Car dealers want to sell as many cars to as many people as possible. The value of a Camry doesn’t go down if three more people buy one, in fact, sales increase with popularity. As a dealer, the more you sell the more money you make, simple business. I bet you would be hard-pressed to think of a scenario where you would refuse to sell a qualified buyer a new car, right? Assuming, of course, the customer was neither inebriated or attempting to pay with a bag of counterfeit bills. If someone wants to buy, you sell. Contrarily, a service-based company with the goal of driving shoppers to your dealership works very differently. At least, it should.
In any given city there are a finite number of residents who are in-market for the auto brand you sell. Your dealership has to cut through the noise and stand out, that’s why you spend so much money on TV, radio, billboard, digital marketing, and special promotions. You have to be the most appealing. If you’re the second most appealing, you lose. They’re only going to buy from one dealership (this time.) Assuming your processes are conducive to closing the deal, your success or failure rests on how well you reach your potential shoppers when they’re ready to buy. It hinges on your “find-ability.” How easy it is to locate your store when they’re ready to do business.
Search Engine Optimization is the art of building relevant content, primarily landing pages and off-site links, which make your website more easily found by search engines when shoppers type in keywords describing your products and location. A Toyota dealer in Portland, for example, should have plenty of content with keywords like Camry, Toyota, Portland, dealership, etc. SEO is not a one-time thing. You must constantly add new pages and new signals to remain the most relevant for your product searches. It is also highly competitive.
Because we are optimizing or trying to make your website better than your competitors as it pertains to search engine ranking, it is inconceivable that we could have two clients with the same product in the same market. There is no such thing as a tie in search results. Any SEO provider who takes on multiple clients in the same market with the same product is doing a disservice to all of them. They can’t make you ALL number one using the same approach across multiple pages. It’s simply not possible.
This is why Dealer Authority is so proud of our exclusivity clause for our Search clients. We will only optimize a single dealer per market of each auto make and that dealer WILL BE the most relevant for their search terms. We’re not satisfied with the only the number one listing. We also strive for two, three, four, and five. As far down the search results page as we can muster, that’s the goal. In conjunction with a properly managed Pay Per Click campaign, which should ALSO be exclusive, our efforts are designed for dealers to dominate the results page.
There’s a science to it, and it doesn’t happen overnight. With constant, correct page building, off-site links, managed PPC efforts, and ongoing tweaking, Dealer Authority clients can expect greater results than the big guys can possibly offer. Exclusivity is the key.
Yes, it hurts when a new dealer wants to sign up and we must turn them away because of our exclusivity clause. We value the relationship with our clients, not just collecting a paycheck. We genuinely want to make each dealer partner the best in their market. When you sell cars, we celebrate. If your current digital marketing partner is also working with the competition then it’s safe to assume that your success is not a pride point for them. Perhaps it’s time to give Dealer Authority a call.