Best Idea Winner Picture Perfect

LAS VEGAS – Josh Pogue did a photo flop, and it increased online search rates for his dealership group.

He notes most website photo galleries of vehicles for sale start out with three-quarter-angle exterior shots. Shoppers clicking those ultimately get to interior photos, specifically ones showing the cockpit.

Pogue decided to do it the other way around, making interior shots the first pictures of the galleries. He assumed it would lead to more clicks and interest. It did.

“We had a 90% increase in leads just by showing the ‘steering-wheel shot,’” says Pogue, marketing manager for Weins Auto Group in metro Toronto. He cites conversion rates going from 2.7% to 4.9%.

The flip-flop project wins first place in a “Best Idea Contest” at the annual DrivingSales Executive Summit here. The contest focuses on online dealership projects. Participants pitched their ideas to a three-judge panel of dealership people.  

“If everyone is doing a three-quarter shot of the vehicle, and you are doing the ‘steering-wheel shot,’ your image stands out,” Pogue says.

To verify effectiveness of the switch, “we put the regular exterior shots back on,” he says. “We saw a 20% drop in clicks.”

The interior photos also serve as teasers for shoppers who at some point want to see exteriors. That’s just about everyone. “They don’t mind the additional clicks,” Pogue says.     

He got the idea while searching online for a condo. “I was looking for a unit with hardwood floors, so I wanted to see photos of that more than shots of the building.”     

Here are contest runners-up and their ideas:

Ben Blanco didn’t hit the panic button when told business was a bit down and asked what he could do about it for his employer.

Instead, he came up with a plan that eliminates the need for customers to hit the print button to get a coupon.

“Curse the print button,” says Blanco, digital marketing manager for the multi-franchise Andy Mohr Automotive Group based in Indianapolis. “People don’t want to print something when they can use a paperless digital coupon on their smartphone screens.”

So he created what he calls “a digital wallet” that includes coupons for service and maintenance work.

“I looked at the competition,” Blanco says. “Not other dealerships, but places like Pep Boys that strategically use coupons.”

They build loyalty and trust, he says. Three Mohr stores participate in the program. About 8,000 digital coupons have been redeemed, mostly for oil changes. The store is trying to boost coupon redemption rates for services beyond oil changes. Blanco built a template for building digital coupons. It’s at www.ServiceCouponGenerator.com

Chris Leslie expanded a blog into an online employee newsletter for the Las Vegas-based multi-store Heinrich Auto Group.

He is e-commerce director of the multi-dealership family business that employs about 400 people. Leslie says keeping everyone on the same page – even if it’s a digital page – is important.

He quotes George Bernard Shaw: “The single problem in communication is the illusion that it’s taking place.”

Leslie uses a software program that creates a newsletter format containing company information, blogs and relevant story links drawn from Google Alert. There’s stuff for customers too in “The Hero Weekly.” It’s emailed to employees and customers alike.

“The idea originally was intended as an internal dialogue,” Leslie says. “We’ve since added benefits for customers.”

Christopher Febbraio says spending five minutes a day on a search-engine- optimization strategy produced more than $80,000 profit for his dealership, Stamford Ford Lincoln in Stamford, CT.

The idea is to intermittently insert new information for online used-car inventory listings. Refreshing the content like that prevents a listing from getting buried near the bottom of Google search results.

An initial vehicle listing would include the basics, such as make, model and VIN number. A few days later, the dealership might make a price adjustment.

Assuming the vehicle isn’t sold, “on day 13, we might then show a custom photo and include customer content,” says Febbraio, the dealership’s business development manager. “We don’t change the comments too much, but we space out adjustments to refresh and reindex.”

He developed the search-engine optimization technique after reading Google’s “SEO Starter Guide.” It lists best practices. “Google wants to help you,” he says. “They want to make sure you aren’t doing anything sketchy and they want their customers to have rich content.”

Ontario Motor Sales is trying to improve on two things, one online, one off.

First, the Chevrolet and Cadillac dealership in Oshawa, north of Toronto, wants to provide “a great Internet experience to customers,” says marketing manager David Hicks.

Consequently, the store has enhanced its website functionality. Customers can do various things online, including schedule demo drives and book service visits.

Second, the dealership offers various at-home customer services. “We’ll bring a demo vehicle to a customer’s door,” Hicks says. “We’ll drop off, and even install, accessories.”

The store doesn’t pick up and deliver every serviced vehicle. A contest judge speculated that courtesy could get expensive. Hicks says, “It’s not a huge cost,” adding the store has six shuttle vehicles for transporting people who bring their vehicles in and prefer not to sit it out in the customer waiting lounge.  

[email protected]