2013
Autospeak-Straight Talk contains articles covering digital and social media marketing social communities and events marketing
QR or (Quick Response) are a two dimensional bar-code system.
Mobile QR codes is when a consumer uses a smartphone to scan these codes
to reveal their information.
Today they are used in many ways, from inventory tracking, to shipping and logistics,
to online ticketing, also to link to promotional videos on YouTube or set reminders
for upcoming shows. Other applications include putting Google Maps directions on
a business card, to linking to a web page, or even sending a text/email to the company helpline.
Here is an infographic with Statistics showing the amazing growth of QR Code usage.
DealeNet Services
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If you are not hosting a blog on your website start one. If you are not posting relevant information and blogs to draw in potential customers do it.
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Bring the traffic to you and become a destination resort for updates and information so you can reap the benefits and attention that this personal form of content marketing is commanding.
Blogging is like having your own newsreel that provides a direct channel of communication between you and your potential customers.
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When you communicate with and encourage people to get to know you as well as your business (A name and a face they can related to), your relationship with them becomes more personal and makes you more credible.
Since starting the blog on my Company website traffic has shot up over 2800 percent per month and people are spending time there. Also on our Facebook Page for our Foundation, Funlicoma Foundation, by just finding and posting interesting articles on different subjects draws hundreds of readers per week.
This astounding increase led me to do some research on how blogs ranked in terms of overall Content Marketing.
I found that Studies show that over two thirds of consumers will spend the time to read content on a subject they’re interested in. And blogs and articles that contain images get 94% more views.
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Blog content is one of the benchmarks by which success in Social Media is tracked. Blogging can also improve your search ranking. Based on a Wishpond Infographic put out this year, companies that blog have 434% more indexed pages and see 55% more traffic to their sites.
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Blogging is a main component of content marketing and provides many benefits– including increased traffic and visibility and SEO optimization. A company blog is also an effective form of inbound marketing.
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Blogging is highly beneficial when it comes to improving your social presence. In fact, according to Wishbone, interesting content is one of the top three reasons consumers follow brands on social media.
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Blogging is cost effective with time being the only real cost. Make your Social presence today and become a part of this social phenomenon mainstream and become a Social Media Destination Resort and you will have customers coming to you.
Written by Bill Cosgrove
DealerNet Services
So how smart is it for small businesses to invest in giveaways especially when their profits are already wafer thin and they’re struggling with their marketing strategies? The answer is of course yes! Giveaways are a worthwhile investment and go a long way in not only building better relationships with your existing customers but also comes in handy in making new clients.Almost all small businesses are heavily dependent on their returning customers which constitute their 80% sales. Following are some of the reasons which make free giveaways a worthwhile investment for small businesses.
Customer retention
Customer retention is of utmost importance for wholesale suppliers since their business largely depends on a few big clients. In an industry where clients are hard to come by, wholesale traders must do whatever it takes to retain their existing customers since, as mentioned earlier, they are their primary source of revenue. Giveaways go a long way in showing just how much you value your special customers. Customers too in return feel the obligation of staying committed in their dealings with you and do not look for other suppliers.
Building better relationships
There is no better way of building trust and developing stronger relationships with your customers than via free giveaways. They are the best possible way to appreciate your valued clients and show them just how much they mean to you. Giving presents as such is a good practice and should be a norm because it literally spells out just how much the customer means to the company.
Free marketing
Before you give anything away, you should make sure that all of your giveaways bear the logo of your company. Giveaways with company logos and trademarks offer long lasting, cheap marketing for both your business and your product as well.
If, as an example, you have given away a paperweight to your client, you can be sure that it would do more than just weigh papers down! A desk, office accessory that your client puts on his office table is there for everybody he meets, greets in his office. So in that sense, you are not only reaching out to your client only but also to those who are your client is reaching out to.
Because of these and many other reasons, I believe this season every small business must invest in free giveaways.
Written by Robert.
