Rebuilding Your Digital Presence Around the Google Buying Moments
This session, originally presented by C-4 Analytics on the Digital Dealer platform, argues that many dealers are being hamstrung by a shaky digital foundation built on poor decisions made in previous years. If your sales and marketing success has plateaued, the root cause is likely an online presence that is not organized around what truly matters: the Google Buying Moments.
The Problem: Conscious Incompetence
Dealers believe they crush the bottom funnel, but testing reveals the opposite. The disconnect is not accidental:
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The Automotive-Industrial-Digital Complex: The OEMs and large web/ad companies know the correct roadmap (the Google Moments), yet they choose not to implement it for Tier 3 dealers. This is conscious incompetence.
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The Goal: The manufacturer's goal is to see the customer exposed to multiple dealers on the locator, which benefits their odds of a sale, not the individual dealer's odds.
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The Trade-Off: To satisfy the OEM master, the web provider must use a templated, one-size-fits-all approach, which sabotages the dealer's SEO and SEM performance.
Testing Your Foundation: The Google Moments
The Google Buying Moments are the underlying principles upon which every element of your digital presence should be built. You must test your site against them to find the cracks:
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Am I Getting a Deal? (Bottom Funnel: Specials, Offers)
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Where Should I Buy It?
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Can I Afford It?
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Is It Right For Me? (Top Funnel: Research, Features)
Testing your site with a search like "Jeep special offers" in your own market will often reveal that you are invisible in organic results and using poorly constructed PPC ads that drop the user on a generic inventory page.
The Solution: Rebuilding and Refocusing
You must choose to gear your digital presence around the Google Moments. This is a fixable problem that pays off with enduring rewards, but it requires paying the piper.
1. Break Away from the Conflicted System
You must find a non-conflicted company that is focused solely on your sales, share, and cost reductions.
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Stop the Templating: Break away from any company that gives you templated SEO/SEM identical to your on-brand rivals.
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Fix the Manpower Problem: The "auto-industrial-digital complex" lacks the manpower to fix the thousands of non-optimized pages. You must hire a partner with the certified, human resources needed to rebuild your foundation.
2. Tactical Rebuilding Steps
The foundation fix involves heavy lifting that does not lend itself to shortcuts:
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Content Overhaul: Every element of your digital presence—SEO, meta tags, content, creative—must be reorganized around catering to the customer queries specific to each moment.
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Focus on Phase One: Start by tackling the easiest shot: the "Am I Getting a Deal?" moment. Once you have this level nailed, move up to the next moment.
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Demand Transparency: Ask who you pay. Demand to pay the ad networks directly to ensure full financial transparency.
Aligning your presence around these moments is the roadmap to driving higher Quality Scores, which reduce your cost per click, ultimately leading to a massive increase in sales and ROI.
Watch the Full Webinar
For a deeper dive into these topics and to hear directly from Rob Stoesser, Vice President of OEM, watch the full webinar below.