Do smart devices or social medias change your shopping habits, and how?

People have claimed that social content changed their minds about something they intended to buy.... there is no disputing that now.

Now, it is common to see that many people use their smart devices to check prices and read reviews of vehicles before they shop. Heck, some dealers are getting so sophisticated that they are putting offers out there for people that actually find them on their smart phone.

Consumers also check for the recommendations from friends and consumer or expert reviews, and they claim that they are a very important part in helping them make a decision before they step on your lot.

A survey from the social media agency, Symphony Teleca showed us thesestats:

§                     64% of Smartphone users shop online using their devices.

§                     167 million people will shop online this year and spend an average of $1,800 per person.

§                     40% of Twitter users say they search for products through Twitter.

So does social media change your buyers shopping habits, I think so?

If you want ot learn more on how to combat this and become more successful converting shoppers to buyers please contact me and we can start a strategy for yoru dealership.

Social Media ~ Attract, Convert, Measure ~ PART THREE

So far we have covered how people find your business and we have discussed how to convert people that contact you into paying clients… now I would like to discuss how to measure success and determine ROI.

To recap we found out that social media, if you are doing all the various traditional and online marketing, generates a small fraction of your business… but, if you are like me, Social Media is the majority of your marketing initiatives; thus generating the majority of your leads.

We also discussed that people that you are attracting to your business through social media are better informed than other clients, thus making you work harder to make them paying clients…

So now, for argument sake, you have sold them. The money is in the bank and you’re on to the next potential sale… not so fast… shouldn’t you truly understand how that client came to you, what it cost you to get that client; then determine if it was cost prohibitive to even make the sale?

If you are investing too much time, spending way too much money, and it is resulting in minimal sales is it really worth it? After all, the definition of insanity is, “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result”.

The purpose of this BLOG entry is to just make you think. I am not going to be the guy that says you should not sell something, or you should sell something. I just want to give you options and create opportunities to help your business grow. Heck, in one of the examples you will see below about my “Twitter” efforts is an example of an ROI loss that I am willing to take because of the increased exposure I get.

I want to take a look at something I was just exposed too; it’s called the “Social Media Money Formula”. The formula looks like this:

(R – Cg) * (F * Cr * Or * Pr) – (h * T) = Profit
R = Revenue per sale
Cg = Cost of goods sold
F = Number of friends/followers (SM reach)
Cr = click rate on SM links (% of followers that click)
Or = Opt-in rate) % of clicks that opt-in)
Pr = Purchase rate (% of opt-ins that buy)
H = Hourly rate for your SM efforts
T = Amount of time you spend on social media

The translation is (Revenue minus cost of goods) * (Number of friends times click through rate times opt in rate times purchase rate) less (your hourly rate that your time is worth times your total time spent on social media) equals your net profit. Or for you business types, “Earnings before Depreciation, Taxes and Amortization”, “EBIDTA”

Let’s look at a real world scenario for me. I have 850 followers on Twitter and have tracked all the sales I generated because of Twitter in the month of the previous month, October. FYI, I always ask how people found me so I can track ROI back to my individual efforts.

I am going to determine the ROI for a sale of a few images to a client that found me on Twitter during October… This was the only revenue that I generated through my Twitter initiatives during October, so it will be simple to show you as an example.

($250 in revenue less $40 in cost of goods, travel and editing time) x (431 followers on Twitter X 50% estimated click rate X 4% opt-in rate to enquire about images X 10% conversion rate of people opted in to who bought) – ($50/hr for my billable hours X 4 hours of my time per month working on Twitter)

Net profit after hard costs ($210.00) x Conversion of my Twitter followers (0.862) – my time doing social marketing ($200.00) = -$18.98 Profit for the sales of a few images from my efforts on Twitter. So I lost money on in my efforts on Twitter but I expanded my network, had a few people sign up for a newsletter and did a decent job creating brand awareness.

My true bottom line showed a net loss when I did the ROI equation, but overall I actually put money in the bank and more people found out about my “Brand”… aka, Me. It may have not been a smart move, and maybe I should have walked away like i said in the post after this one... but I made the conscious decision to sell them for less than I normally would have.

If I want to increase the ROI I know I have to do a few more things to increase my brand awareness and create better conversion… and you may want to try these as well.

For those that blog tips and tutorials, create more compelling information and schedule the releases at the same time each week. These BLOGs for instance are always released in the morning. People are starting to know that about my blog and will come in the morning and know when to read what I posted.

