As a digital marketing agency, one of our most frequently asked questions is how we are going to turn online footprints into physical ones. Face it, you could have a reach of 100,000 people or 1,000 website clicks, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you made even one sale. Target customers need an incentive to choose your dealership other than price. By changing the conversation from being solely about your inventory to focusing on the reasons why your dealership is the obvious choice over your competitors, you can begin to attract qualified customers to your dealership for sales and service. What problems can you help your customers solve that your competition can’t or won’t? What unique experience comes along with buying a car from you? What do you have that no one else does?

By answering these questions, customers will be more inclined to choose your dealership. Check out my five tips to help you turn online traffic into foot traffic:

1. Offer Incentives and Clear Calls-to-Action for Potential Customers

Once a customer reaches your showroom, they are far more inclined to sit, test drive, or even just take a look at a vehicle that they may not have known they wanted. One way to target these consumers is to offer online incentives for offline use. A lead form can then be placed on the Facebook ad for viewers to sign up for a test drive and have their name entered to win a prize. From there if they lease or purchase a vehicle, they are entered again. Prizes can be anything from a gift card to tickets to a local event.

2. Offer Incentives to Current Customers

You can also use Facebook to advertise to your current customers. For example, you can provide incentives such as a free tank of gas for every three of their referrals that come in. This information can then be used to retarget customers who previously purchased from your dealership to lead into potential future purchases.

3. Highlight Amenities for Service Customers

Do you have a waiting room that exceeds the norm? Does your dealership carry a local coffee shop’s coffee? Is the dealership pet friendly? Do you offer daycare assistance while parents are shopping? This information can help draw customers back to your dealership for service instead of the local repair shop, and are unique qualities worth highlighting in your advertising efforts.

4. Help Local Customers Find Your Dealership Online

Helping people find your business is crucial, especially in the car industry, because purchases must be made in person. Local Awareness Ads help to bring attention to where your dealership is located by giving the viewer relevant call-to-actions like “Get Directions” or “Call Now.” These Local Awareness Ads are especially beneficial to mobile users, allowing them to click on call-to-actions right within the Facebook app. Due to the fact that 88% of Facebook advertising revenue comes from mobile ads, this is crucial to your dealership’s campaigns to ensure local shoppers can find your dealership.

5. Focus on Your “Why Buy”

Last but not least, a “Why Buy” campaign will showcase the benefits that come with purchasing a vehicle at your dealership. In reality, for example, all Ford dealerships sell the same cars, and that stands for the great majority of branded dealerships. Because of this, it is important to create a message that differentiates your dealership from the others selling the exact same vehicles. What protection/insurance plans do you offer that competition can’t or won’t? What unique experience comes along with buying a car from you? What do you have that no one else does (besides customer services and years in business). Take some time to craft this message, and create a “Why Buy” video to humanize your brand.

In conclusion, if your dealership strives for groundbreaking results, you have to show your audience that you yourself are groundbreaking, too. Remember, through your future digital marketing efforts, it is important to highlight the unique qualities that your dealership has to offer where others fall short. In addition, with changes happening in the online marketplace daily, it is crucial to stay in front of the learning curve and utilize new technologies and tactics as soon as they become available to you. Being one of the first to utilize the latest technologies in the marketplace will help your dealership standout from others, creating a brand awareness that could possibly lead to a future sale. If you want to learn more about using Facebook advertising to increase foot traffic to the dealership, download our latest white paper, The Automotive Social Media Sales Funnel.

“That generic ad of a car and a matchable price really caught my attention and is stuck in my head”

-Said absolutely no one ever