DealerNet Services
Social Media: The Most Economical Yet effective Marketing Tool
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(Posted on Aug 13, 2013 at 02:48PM )
We all know that social media is huge today. People just can’t live without sharing what they feel or displaying what they wear. It’s all sociology from one perspective but it can also mean marketing to a few from another perspective. It is a common fact that where there is sugar there will be the bees. Similarly whenever there are huge concentrations of people, the marketer and advertisers are always there to make use of such situations and struggling to sell products or gain a good brand reputation.Customer retention is by far the most effective way through which a business may gain prosperity and customer retention could only be possible when the people are repeatedly reminded of a brand or a shop or by simply infusing in them a desire to feel the need of anything which the company might be selling. With the advent of social media or to be more precise, when the social networking became the life of the people around the globe, viewership at a specific portal started increasing. Since all that a good TV channel needs is ratings to attract advertisers, here at social networking websites all was already set. People are frequently logging in and out of websites like Facebook, uploading pictures to get comments and statuses to tell their friends what they are going through.
The high concentration of people gathering around the social networking websites provides the traders with the cheapest form of marketing possible. The best part is that the add is displayed on various places and even if the user ignores the advertisement the people around the user may notice the availability of a new item at a some celebrated store and might hasten to buy it before someone else from the community buys. The desire to stand unique among the rest is experienced by everyone and it is this very desire which the traders may cash even when they are trading for wholesale products.
It is an open secret that nearly everyone uses Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram etc. these days. People even prefer to buy cell phones supporting applications which may lead them straight and in as less time as possible to their cyber wall where they post all their statuses or tweets or whatever they want to post. So naturally potential customers are always there looking for ways and means to get a better bargain in the market, searching for some better way to defeat that big competitor who usually gets all the customers due to his high quality yet economical products. Here is where the wholesale traders can actually seal a good deal and earn major profits if only they can post their advertisement, which is always facilitated by such websites.
Social media has by far, revolutionized marketing in every way imaginable. Advertising in now cheaper, effective and result oriented and many businesses are gaining the upper hand in the markets just by a little but careful investment on the social media. What people need to do is to concentrate on social media for advertising their products as compared to getting involved in other expensive, less effective means of advertising.
Written by Robert.
DealerNet Services
What Is Google Plus And Why Should I Join Another Social Platform?
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(Posted on Aug 12, 2013 at 04:11PM )
In the web industry, we need to spend a lot of time researching and keeping up with the constant change in order to provide relevant and sound advice to our customers.Our customers are typically small to medium businesses who often don’t have the time to engage on any social media, but one of the questions I’m being increasingly asked is what is Google Plus?
We’ve all seen the gradual change within Google towards better quality content being a key search factor, along with the growing influence of social media on search, but to put it bluntly, Google Plus has the potential to permanently change the search landscape.
If you and your business aren't actively engaged on Google Plus, you are placing your business at risk!
A study by SearchMetrics earlier this year (you will need to register to download thestudy) showed that social signals such as “Likes†etc correlated very closely to search rankings, and that Google +1s more so than Facebook and Twitter. Correlation isn’t necessarily causation, but recent comments by Matt Cutts and a Google blogannouncing “in depth†articles show that Google Plus participation is going to be vital to gain and maintain rankings.
So, what is Google Plus and how do I use it?
If I had to summarise my thoughts on Google Plus, it would be that I came for the SEO benefits, but stayed for the huge amount of valuable and relevant of information that is shared, the standard of discussion and the willingness of most members to help out and contribute.
Google Plus is different to other social media, in my experience it is less prone to bad behaviour, and experienced members give freely of their time. Discussion topics can we wide ranging, I've been caught up in discussions on music, poetry, westies (as in dogs, via one of the very many "communities"), as well as my core interests of web design, digital marketing and social media.