Whatever you post online on your website the formula is quite simple…

1)Create compelling and interesting content
2)The content must lead them to an opt-in form so they can see more valuable content
3)Share all your content via social sites
4)Capture the leads
5)Follow up immediately when they enquire
6)Sell them…
7)Ask for referrals to obtain more prospects

Have a great week everyone,

Kev

Social Media ~ Attract, Convert, Measure ~ PART TWO

This is part two of three in a series of postings dealing with Social Media. This posting will focus on how to Convert web traffic to buying clients.

For those of you that missed “Part One” I would suggest you read that BLOG post that was posted yesterday so you understand what influences traffic to your website. Then come back and finish reading this post.

Buyers are in control now more than ever, especially consumers coming to you from an online source. There is so much information out there on the internet that our customers are approaching us armed with competitive information and even most are amateur photographers themselves, therefore able to take photos that occasionally rival a professionals. So, not only is there more competition out there, the people we are trying to sell are extremely well prepared before they talk to you.

The keys to converting these types of clients is really quite simple in theory, it just takes a leap of faith from traditional ways of thinking. Just remember the acronym, “RISE", its an acronym for “Respond, Intelligence, Share and Enjoy” …

“Rise” above your competition!

Respond – If a potential client contacts you, respond in an efficient and timely manner with more information than they asked for.

You have so many competitors out there that you need to respond as fast as you can with a personalized message. Engage them and maintain a captive audience.

Intelligence – You have to make sure you know just as much about what your competition offers than what you offer. Sounds silly, but it’s true. Information is power and will give you control.

The Chinese General Sun Tsu who wrote the “Art of War” teaches, “It is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle.”

Share – Prior to the internet, information was scarce. Now, those that are visable on the internet have to share their information and become a trusted member of an online community in order to attract potential clients. If you don't share and offer a lot of information, a competitor is just a click away. Its not like the potential client is driving from store front to store front. They are sitting at home and just have to click on the next photographer to find what they want.

When if comes to social media people do not want to be sold, they just want options. In order to penetrate any social online community you need to be perceived as an expert and just have a strong presence. Remember what I said in part one, “you are in or you are out of social media”!

If you are in, be IN, and participate in the community, share your knowledge and allow the potential clients know you are a trusted source… that comfort level you gain will go a long way in converting the tire kickers into dollars in your jeans.

Think of it this way... why are people on facebook? To reconnect and talk to friends? If you are one of their friends and you are always posting about your products and services and always trying to sell something... well the perception they will have about you on Facebook is probably the same way you feel everytime a pesky telemarketer calls your house at dinner time trying to sell you window cleaning services.

Enjoy – Have fun in your online communities… don’t beat people over the head with your products and services. Just enjoy the communication… send out silly surveys, talk about your family, throw out jokes… let people know the real you.

If you are not enjoying yourself you are not going to do it well. Let’s face it, we are photographers, we prefer to be behind the camera. So while doing this necessary evil, you might as well enjoy yourself. Your engaging personality will come through and people will learn to trust you... then they will buy from you.

In the next post in this trilogy I want to start to discuss something that I just learned… it’s called the “Social Media Money Formula” … this again comes courtesy of Tyler Garns. In addition to that you can also expect to learn how to "Measure" your efforts to see if they are working.

But not only "Measure" success, but I will take a deeper dive and help you really understand what your ROI is. We will be accounting for more than just looking at the money you make, but the time you spend doing certain things.

Talk soon and remember to RISE above your competition!

If you would like more information please contact me below. If you also want to be on my mailing list, please email me and I will put you on the distribution list that goes out 4x a year.
Enjoy the holiday season with your family and friends.

Kev

Online marketing pointers for Auto Dealers

Most auto dealers seem to be aware of the potential of social media for their business but most don’t know where to start. Because there is this confusion, people either skip it entirely or do the wrong things. Either way, it just doesn’t work for you and you are left feeling that you missed a huge potential. Sound familiar?

Most of your social media marketing is going to be about engaging with your potential and existing clients so it's best to pick just one or two services and concentrate on those to maximize your efforts. Joining a multiple of sites will leave you exhausted trying to keep up with the communication and posting… you will have less time for actually making money and taking photos.

One thing I would suggest is a Blog for a long term strategy. Plan your posts to ensure you are posting a minimum of one thing a week. This has long term search engine benefits and if done at the same time each week. Your followers will also be able to form a habit of knowing when your posts go online.

