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

Honda Creates Best Auto Commercial In Years

My guess is by now everyone has seen the Honda Rube Goldberg Commercial on YouTube. This commercial was so well done that Honda executives thought it was done with CGI when they first viewed it.

Reportedly this commercial was done in 606 takes and cost nearly 6 million dollars to get right (that's approximately 3 million bucks a minute) and that's before you factor in the cost of ripping apart two cars.

Socially Responsible Advertising- A New Spin?

2008 is the "Year of Change" according to just about every political analyst and CNN headline, so how are you going to change your marketing strategy for this year? Are you going to finally break into the blogosphere? Maybe try a little Facebook action? Or are you looking for something new and cutting edge such as Video Ads on Youtube?

No matter what your new medium is perhaps its time to fully embrace socially responsible Advertising - or advertising specials that not only benefit the customers you are trying to bring in to your dealership but the world as a whole. Social networking made great leaps last year in unifying the world as one large global community and companies like Apple and Hallmark have not only embraced the idea of socially responsible advertising but they have made it pretty darn cool.


Companies who embrace major fund raising events is not a new idea, after all we were all right there when Oprah when shopping for the first (Product Red) Ipod and have sat through countless Jerry's Kids telethons. With the majority of new car being purchased by younger, more socially conscious people, especially women, these sales tactics (when deployed properly) are having a powerful impact on sales figures.

For instance one dealership that I know of ran a special all last year that for every new car that was sold of a particular make and model (that they usually have trouble moving in their area) they would write a check for 1% of the sale price to the local orphanage. They included this message at the end of every radio, tv and newspaper ad as well as having a huge sign out in front of their store. The results were pretty impressive, they 8 sold more of that particular type of vehicle then they had the year before. While 8 car sales doesn't seem to be a huge deal in the grand scheme of things that is still a nice boost. What if they had run that special on all new cars? Or run it at the same time they ran an ad offering to send 100.00 to Green Peace for each used car they sold?

Have you ever tried a sale like this? Was it successful? Do you have plans like this for 2008?