While I’ve had a Google Plus profile for quite some time I’ve only been actively engaging for the last few months. So instead of me trying to explain it all, I’ll link to some excellent articles by Martin Shirvington, an outstanding authority on Google Plus amongst many other things and someone who will engage with you and help you make the most of this platform. (Make sure your first connection on G+ is Martin)
“If you think Google Plus is just another social site, you are in for a big surprise. What has been created is, put simply, a phenomenal tool for human communication, and much more. But it takes you to experience it, embrace it and ‘get it’ before this realisation really comes.â€- Martin ShirvingtonÂ
Martin Shervington
Marketing, Psychology & Google+ InsightsWhat is Google Plus? A Complete User Guide. (Videos and Blog)
Article resources (including additional videos)
- The Ultimate Guide to Google Plus Posts
- The Ultimate Guide to Google Circles
- The Ultimate Guide to Google Hangouts
- Complete Guide to Google Plus Pages for Brands and Businesses
- Complete Guide to Google Plus Communities
- Complete Guide to Google Local
- How to use Google Plus with Google Adwords
- Complete Guide to your YouTube Channel
- Google Authorship and Social SEO
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO), using Google Plus
BY CHRIS SUTTON
DealerNet Services
Which do you think would be more interesting to your customers – that your dealership is #1 in sales or that your dealership has the largest inventory in the region?Here’s a hint: One is about you, the other is about the customer. One is inside-out thinking and the other is outside-in.
The differences between the two can be subtle, but simply put, inside-out thinking is when a company or brand talks about things the company cares about. Usually these are business-related topics like industry awards, marketshare growth, new logos, new hires, and so on – the kinds of things that make more sense in a press release than a newspaper circular.
Outside-in thinking is what your customers care about: added locations, extended hours, new inventory, easy financing, pick-up & drop-off services, if you’re first-time buyer friendly, and so on. Outside-in thinking means thinking outside of the box and looking at your vehicles from the buyer’s perspective.
Think of it this way, when you’re inside out, your mouth is moving. When you’re outside in, you’re listening.
Don’t misunderstand; of course you should present a professional and reputable business presence, especially when it comes to high-ticket, long-term purchases. In fact, a little inside-out thinking is good. However, there’s a time and a place for that – a mention will usually do. What you want is to make customers comfortable as early in the process as possible so you get a shot at their business. Outside-in thinking is the surefire way to draw potential buyers to your door.
So, when you’re branding your dealership, no matter if it’s a radio ad, website or even a vehicle description, approach your messaging from your customers’ point of view and use your “outside voice.â€
Posted by Anne-Marie Jeffrey
DealerNet Services
Do you really know how important SEO is? Seriously, do you really?You can’t just have a website with cars on it any more. You’ve got to make sure people can see it, which means you’re responsible for link building, citation building, site optimizing, blog writing, and social media work.
That seems like too much work to most dealers, but numbers don’t lie – and these numbers show just how important SEO is for continued success.
The first stat I hit dealers with is that there are 100 billion searches per month on Google1 - that’s 33 million a day. To put it in better perspective, if each person on the planet were able to, they’d have to search on Google 5 times a day, every day. This at first seems astronomical, but even today I’ve probably used Google 10+ times for non-SEO related searches. I usually use this stat to illustrate the importance of Google’s market share to dealers.  Frankly, Google rules, and it doesn’t really matter if your small business ranks high on AOL.
The second stat: 89% of consumers use search engines for purchase decisions as well as (3.) 71% of business purchase decisions are started with a search engine. I know, I know… That’s two stats, Bryant. I threw these together for a specific reason. It is in fact a ‘double-edged sword’ – regardless of the sector or industry you’re in, both companies and consumers are using search engines to start the buying process.
At this point, I’m usually steering a dealer towards answering the “what does this mean for me?†question. The next stat I use: of the 30 billion mobile searches a year, 12 billion are local.(4.) It is widely expected that in the near future, local searches will account for over half of all mobile searches annually. This is where I start hammering in the importance of a mobile site. If you don’t have one yet, you absolutely need one.
With the fourth stat, I try to hammer home the importance of the mobile site. This is when I tell dealers that 77% of mobile search happens at work or home even though a computer may be accessible (5.) As strange as this sounds, it happens more often than you’d expect. Regardless of where I am, even if I’m at my computer,  if I’m looking for driving directions, I use my phone. At home, if I am browsing on the couch, I am using my tablet. It never occurs to me to jump on the computer in the office, or to pull up the browser on my home desktop for a simple and quick search.