The second thing I would suggest is a micro-blogging platform like Facebook or Google+ for short updates. These sites are an online destination where you can post your products and services and join communities to have fun. I would not be doing any hard selling on these sites, that’s not what they are for. Just join post and have fun. A friend of mine runs a few companies, some are posted on Facebook. One in particular is an "Event Management" business. He has all the information of his services on the Facebook profile but never sells… but rather sends out videos and posts humorous comments and polls that people watch for. He is building his business on his perceived knowledge and likability… and it works. People hire him because they like him and he is perceived as a trusted expert. There may be better "Event Managers" out there but Steve proves that people buy on trust, emotion and relationships.

Whatever platforms you decide on, give yourself a schedule and allocate a specific amount of time to post updates. BUT STICK TO IT. A regular update on what is going on, a few tips here and there, put up photos that you have recently taken should take you 15-30 minutes once each week to post to your blog, and 5 minutes a day to check your Wall on Facebook or Google+. And if there are any comments on your wall, make a response to any comments and post your own update.

Never go to your Blog or your social media page without a clear idea of what you're going to write about! Turn off the e-mail alerts when visitors post to your blog or wall and don't fall into the time sucking mistake of checking it continually like email! Instead, focus on what’s going on over the last day and just comment on that.

Always remember the goal is to make your social marketing page a hub where your clients can connect with you, so you have to keep pushing them to go there and keep encouraging them to join the conversation! Effective methods of pushing people to your social media efforts are Twitter, links to your social media accounts on your website, QR codes on your business cards and marketing materials and cross marketing your social media initiatives.

A QR code (abbreviated from Quick Response code) is a type of matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code) first designed for the automotive industry. More recently, the system has become popular outside of the industry due to its fast readability and comparatively large storage capacity. The code consists of black modules arranged in a square pattern on a white background. The information encoded can be made up of any kind of data (e.g., binary, alphanumeric, or Kanji symbols). Here is the QR code I use to get people directly to my website.

Now that I said all this and possibly got you thinking a little more about social media, you should also be tracking what is generating leads and “Gross” for your new car showroom, used car showroom and your service departments. There is no use spinning your wheels in the mud and not getting anywhere.

I hope this article helps you. I will post more on the subject in the coming months.

Contact me if you would like to learn more about social media or creating more effective advertising for your car dealership

Happy networking,

Kev

Social Media ~ Attract, Convert, Measure ~ PART ONE

Social Media ~ Attract, Convert, Measure ~ PART ONE

I attended a webinar this week about social media. The webinar was put on by Tyler Garns. If you are on TWITTER you can follow Tyler at @tylergarns
The information he pumps out is extremely valuable to anyone owning a small business and wanting to grow their revenue through maximizing online.

I am going to split this blog out into three parts because of the vast amount of information I have to give. This posting will focus on what influences website traffic to your website, the “Attract” portion of these BLOG entries.

What influences website visitors? The primary influencer to a small business’s website still is “familiarity with your brand”. Generally this accounts for 38% of your monthly traffic. This is people that know you or your company name and will search for your name on a search engine query. Or they will come directly to your website by entering in your URL. I suggest that you go to your analytics tool and look at the referral traffic to your site, find out where the traffic is coming from, and add up the searches with your name or company name to the direct traffic to your specific URL.

This will show you how familiar people are with your name or brand, and how that translates to a percentage of your overall traffic

The second most influential for website traffic is promotional emails. In my experience I know this to be true. If you are doing email blasts or newsletters, and you are doing it right with deep linking you will see the benefits. If this is something you are doing in your mix of marketing, the statistics say that this will generate approximately 19% of your website traffic.

Where that traffic from your newsletter lands is entirely up to you. I like to drive people right to specific pages on my website. Why? Because I know what pages I have higher conversation ratios of taking browsers to paying clients.

The following marketing initiatives seem to bunch up and represent the second tier of marketing influencers to your website.
Search Engine Results accounts for 8%
TV, Newspaper, Radio and Magazine account for another 8%
Word of mouth recommendations yet again accounts for 8%
Traditional internet advertising accounts for 7% of your traffic generation.
To be honest I do not know many photographers that advertise on TV, Radio, newspaper or magazine; and frankly there are very few that even do traditional internet advertising.

I would suggest that you, as auto dealers, spread the 15% that these advertising mediums traditionally account for and distribute that over our newsletters, social media, SEO and SEM tactics. What we do, do as photographers is influence our search engine results and if we are paying attention to our reputation, we can influence positive word of mouth.

Search engine results being on average 8% of a small business web traffic is low to me. While I just let it go on the webinar because there were many types of small businesses in attendance, I disagree with this stat for a auto dealer. If you are trying to grow your business, and you have a website you will be focusing significant amount of your time on keywords and meta tags on your website to ensure higher ranking in search results. I know I do, and I pay as much attention to this as I can, both on my blog and on my website. Search engine results, and subsequent click thru to my website accounts for just over 10% of my website traffic… and growing.

