Press Coverage

Phil Sura, VP of the Automotive Division of UnityWorks Media is a regular contributor to Digital Dealer Magazine.  Below is his article from the current issue:

Unlocking the Most Intractable Riddle for Auto Dealers

Many successful dealers believe that Google has cracked the riddle on being a key part of the auto purchase experience. With estimates that 85%-90% of consumers use Google during the search process, it would be hard for most to argue this point. I recently facilitated a Best of the Best panel discussion at the fall conference for Digital Dealer. The title of the session was: Demystifying SEO and Organic Search. It was an opportunity for dealers to hear how three successful dealer groups are in part cracking the Google code to gain organic search with Google. The panel consisted of Andy Graff from Galpin Ford, Wayne Ussery from Jim Ellis and Michael Donovan from Lia Automotive. Here is a summary of some of the questions that were discussed with the panel:

• What metrics should I use to measure the effectiveness of my SEO strategy?
  

Michael tracks year to date and year over year numbers from Google webmaster tools. This includes tracking visits, pages visited, and average time on site with Google analytics. This allows you to track the direction that you are moving. One easy test is to place your URL with site into a Google Search. For example, search Google for ”Site: http://www.galpinford.com/”. This will also provide insight into the number of pages indexed or linked (look for the number that appears under the URL).

You can compare your results to the URL’s for other dealers to see how you compare. Andy tracks the following with every company providing leads or activity from organic and paid search: Source, New Internet leads, New Phone leads, Total Leads, Apps Opened, Apps Showed, Apts Made/Show %, Shows Made %, Sold, Sold/Lead %, Sold/ Apt Made %, Front Gross, Finance Gross. Total Gross, Vendor Cost, Cost per lead, Cost per sold, Vendor Cost/ Total Gross. This format allows a store to determine the effectiveness of each area of focus. The effectiveness of each focus becomes very clear if this is reviewed each week.

• Who Should Manage My SEO?
  

All three panelist manage their own SEO rather than relying on their web company. Reasons for this shift included the following: why would a large web company do something special for my dealership compared to the other clients that they are supporting in my home city. How would an SEO company based in another city really know what the best searches are for my dealership?

• Do Organic searches convert at a higher rate? How can I track my effectiveness with organic search?
  

Yes is the answer to the first part of this discussion. For the second part, Wayne uses a heat tracking analysis of individual pages on his website as well as the Google pages with the appropriate search phrases to determine what the prospects are clicking on. The “heat map” allows Wayne to see, based on the information being provided, where the consumer will focus. You can download this software by going to: www.clickheat.com

Wayne also uses www.seomoz.org to rank organic visibility or the percentage of participants looking at specific links on the first page of the Google search results. Here is an analysis of visibility on the first page of a Google search tied to his operation:

Rank 1=100% Rank 2=100% Rank 3=100% Rank 4= 85% Rank 5= 60% Rank 6=50% Rank 7=50% Rank 8= 30% Rank 9= 30% Rank 10=20%

He does the same exercise with the paid search:

Spot#1=50% Spot#2=40% Spot#3=30% Spot#4=20% Spot#5=10% Spot#6,#7and#8=10%

Wayne also summarizes all activity tied to organic search with a table like this:

Conversion (phone calls and emails)= 11.4%

Both Andy and Michael also confirmed the importance of the Google organic searches compared to all other options.

• How can I find out what websites are linking to mine? Could this be a concern?
  

You don’t want outside competitors or companies that you don’t approve of to link to your site. You should also focus on linking to the more dominate sites according to Wayne. You can use Google Webmaster tools to create your own dashboard and help with this. Your website company should be able to help with this, according to Michael. From your Webmaster tools, you can determine if there are unwanted links and who is linking to your site the most. Michael shared that Lia has 57,000 links to their main site. Some of this activity is tied to daughter sites of the indiviual 15 dealerships.

Andy also shared the following: “Buzz generates citations. Citations generate links. Links generate rankings and top rankings =good SEO. The key really is to get the buzz going. People are going to refer back to your site. Basically the more inbound links, the better the SEO strategy.”

• Is there a way to find out what the general public is searching for to help me choose the best keywords?
  

Use this link for help: https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal In addition to this, Google has the ability to guide you through this process if you use Google Insights for Search. The great point about this is that there are online video tutorials that will explain how to use these tools.

• Does social media help with SEO and how?
  

All of the panelist are involved with linking to Facebook, Foursquare, Linked In, YouTube, The Big W, Yelp, Tumblr, blogs and Twitter. Linking to these social sites helps with the organic searches.

• Are there tools that I can use to learn about Google? Where do I go?
  

You can use the following link for the Google sanctioned areas of their site dedicated to learning about their various services: http://www.google.com.intl/en/about/products/index.html
For Ad Word related items, visit: http://www.google.com/awexpress

• What is VSEO and does it help?
  

Andy showed some examples of how video has helped Galpin in driving organic search with Google. Conduct a search for the following: 2011 Ford Mustang San Fernando Valley (5 of the top positions were tied to their video strategy) or Ford oil change Los Angeles (2 of the top spots were tied to Galpin’s video search strategy). Wayne shared some examples as well: 2011 VW CC Atlanta (5 of the first organic positions were tied to the Jim Ellis video search approach) or 2011 Audi A8 Atlanta (five of the top five positions were tied to the Jim Ellis video search approach). Andy indicated that their next focus with video search will be the service operation.

Wayne had recently attended a meeting at Google’s headquarters. He shared the following stats that have been released by Google: 53% of Auto Shoppers priced a vechile after watching an online auto video and 80% of Auto Shoppers used an online auto video in their purchase process. Source: Compete Polk/ Google online video-The Role of the Video in the Automotive Research and Purchase Process March 2011

• If I build more pages for my site(s) will my organic traffic improve/increase? What are the key components.
  

Building more pages will absolutly drive organic searches. Here are the key points from Michael: URL, page title, content/kw density, structure, alt text on images. Wayne also explained that he uses the following logic:

I would have to believe that everyone in attendance recevied at least one key point to focus on. I’m also certain that not everyone in attendance agreed with everything that was stated since the panelist had different thoughts on several points discussed. One clear conclusion is that the dealers who are not engaged with trying to demystify organic search are at a clear disadvantage.

Phil Sura is a VP of the Automotive Division of UnityWorks Media.