Auto Dealer Blogs Where Art Thou?
omuoto @ 5:27 pm While the number of Real Estate blogs continues to grow, auto dealers are simply not making it to the blogosphere. Inman Blog last week had an interesting post on the 1,000 Real Estate Blogs that Robert Melton of Pittsburgh Homes Daily was able to identify – and I am sure that list only continues to grow! Unlike their real estate counterparts, it seems that few auto dealers or dealerships engage in the ancient art of blogging!Â
In fact when I did a search on both Google and Technorati, i was hard pressed to find any actual (active) auto dealer bloggers! The chart below illustrates the problem clearly. Either people aren’t buying cars or auto dealers are simply too busy to blog!
The reason auto dealers should be concerned is that according to Jupiter Research, dealer web sites are one of the top three most visited online resources when it comes to researching a vehicle purchase. In a recent report, Jupiter states that most dealerships still don’t view the Internet as an integral part of their business. In an earlier report, Jupiter found that 2/3 of the dealers surveyed that were the most successful at converting Internet leads into sales viewed their site as a research tool for consumers as opposed to simply a place to list inventory – and what better way to interact and learn from prospective customers than through a blog?
I was able to track down the JW, blogger for the The Pennsylvania Independent Automobile Dealers Association, who told me this:
Perhaps JW has a point, but auto dealers willing to make the investment may indeed have a payoff waiting for them. Those brave souls may want to get some advice from Real Estate Tomato’s Jim Cronin’s post “To Blog or Not to Blog†which does a excellent job of outlining the “The 4 C’s to business blogging success.â€Â Looking for more info? A little more comprehensive guide to maybe Northwestern University’s and Backbone’s Blogging Success Story. Unfortunately, few real estate agents or auto dealers will have time to actually read it!
Interesting, I have never actually performed a technorati search for other dealer blogs.
5 reasons why car dealers do not blog;
1. Most dealers don’t even know what a blog is.
2. Most dealerships still don’t view the Internet as an integral part of their business.
3. Most dealers usually do not have right personnel on staff for consistent postings.
4. Blogs will not sell you a car this month (that would be the perception).
5. Blogs are too much work for most dealers; dealers have enough problems just keeping up with their website.
I’m an Internet sales and marketing director for a smaller Mercedes-Benz store in the Maryland region. I started our dealer blog (MercedesDealerNews.com) a little over a year ago (with little to no regular postings) and have just now started to “try†and get serious about it.
Quote: “Either people aren’t buying cars or auto dealers are simply too busy to blog!â€
The problem is TIME. I’m the only one here at my dealer that sees any value in a blog but finding the time between everything else I do makes it hard. AND to be honest, our blog is not at the top of my priority list?
So why is a blog not at the top of the list? Because a car dealers performance is based on the monthly numbers. Whether its how many cars did we sell this month or how much did we gross in the service and parts department, dealers work month to month. Most dealers are not going to see the return on a monthly basis in maintaining a blog.
Great posting and thank you for allowing me to comment.
-Jeff Kershner
DealerRefresh.com
Comment by Jeff Kershner — April 17, 2007 @ 4:39 pm
Real estate are probably just as busy too
Comment by Charles Daher — April 17, 2007 @ 5:51 pm
I’m getting the service manager at my auto dealership to try out a blog that gives out tips on how to service your car… there’s nothing like this kind of information now….
Comment by Pat Kitano — April 17, 2007 @ 9:07 pm
[...] We’ve got a few newcomers this week and first up is Oliver from vFlyer Blog. Oliver has made the observation that while the real estate industry has jumped on the blogging bandwagon with gusto, the retail car industry seems to have shunned blogging. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say it’s because car dealers are slow changing, skeptical types who don’t see the value of the internet. [...]
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