I am sure if I purchased keywords this would grow, but I decided to focus on SEO versus SEM, I am saving the money and I only invest my time. And yes, time is money, but when faced between watching TV or doing SEO on my site, doing the SEO usually wins over a mind numbing episode of Grey’s Anatomy… Now, the Big Bang Theory is another story. Not much gets in the way of me and my thirty minutes with Sheldon, Leonard, Penny, Raj and Howard.

The last grouping of influencers seems to fit together nicely as well. It will prompt those of you that do not participate in social media to question whether it’s worth the effort, but for those of us that participate in social media already have the answer, and that answer is yes, absolutely.

The statistics show that for small businesses the following seems to generate smaller percentages of traffic.
Interaction on Social Networks accounts for 5% of the traffic
Blogs and discussion boards account for 3% of the traffic
Shopping comparison sites and product review sites account for 4% of the traffic.

Personally, as a person that participates in social marketing, I can say firsthand that social marketing is the largest influencer of traffic to my website. BUT… a word of caution. You are either doing social media or you are not. There is no half way here. Commit yourself to it and you will drive traffic.

Social media is a huge topic unto itself so I am not going to go into all the details here. Social media can consist of using websites such as… Facebook, Google+, Farmville, Flickr, 500px, youtube, Gowalla, Instagram, twitter and many, MANY others.

The trends that do seem to be taking hold that you might want to look at are, “Urbanspoon”, a geo based application that will find places to eat, be entertained etc, Google and Facebook places to list your businesses on to be found. Other trends that are on the rise are Foursquare, Gowalla and Groupon. But one that I would suggest you get involved in is YELP… get engage here and see the rewards for traffic generation, and subsequent conversation because the traffic are qualified prospects.

The next posting will be about converting traffic from browsers and tire kickers to actual clients… that will come out tomorrow.

In the meantime, if you want more information please contact me below.

If you also want to be on my mailing list, please email me and I will put you on the distribution list that goes out 4x a year.

Contact me by clicking here

How Car Dealers Should Use Facebook

FACEBOOK TIP: The best times to update the facebook pages are Wednesday and Sundays, but Wednesdays are the better of the two days.

FACEBOOK TIP: If you read someone’s post or look more closely at their pic(s), the least you can do is like it, even if you hate it… That’s a common courtesy payment for the piquing of your curiosity.

FACEBOOK TIP: Studies show that fill-in-the-blank posts garner nine times more response than other types of posts. That’s what I call ____.

FACEBOOK TIP: Try not to LIKE your own posts. It makes you look desperate.

FACEBOOK TIP: Save time by having a planned strategy before you login. Know what you are there to do.

FACEBOOK TIP: Your face is your logo in the world of social media. It’s called “Facebook” not “Logobook.”

FACEBOOK TIP: Don’t over-post. It annoys your audience. Limit posts to 1 x 4 hrs. If you need more, go to Twitter.

FACEBOOK TIP: Start by making friends & being social. Don’t worry about selling. People do biz with those they like. So use your Facebook page to have more fun than blast out deals.

FACEBOOK TIP: Likes do not lie. If you’re not getting Likes, it means people don’t like what you’re posting. When you post something good, people will let you know with likes.

FACEBOOK TIP: I don’t care how famous you are. Everyone should take time to comment respond to those who comment on your posts. Not responding may make you seem anti-social, rude and self-absorbed (even if you’re not!).

FACEBOOK TIP: Research from Buddy Media shows that there is an 18% increase in engagement for posts made on Thursday and Friday. The less people want to be at work, the more they are on Facebook!

FACEBOOK TIP: DON’T over-capitalize your POSTS. It arouses suspicion, and makes you LOOK like you are TRYING too hard.

FACEBOOK TIP: Give details about the pics you post, including who, what when & where. Like a soap opera, not everyone has been watching from day one. Keep them informed.

FACEBOOK TIP: Follow my 25% Rule for Facebook Posts by not posting too much about one thing. Diversify your posts for the best results, and to accomplish your goals.

FACEBOOK TIP: Don’t worry about posting the wrong thing, so long as you share your heart, you can’t go wrong. Be yourself, unless you’re a creep.

FACEBOOK TIP: According to research by @BuddyMedia, you get 20% more engagement on Facebook when peeps are home from 8pm-7am.

FACEBOOK TIP: You can link your Facebook account to your twitter account. A post on twitter will then be seen on your Facebook.