucks a week.

Let's take the fictitious story of Jimmy and his local Porsche dealership. We will pretend that Jimmy went out and bought a brand new 2008 Boxster in his favorite color of Sea Foam Green. Jimmy loved his car for the first 150 miles or so until the engine fell right out of the car in the middle or rush hour traffic. Suddenly Jimmy isn't very happy at all, so he calls the dealership asking them to come get him, the car and what is left of the engine. Well things go from bad to worse and Jimmy is left with his very expensive car and a box of engine pieces standing on the curb.

Our hero eventually gets his car put back together but at an extreme cost and so he vows revenge against the dealership. How does he plan to get revenge? He starts a smear campaign using a "disposable" blog and his adwords account. Jimmy writes an SEO friendly blog and then sets up an adwords account with 20 bucks and just lets it run.

For most dealerships a smear campaign like this would be earth shattering, because the average dealership does not have a reputation manager on staff. If this were to happen to a dealership without a website, or a poorly designed website the ramifications could be catastrophic. It would take the dealership forever to get that link buried if they ever even found out that someone had done this to them.

Microsoft to Help Small Businesses Enter the PPC Market

Today Microsoft announced it's newest "feature" , they are going to offer PPC assistance inside of their Office Live Small Business edition. Personally, I think this is asking for trouble not only for them but for many small businesses who may not be ready for the challenges of adequately managing a PPC campaign. Doesn't this reek of conflict of interest to you? As a consumer I am definitely going to sign up to have my campaigns run by the company who owns the third largest search engine in the world, no questions asked. I am almost guaranteed a fantastic ROI (or so I would think) as it would be stupid of them not to give my campaign a healthy cost per click discount.

The press release says they are going to offer three classes at 19.95 to teach the essentials of SEM and SEO. Wow, I bet my boss would have loved a deal like that when he was spending thousands of dollars training us on SEO and SEM. The reality is that at best these businesses will get a crash course in Live Search, ROI, Adcenter and some basic information on what PPC is. My guess is there won't be real training that covers a/b testing, negative keywords, proper geo targeting by population, the importance of meta data, dynamic landing pages, effective ad copy writing, etc, etc, etc.

If 60 bucks was all it took to become an SEM/SEO expert then every campaign out there would have a fabulous ROI, a 25% conversion rate, and a CPC of under $3.00. The majority of these companies are going to set up their own SEM campaigns and then forget them, which is terrible for the industry as a whole. These businesses need to have a strong, well formed online marketing presence handled by a qualified professional who not only has the time but the skills necessary to coax these campaigns into success. The changes to search engine algorithms change regularly which often sends even the most seasoned SEM/SEO experts scurrying to regain lost conversions. Now imagine the effect one of these changes could have on "Jim the Plumber" who believes the hype that this solution is all he needs to secure his dream of retiring next year. It's Microsoft and they are the good guys... Right? When will Microsoft learn from it's own mistakes?

Parts and Service Leads

Why is it that so many dealerships don't want parts and service leads from their PPC Campaigns? Every couple of weeks I hear from a disgruntled client who is upset that they are getting contacted for their parts and service centers, but I just don't understand why. To me this is like my little brother being upset that people are coming into his bakery for whoopie pies but not peanut butter balls. Eventually all of those whoopie pie eaters are going to be adventurous enough to try the peanut butter balls. No one can resist all that chocolate covered peanut buttery goodness forever...right?

Someday those people who need parts/service are going to have to buy a new car (usually sooner rather then later), and it seems to me that getting someone in your front door is a great way to be added to the list of places to buy cars from. Occasionally, you will even find the golden customer who brings their vehicle in for repairs and realizes its cheaper to buy a new one. Is there a new school of business that says money is bad? No? I didn't think so either...well just in case you are feeling adventurous here is my little brothers peanut butter ball recipe (shhh it's a secret)....