The fifth stat backs up the mobile aspect even more strongly: 46% of mobile web users are unlikely to return to a website they had trouble accessing from their phone and even more are unlikely to recommend the site (6.) This is succinct enough to illustrate not only the importance of having good mobile content, but a site that’s easy to navigate and isn’t confusing.
The next stat is what I call “the closer†– 55% of purchase-related conversions occur within 1 hour of the initial mobile search  (7.) Simply and strongly put, mobile sites convert at a much higher rate than conventional websites – but if you aren’t doing SEO, no one will find your site… and no one will convert.
The next three stats further illustrate the importance of SEO to dealers: in all searches conducted, 70% of users click on organic results  (8.) that 53% of the organic search clicks go to the first link (9.) and most importantly, 75% of users never click past the first page (10.) This is usually when the bell goes off for most dealers. They finally realize that if they  want to get more clicks, they have to rank the highest in the organic results – and that won’t happen without SEO.
Stats even show that organic search leads are more qualified. SEO leads have a 14.6% close rate, while those archaic print or direct mail ads only close at a 1.7% rate (11.) Pretty crazy – leads from search engines are 8.5 times more likely to close than a standard outbound lead.
Most dealers aware of any of these points until we talk to them, which is why I’m sharing this post. In fact, Search Engine Optimization is still only an industry term that most people outside of marketing probably hasn’t heard. These numbers are proof – SEO is not only vital to maintaining a brand, it’s absolutely necessary if you want to stay competitive and grow your business.
Written by Bryant Goodall
DealerNet Services
 Stat Sources:
1 Search Engine Land – August 2012 (http://searchengineland.com/google-search-press-129925)
2 Brafton – February 2012 (http://www.brafton.com/news/89-percent-of-consumers-use-search-engines-for-purchase-decisions)
3 Brafton – December 2011 (http://www.brafton.com/news/search-marketing-alert-61-percent-of-business-purchase-decisions-start-with-search)
4 Search Engine Land – April 2012 (http://searchengineland.com/analyst-mobile-to-overtake-pc-for-local-search-by-2015-119148)
5 Search Engine Land – August 2012 (http://searchengineland.com/study-55-percent-of-mobile-search-driven-conversions-happen-in-one-hour-or-less-151432)
6 Gomez – 2011 (http://www.gomez.com/resources/whitepapers/survey-report-what-users-want-from-mobile/)
7 Search Engine Land – August 2012 (http://searchengineland.com/study-55-percent-of-mobile-search-driven-conversions-happen-in-one-hour-or-less-151432)
8 Search Engine Journal – April 2012 (http://www.searchenginejournal.com/24-eye-popping-seo-statistics/42665/)
9 Search Engine Watch – October 2012 (http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2215868/53-of-Organic-Search-Clicks-Go-to-First-Link-Study)
10 Hubspot – May 2011 (http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/14416/100-Awesome-Marketing-Stats-Charts-Graphs-Data.aspx)
11 Search Engine Journal – April 2012 (http://www.searchenginejournal.com/24-eye-popping-seo-statistics/42665/)
- See more at: http://blog.autorevo.com/2013/08/10-seo-stats/#more-3198
Every once in a while I stop for a moment and consider just how radically different marketing is today from what it was just three years ago. Looking no further than my desk, I am quite amazed at how my job has changed in just that short time.Previously, marketing seemed more an art than a science. It stood in contrast to IT, finance, and operations -- the enterprise functions that lived in a more structured and quantifiable reality than marketing.
Back then, the concept of strategic alignment across organizational lines usually seemed limited to the domain of those in the C-suite. They still focus on it to be sure, but now strategic alignment is also a concern of marketing.
