Use Data to Target the Vehicles You Want to Move Most

In an ideal world, dealers would be able to market all of their vehicles equally without biases, but that's simply not the case. You may have too many of one particular model. There can be incentives from the OEM on specific vehicles. Then, there's the dreaded "leftover" vehicles that are still sitting new on the lot while the next model year starts to hit.

Thankfully, there are ways that dealers can target their marketing to focus the right amount of effort in the right marketing venues that focus on the right potential buyers. This is the age of data and dealers can use it to take advantage of information that can help them to go to market much more easily for targeting the right vehicles they want to sell.

In our recent eBook titled "5 Ways to Move That Model", we give dealers tips that they can use to apply data as the primary force behind their marketing and advertising decisions when it comes to moving specific vehicles. It has always been an important aspect of digital marketing for car dealers, but in this growth market of today and into next year, we're going to see a greater need to be smarter with the advertising spend. More of your competitors are marketing and advertising in the same venues as you. The way to beat them is to spend more money or spend your money more wisely. The former requires increased budgets. The latter requires a better understanding and application of data.

Here are some of the things that you can do today to position the vehicles you want to sell in front of the people who are most likely to buy them:

• Get real with your territorial expectations. Perhaps the biggest mistake that dealers make when trying to promote specific model is to look at their own sales data only. What's better is to see how many of a particular model are being sold in all of the various zip codes surrounding your dealership and identify the low-hanging fruit -- that's where to point your advertising dollars.
• Track shopper intensity to save gross. Another common problem is that dealers are often too quick on the draw to drop prices on target models because they feel that their competitors are. Today, the industry still follows the trends. If a model and the customers seeking it are hotter than normal, there's simply no need to go straight to the bottom dollar.
• Start hypertargeting. The data is available. It is not difficult to focus on very specific areas with your marketing, but most dealers and vendors tend to paint their marketing with broad strokes. This is no longer necessary. The technology to hypertarget people with the right message is available, as is the data to help you pick the appropriate targets.
• Utilize demographic targeting to determine style and message. You know your ideal customers. You can see them very clearly when they get out of their car. These are the people that fit an appropriate likely-buyer profile. If you understand who your target market is, you'll be more likely to generate the right message to compel them.
• Think campaign, not ads. It's easy for dealers and vendors to focus on one marketing or advertising venue at a time, but this can be a mistake. Instead, look at everything holistically to help you determine the right messaging, then mold that message to be most easily delivered through the various mediums.

Between an increase in data and better methods to decipher it, dealers have more power at their fingertips to truly move the needle without having to spend more money. With this data and sound marketing strategies, you can put the cars that you want to sell in front of the people who want to buy them.