In today’s hyper-competitive market where drivers can research car values and prices online, automotive dealerships need marketing campaigns that go beyond initial vehicle sales. While encouraging sales, campaigns should ultimately move drivers towards using a dealership for all of their automotive needs. If you run an automotive dealership, here’s how a marketing campaign can transform first-time buyers into lifetime customers who return whenever they need to purchase, service or trade-in a vehicle.
Generating Visibility to Attract Drivers
All marketing campaigns, and especially those of automotive dealerships, begin by generating visibility for the business. Through television and radio commercials, print collateral and online advertisements, campaigns increase brand awareness and provide contact information for customers to use.
Communicating these details is particularly important for auto dealerships because dealerships are often located in non-central locations. Building on the outskirts of town or in a low-rent district helps keep overhead low, but it minimizes how many passersby see the business. Regularly running a multi-faceted marketing campaign can help make up for the lost visibility.
Showcasing All Services to Increase Business
A robust automotive dealership marketing campaign won’t focus solely on new or pre-owned vehicle sales. In addition to these, a well-designed campaign will also showcase all of the other services that a dealership offers. There will be commercials and advertisements for new and pre-owned cars, but also for brake services, oil changes and tune-ups. When seasonally appropriate, advertisements for snow tires might even be included.
Expanding a campaign to include all of the services offered gets drivers thinking of a dealership as more than a place to buy cars. It’s also easy to do. Service-oriented ads can be created as stand-alone pieces, or incorporated into existing new and pre-owned vehicle materials.
Building Trust to Capture Lifetime Customers
The final component of dealership campaigns is to build trust. Once drivers are aware of a dealership and know the services offered, trust is what will convince drivers to visit the dealership for all of their automotive needs.
There are two distinct aspects to building trust. First, drivers must come to trust that a dealership employs the most knowledgeable professionals in the industry. Second, drivers need to believe those professionals have the driver’s (and not necessarily the dealership’s) best interests in mind. When these two facets of trust are established, drivers will both seek out and take technicians’ automotive advice.
Building trust like this takes time and requires treating every driver with the highest level of service. It starts, however, with a marketing campaign that has a consistent message of professionalism, expertise and appreciation.
Start Transforming Car Buyers into Lifetime Automotive Customers
To learn more about how a well-crafted marketing campaign could help your dealership attract and retain lifetime customers, contact us at Man Marketing Inc. We’ve been assisting auto dealers as a full-service marketing agency for over 35 years. One of our experienced team members would be happy to discuss how we might help you.