Traditionally, the consumer packaged-goods industry was the leading on in which management engaged marketing in enterprise-wide alignment. It's not surprising considering the nature of the CPG business, and that focus on alignment became known as brand management. As Phil Kotlerattests in this short video, good brand management rests squarely on the shoulders of strategic alignment. The idea is not simply to communicate a brand promise, but to also fulfill that promise with well orchestrated execution and delivery.
What has changed? Now the world is increasingly lived online. The advent of social media has also tipped the scales of business communications decidedly in favor of the consumer. Therefore, customer-centricity is not merely a concern for soap makers and cereal purveyors -- it's essential for all businesses. As a result, brand-management approaches that depend on internal alignment are key to marketing success across industries. Alignment increasingly entails marketing and IT, given the online nature of our digital world.
More than ever, great marketing is about spot-on execution that delivers what's promised.
It follows then that it is not only important to align across departments, but also to align withinthe marketing department through marketing-operations management. It's no longer optional -- marketing-operations management is critical to planning and executing marketing that grows your business. When you can integrate marketing-operations management with marketing automation, adaptive customer-experience management, social media analytics and marketing optimization, then you have your hands on all the major levers that engage your market and grow your business in ways that are structured and quantifiably effective.
Marketing operations management enables success, because you’ll achieve greater consistency, efficiency, and effectiveness by automating and integrating marketing processes and workflows. Key components of this process include marketing-strategy development and planning, asset creation, campaign execution, and post-campaign analysis and reporting.
With the right approach to marketing-operations management, you can plan and develop marketing programs and workflows based on corporate initiatives, and then deliver confidently at a tactical level with consistent messaging, collateral, and execution methods. If you add budgetary views to that operating model, you achieve fiscal control while enabling collaborative planning, allocation, and program execution.
In a nutshell, that's how marketing-operations management supports strategic alignment. For more details, you might be interested in downloading this whitepaper, "Integrating Marketing Operations: How Marketers Can Align Their Strategy and Planning with Overarching Corporate Goals."
Written By John Balla
DealerNet Services
What you did five or 10 years ago is probably more important than your 30-second visit to some e-commerce site that’s now bombarding you with cookie-fueled retargeted ads.That’s why looking to the past – not to the future – is the key to success in the world of data.
Here’s a quiz: What’s the most meaningful piece of digital data about you?
1)Â Â Â Â Â Â Â One of the 100-plus third-party cookies dropped on you today.
2)Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Your 2004 @gmail.com address or 1997 @AOL.com email address.
While you may not think of it this way, the oldest piece of useful digital data about ‘you’ is probably your personal email address. Your email address is the Internet equivalent of a combination birth certificate, driver’s license and passport. As a digital person, you are virtually born the day you get your own email address.
What’s so valuable about something that everyone has?
Uniqueness. Email addresses are personal by design – no one’s been able to devise a better “openID†– and they establish a persona that is very descriptive. AOL, Hotmail, Yahoo or Gmail – your email tribe membership card is like a geologic sedimentary layer.
Longevity. Unlike short-lived cookies, email addresses have half-lives that are growing every year – since people tend to keep their personal addresses forever. How long have you had your personal email address? Why would you ever get rid of it? Probably not. It’s become your digital name.
Portability. Email works in mobile as well as it works on desktop. You carry your email addresses along with you on every device, unlike the device/browser-dependent cookie. The first thing you do when you get a new device, to make it useful, is setup your email address (and for many, your Apple ID, which is an email address, of course). Services like “Last Pass†are the closest cookies come to portability are services.
Access. Email addresses have become your de facto login for every site and app you visit and use. It’s now practically impossible to use the Internet without an email address – even if you don’t subscribe to a single email newsletter.  Try it. I dare you.
With the third-party cookie under attack from Do Not Track, marketers have been looking for the next big thing. That’e email, thanks to the MD5 hash,  privacy-friendly 32-character one-way encryption of the email address. This simple process has allowed Facebook, for example, to create a “custom audience†targeting product that allows retailers to upload hashed customer data segments to target their subscribers who are spending time on Facebook – and show them an ad consistent with their customer status.
