Internet Marketing for Small Businesses

A handful of search engine marketers and auto dealer website designers have begin to offer a blog as a suggestion. The rationale is that it allows them to connect with a new demographic, develop a report with their customers, and it drives new traffic via search engines.  It’s a good idea, but it takes a remarkable amount of effort to be successful.  Here, I take a look at those touting the value of the local car dealership starting a blog and a couple examples of blogs in action.

First, we have you understand the source: web services providers have identified a new revenue stream that they can offer to their clients. Nevertheless, they offer some good rationales.

• Durbin Media’s first post on auto blogging
• Blog Pro Automotive has organized a business around auto dealer blogging
• Laura Spencer from the Business and Blogging Blog put out some good reasons to blog, but the comments to the post are what’s really worth reading (both sides represented).

But I’m a car man, not a writer….

Blogging is a public contact sport.  Small businesses can use blogging to improve their reputation, but by the same token, writing is a personal venture.  You open yourself up to criticism.  Many salesmen with polished verbal skills remain hesitant to dive into the online world.  If u cannt right good, don’t make blogs.

If I write it, will they come?

One of Blog Pro Automotive’s clients raises an interesting point: will people actually go to these blogs?  And will blog readers go back to the main site?  In my experience, the actual tracking numbers for small business sites that I’ve observed has dampened my initial enthusiasm.  While I have little doubt of the SEO value of blogging, it’s unclear to me at this point whether a blog can quickly find a readership or convert readers into a steady mainstream customer.  A blog for large companies like McDonalds or Whole Foods or General Motors–major national brands–would be successful if 1 in 500 visitors raised their brand awareness or found out more about the company product.  But for a small business site that receives 30 to 150 hits per day, or a blog that receives 10 hits per day, even a 2% crossover rate may not justify an investment in weekly writing.  My view is that the blog must be of consistent high quality to drive traffic; a mediocre effort may not pay dividends.

What if I hire somebody to write it for me?

Ah, the “full service auto blog“?  This type of blog certainly provides SEO value for the site.  But the question is whether the blog is personal enough to establish a relationship with customers.  A professionally managed blog improves the frequency of blog posts, but the value in building a relationship should be questioned.  In order to be effective, a managed blog should be part of a personal relationship between the upper management at the dealership and a professional writer–whether it’s a young college graduate in the sales department or an outsourced third party.  Dealers who follow this path need to ask the third party for the “RSS subscription numbers” and the number of return visits to the blog to gauge the size of the following and it’s actual value in building a relationship.

How does this sell cars?

Blogs don’t sell cars per se, but they are one part of your overall marketing machinery.  To be successful, a blog need to be integrated into the daily business routine.  The salemen should read the blog and offer suggestions about new content.  The litmus test for a blog is whether a) the employees know the blog exists and b) whether they refer a customer to an informative post in reponse to a good customer question.  If the blog doesn’t become integrated into the daily business structure, it’s likely just an ancillary part of your website that 1-5 customers will look at per day, leading to few conversions.  When I read posts obviously written by someone at the manufacturer’s headquarters or an offsite web marketing guru, I become skeptical whether the blog is able to drive quality traffic.

Dealer Blogs in action

Perhaps the best way to evaluate the value of a blog is to review the quality of dealerships who have taken the plunge into the wild-world of blogging.

• Perruzzi Toyota of Pennsylvania has a nice blog and a shameless SEO blog.  In the regular blog, they write relatively informative information about new updates to their models (with a nice embedded video), and cheeky pieces about how driving a used car is better than flying.  The shameless SEO blog uses keywords from local events like a Thanksgiving parade in the local area to try to get search traffic for current, local events.  This is a “grey hat SEO technique” but seems to be working for them
• JelMac Auto group of New Jersey runs an infrequent blog with decent posts.  One prominent criticism is that it is  difficult to navigate betweeen the blog and the main site–a goal of any blog (see next bullet)
• An integrated dealership site design with the blog like seen at Braley and Graham in Portland is preferrable.  These guys are just getting started up; they do an interesting job of drawing attention to their company being in the news with the recent government bailouts.
• AutoConversion run another full service blog for a Nissan dealer.  The worst part is that the links back to the main site are BROKEN! (at least the main “website” one).  The blog provides informative information, however, it’s clearly written from a distant third party.  The posts on winterizing a vehicle and credit related info are helpful, but are clearly written from outside the dealership.  A nice post might bring customers back to a person or service at the dealership who can help (ie the finance person with the 650 to 700 FICO score).  Similar comments could be said about Lankford Buick’s full service blog.  Or YourMercedes blog. Anyhow, this is solid work, however impersonal.
• Toyota of Watertown (Mass) got off to a great inhouse start start.  But after two posts, they quit writing.  Further proof this is a common outcome.
• Hendrick Pontiac’s blog is a pretty solid effort by the sales department to promote current deals.  But it doesn’t provide enough of a narrative to hook a reader.  Plus, it’s another example of unsustainable blogs: 9 months without a post.
• Superior Toyota of Kansas City runs a nice blog with customer testimonials, and some nice sales content (clearly written by the sales department).  After a couple of months, however, they petered out.  As of this post, they have not written in 8 months.
• Central City Toyota’s blog is difficult to read.  They get some great information out about their donations to the community, but the benefit for the customer is questionable.  I wish them luck–they just started a couple months ago and hopefully the blog will continue for post #4.
• Elmhurst BMW’s blog is another solid attempt, likely written by an offsite webmarketer based on knowledge of the current promotions.  The use of the blog to repeat news of promotional offers that were likley advertised through traditional media is a nice way to unify the marketing strategy.  This is a another Izmocars site…a theme is growing.
• Mickey Chrystler Dodge Blog is my favorite blog out there.  This is a personal blog run by the general manager of the company.  We see their personality in the blog posts, the videos of a new car, and the testimonials.  I imagine that all the employees know the blog exists and that a salesman would be comfortable telling a customer about a blog post relevant to one of their questions (say, on the phone).  This blog offers value beyond just reproducing articles in magazines or radio commercials.  The tribute to the GM’s father, the deceased former owner, is a wonderful touch.  In another blog, the GM cites her experience reading her daughter’s travel blog as a motivation for her efforts.  Keep up the good work–they’re only 3 months into their experiment.