Trying to keep ahead of your competitors can feel like a full time job in itself. It doesn’t help that online marketing techniques are constantly evolving.
Many of the well-established automotive product sellers that have come to us for help have experienced a real slow down in demand over the last five years.
Depending on the area you specialize in, the car industry can be highly cyclical and years of declining disposable income reduced consumer interest in classic and muscle cars.
But, the industry is slowly recovering!
Getting your company performing online is the key to future success in the industry. Your potential customers are browsing what's for sale on their mobile devices at all times of the day and night.
The best way to reach your audience is now online.
Remember, to get the most out of your online advertising, you need to bring potential customers back to a professional, modern website that is optimised to turn casual visitors into paying customers.
With so many different advertising options out there, it can get confusing (and expensive) if online marketing isn't done right.
When you're advertising your company and it’s products online, you're opening yourself up to a much bigger audience over a much larger geographical area than traditional advertising methods.
To help get you up to speed, we've created this quick introduction to the world of online advertising for performance auto parts.
How To Improve Auto Parts Sales
Advertising on Car Enthusiast Websites and Forums
If you're new to the world of online marketing, this is probably going to be the most familiar entry on this list for you!
For years, the auto industry relied on placing ads in car magazines, garage directories and forums for car enthusiasts. With the shift from traditional to digital, you might have noticed a lot of the places you used to buy ad space with have gone online.
Buying digital ad space is pretty much the same as a paper ad, the only difference being the magazine will add your advert to their website.
The benefit of advertising on the websites of the industry's biggest names means you have access to all of their subscribers and visitors. The downside? You have to fight hard to get noticed amongst all those other companies advertising too.
A popular (but time-consuming) way of advertising to our industry is a seller setting up their own Facebook group, dedicated to the niche area of the industry you specialize in. If you have the time and interest to do this, it’s a great way to make a name for yourself in the industry.
Promotional Item Giveaways
If you've got a Facebook account, you've probably already seen plenty of these.
Promotional giveaways involve giving away an item in exchange for people giving you their contact details (most likely on your website) or by liking and sharing your social media post. After a certain amount of time, a random winner is chosen, and they get their free item.
Promotional giveaways can potentially bring you a huge amount of brand awareness. Depending on the item you choose to give away, they can continue to have a beneficial effect on your company long after you have stopped promoting them.
Things like t-shirts, bags, pens and baseball caps can enter daily use amongst your target audience.
When people give their contact details to enter, make sure to store these in an email database or automated email software for any future marketing project.
The most popular (and most shared) items are usually free products given away - but whether that's suitable for your business really depends on what items you sell. If you stock car accessories or branded driving gear, this could be a great opportunity for you.
Make sure to maximize your exposure by taking photos of the winner collecting their goods and promoting it on social media (and even local newspapers, if the prize is big enough).
Retargeting Adverts (AKA Programmatic Ads)
Retargeting is absolutely essential if you're investing any money at all into online advertising.
You might have noticed after looking at something online that you keep seeing adverts for that exact item or similar products. This is retargeting ads in action.
When someone visits your website, they're automatically assigned a tracker ID that will display your ads to them repeatedly when they visit other sites.
The great advantage to implementing this type of online advertising is there are thousands of websites that will show your ads to people who have visited your site, including the likes of: Facebook, Instagram, Amazon, Twitter and so many more.
The average customer will interact with a company SEVEN times before actually purchasing from them. In fact:
96% of visitors that come to your website are not ready to buy.
Now that’s a scary number for anyone investing money in their website.
But, by repeatedly reminding them of your amazing products and unbeatable service, you're touching base with them, building that relationship - without having to put any time or effort in.
Retargeting ads do the hard work for you.
This latest innovation in advertising enables you to pay for the potential customer, not the ad placement.
Google AdWords gives you access to millions of people searching for information on your industry every day.
When you combine AdWords with retargeting, the Google Display Network Reach in the US reaches over 92% of visitors across millions of websites, videos and devices.
Now that’s a result.
The best way to approach AdWords is to narrow down the target audience of your ads. You can define who sees your ads by age, sex, location, occupation and so much more.
To get the best return on your investment, you need to know exactly who buys from you: where they live, what they do and what they're searching for. When you can pinpoint exactly who your customers are, you can choose to target them and pay to get your details above your competitors.
Facebook Marketplace
Launched in 2016, Facebook Marketplace is a great way to sell to local car enthusiasts (shoppers can choose to see items anywhere from 2-100 miles away).
The number of potential customers is encouraging - Facebook has more than a billion monthly active users with more than 450 million people visiting buy-and-sell groups each month.
In terms of the dedicated Marketplace, there are currently 100 million active iOS and Android app users that have Marketplace featured in their Facebook app.
With the average user spending 50 minutes or more every day on the app, you've got a good chance of attracting new customers.
The downside? Facebook Marketplace is used by a lot of casual sellers - if you sell common products, you might find yourself competing on price.
Email Marketing
Email marketing has the highest return on investment of any advertising option. On average, every $1 spent on email marketing sees a return of $38.
With email marketing software, you can now prepare customized and personalized emails months in advance and schedule them to send out at set times of the year.
Once you have a number of customers' email addresses, you can start sending them promotional emails or let them know about any new products in stock.
As each person you're emailing has already expressed interest in your product or service, you're going to get a much warmer reception (and higher success rate) than if you were contacting random people in the industry.
The result? Your emails are going to get more opens, clicks and conversions. You can even target customers with specific products based off their previous purchases.
Online marketing can help drive qualified leads to your business.
If you’re an automotive business ready for a higher level of performance in your digital marketing efforts, the Motorhead Digital team has proven processes that will help you stay savvy and at the top of your game - going way beyond a simple website.
Get in touch for a free strategy call today and get your business working for you.