PEANUT BUTTER BALLS

2 lb. peanut butter

3 lb. powdered sugar

1 lb. butter, melted

2 tsp. Pure Vanilla Extract

Mix well in large bowl. Make small balls (approximately 150).

COATING:

2 (12 oz.) pkg. chocolate chips

1 block paraffin wax

Melt together in double boiler. Dip balls and put on waxed paper to "dry".

And for those who don't know what a whoopie pie is :


For cakes:

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup Dutch-process cocoa powder

1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup well-shaken buttermilk

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 large egg

For filling

1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, softened

1 1/4 cups confectioners sugar

2 cups marshmallow cream such as Marshmallow Fluff

1 teaspoon vanilla
Make cakes:
Preheat oven to 350°F. Whisk together flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt in a bowl until combined. Stir together buttermilk and vanilla in a small bowl. Beat together butter and brown sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes in a standing mixer or 5 minutes with a handheld, then add egg, beating until combined well. Reduce speed to low and alternately mix in flour mixture and buttermilk in batches, beginning and ending with flour, scraping down side of bowl occasionally, and mixing until smooth. Spoon 1/4-cup mounds of batter about 2 inches apart onto 2 buttered large baking sheets. Bake in upper and lower thirds of oven, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until tops are puffed and cakes spring back when touched, 11 to 13 minutes. Transfer with a metal spatula to a rack to cool completely. Make filling: Beat together butter, confectioners sugar, marshmallow, and vanilla in a bowl with electric mixer at medium speed until smooth, about 3 minutes. Assemble pies: Spread a rounded tablespoon filling on flat sides of half of cakes and top with remaining cakes. Makes 8 individual desserts

Google hits the Road

It's late and I am surfing instead of sleeping, but this is to cool not to share. Google is now appearing in BMW's in Germany! This is huge for us in the automotive ppc industry....imagine if I can have my customers ads served to the people who are actually in the car driving to a dealership!! You can't get much more targeted then that.

The article is from myTelus, and is definately worth checking out :).

Have a great night.

Why Read Marketing Pilgrim?

Sorry for no post yesterday the release of Presentation and the live Demo with Googlers stole a huge part of my day.

During my thrice daily review of MP I noticed Andy Beal is offering $500.00 to write about why we read their blog each day. This is a fantastic way to build link juice for themselves (not that they need it) and for a lot less money then if they were buying links.

This is part of the reason I read them every day, they have fantastic ideas on marketing, blogging and provide some very interesting reviews of the latest and greatest in SEM. Andy's blog is one of the few "out of industry" blogs that I read because of the product highlights and new features.

After all, without them, it might have taken me an extra 3 hours to find out that the awesomeness that is Google Presents had finally been released.

Double Clicking is for Windows

Today, while we were doing research for our PPC applications, I sent my co-worker the link to MSN's Ad Center Labs http://adlab.microsoft.com/. The ad with "Search Master Steve"really made me laugh. Sure the ad is targeting non professional SEM folks but I find it hard to believe most people won't consider the ad slightly insulting. How did they miss the lessons that Dell taught with their "Steve" in the early 2000's? I mean come on the guy was arrested for pot possession and completely ruined millions of dollars in advertising...

On initial review there are some cool little tools (demographic approximations!) but the real value seems to be diluted by MSN's outlandishly cartoon like presentation. Any statistical value these tools may actually hold seem to be so far buried in cute that they are rendered pointless. MSN would do well to just give us the info we need in plain html without all the "pizazz".

As my co-worker was reviewing the site he also pointed out that the site was extremely Microsoftish with its bright, surreal, cartoon like graphics and cheesy interface (I knew that was coming as he is a self proclaimed "website snob"). After getting over his "snobbery" he decided to check out some of the links anyways. After a few moments of discussing the relevance of some of the new information potentially available for our PPC campaigns he exclaimed "Double clicking is for Windows not the Internet! No one wants to double click on the Internet!"