And when paired with a cookie downloaded at the time an email is sent and opened, email-address hashing works for display retargeting too.
In the coming months, you’ll start seeing so-called “custom audience†capabilities arrive from Twitter, PayPal, Amazon, you name it. Any site that requires an email address as an account login can get into this game. As marketers realize the superiority of the email hash, they will be bringing long-tail CRM data online, and we’ll all be better off for it. After all, who wants to spend for a prospecting campaign to their best customers?
Take another look at your old email address. You’re looking at the future.
Wriiten by Dave Hendricks
DealerNet Services
The Importance Of Influencing Pre-Market Consumers On Social Marketing
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(Posted on Aug 11, 2013 at 01:29AM )
63 percent of car buyers have an initial brand in mind before they begin researching their purchase. (Source: Google/think)Why should you care about this stat that has to do with a category in which you likely do not compete?
Great question.
You should care because what this demonstrates – check that, proves – is that consumers’ brand preference and purchase intent is being influenced in the pre-market stage of their purchase path. That is, they are making critical decisions that will influence their purchases even before they are thinking about making a purchase.
Powerful stuff.
So, what does this have to do with social media and content marketing?
Another great question.
Well, this has a lot to do with it actually. Social media and content marketing affords us the opportunity to forge relationships with consumers at every stage of the purchase cycle – pre-market, in-market and post-market.
By finding ways to develop relationships with consumers before they are thinking about making a purchase – in the pre-market phase – we can influence brand preference, land our businesses within consumers’ initial consideration set, and dramatically increase the chances of making a sale to consumers when they are ready to make a purchase, or when they are in-market.
How can you do this?
That’s right, probably the best question yet.
There are actually a number of ways that you can do this, and a number of things to bear in mind when doing so.
Here are a few thoughts for how you can develop relationships with pre-market consumers that work toward influencing their purchase decision in your favour:
Provide value that is contextually relevant
I write about the importance of providing true value to your audience on social media a fair bit, but it is absolutely imperative when we’re talking about influencing pre-market consumers. The value and relevance of your content is what is going to attract them to your brand even before they’re thinking about making a purchase. Depending on your strategy it can also build credibility, establish trust, sway perceptions, and more.
When developing your content strategy for connecting with pre-market consumers, the content they view as being valuable may be different that what in-market or post-market consumers see as being valuable. They aren’t yet invested in your business or brand, and they might not even be thinking about your category at this point! This can dramatically affect the content you should consider producing, though it should always retain relevance to your value proposition.
Don’t pitch them
This is pretty simple, but don’t bother pitching to pre-market consumers. Don’t try to sell to them. They’re not shopping, so you shouldn’t be selling. Just think about how annoying it is when a salesperson approaches you and is pushy when you’re just browsing, or accompanying a friend with their purchase.
Avoid turning pre-market consumers off of your business or brand by laying off the pitch until your consumers have indicated they’re ready for it.
Invest, be patient and be confident
What I’m talking about here is no flash in a pan solution to selling like crazy on social media. This is an approach that will take time, and the value of which will be more apparent in the long run.
Invest in connecting with pre-market consumers today so that you can sell them not tomorrow, but six months from now, or a year or two from now.
This approach will yield returns, but they won’t be the immediately apparent returns of cutting prices, or holding a BOGO event. Be patient and confident in your strategy and you’ll see the benefits in due course.
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This approach of targeting pre-market consumers is not intended to work for every business. If consumers in your business’ category go through a short purchase cycle, or purchases are made by impulse, then there may not even be such thing as traditional pre-market consumers in your category.
However, if purchase cycles are sufficiently long, and the financial payoff of converting social media activity to a sale is high, then I strongly recommend you start thinking about your social media and content marketing activity to pre-marketing consumers as an amortizing investment.
How do you target pre-market consumers? How do you get people interested in your business even if they’re not looking to make a purchase? Have you had any success attracting people to your brand even if they’re not considering making a purchase?
Written By Matthew Peneycad
DealeNet Services