Articles

Host a Black Friday Event!

Consumers are eager to spend money on Black Friday weekend.  Don't force them to shop at the big box stores this year. Give them a reason to do their holiday shopping at your dealership this year by hosting a Black Friday event. Click the image above for more information.

Local Web Dominator Case Study: Kissimmee Motorsports

Objective:

Jeff Lampe, General Manager of Kissimmee Motorsports, knows that he has a passionate team of Powersports enthusiasts at his dealership. And, he takes a lot of pride in making sure that Kissimmee Motorsports offers the Central Florida area the best shopping experience around. So, he wanted to find a way to ensure that potential customers knew that they could expect 5-star service every time they visited the dealership.

Solution:

When Jeff signed up for the Local Web Dominator, they integrated their Lightspeed account to allow the program to automatically request reviews from anyone who had recent transactions. And that is where most dealers stop, but not Jeff. He took a very engaged, active approach by taking advantage of the ‘Business Reply Cards’ provided in the POP Kit. He implemented a friendly internal competition among his staff and compensated the team member who got the most Business Reply Cards completed by happy customers.

Results:

The results of this active approach to review acquisition are numerous: Increased email capture, employee engagement, employee recognition, boosted morale, etc. By having customers complete the business reply cards, they also provide their email address which Jeff can download as a spreadsheet and add to his future marketing efforts. Not to mention, the critical employee engagement and ownership of the review acquisition efforts. In less than 3 months, Kissimmee Motorsports has earned 378 reviews on their custom review site: www.mykissimmeemotorsportsreviews.com and his Google + page increased from a 3.9 star rating with 16 reviews to a 4.5 star rating with 43 reviews.

Now it’s much easier for potential customers to see that Jeff and his team are committed to quality customer service from a passionate, knowledgeable staff.

Want to generate additional unit sales from a steady stream of leads to keep your sales team busy as we close out the 3rd quarter of the year? Give us a call at 877-242-4472 and we’ll show you how to get started.

SHARP SHOOTER BOOK & TRAINING PROGRAM

Our FREE book program supplements the current Sharp Shooter campaign training we offer each week.  When you sign up for a Sharp Shooter campaign, we’ll train your staff to be ready for the event with our live ‘Campaign Kick-Off’ webinar.   View the training times and log in details by visiting our Training Calendar here.

In addition to getting your team motivated to provide outstanding service to your customers during your event, dealers who attend the Campaign Kick-Off Training prior to their event will receive one FREE motivating business/life book each month they attend.

Following is the list of FREE books for 2015:

Biker Santa Event!

Give you customers their merriest Christmas ever by hosting a Christmas party at your dealership next month.  We have dozens of creative Christmas Party designs for you to chose from to get the ball rolling. But, Hurry!  You have to sign up tomorrow for a December 19th event.  Click the image above for more information.

Local Web Dominator Case Study: Headingley Sport Shop

Objective: 

Headingley Sport Shop is no stranger to high performance and incredible service.  In fact, their dedicated team of professionals has made Headingley Sport Shop the most trusted Powersports dealer in Manitoba. Their primary goal is to ensure the highest level of service by building lasting relationships with their customers.  And, they’ve done business each day since 1969 with that very goal in mind.  Operations Manager, Mindy Cole, knows that word of mouth from happy customers is critical to their business’s success. But, she is also aware of the fact that digital marketing has now also become a non-negotiable.  So, like many other Powersports dealers, Mindy’s objective was to use her digital marketing budget to yield the highest ROI possible.

Solution:

Being an ‘operations’ minded person, Mindy isn’t wooed by fluff or gimmicks.  She’s a clever business woman who wants to see the hard facts supported by data.  So, while she was content with her previous vendor for her digital marketing solution, she met with our team and looked at the performance of her current campaigns. She then decided to give our team a chance to manage the Google AdWords PPC campaign for Headingley Sport Shop. Mindy worked closely with us to ensure the expertise we bring to Google AdWords melded together profitably with the knowledge she has of her market and her specific business details.

Results:

Through this collaborative partnership, the Headingley Sport Shop AdWords campaign has generated an average of 40+ conversions every month. Not just clicks, but conversions.  That means that someone: 1. clicked on their ad 2. visited their site 3. requested a quote, completed the contact us form, requested a demo ride or filled out a finance application.  More than forty times per month.  And even more compelling is that their average cost per conversion is only about $13 each.  That’s in addition to the 100,000+ people in her market that have seen the Headingley Sport Shop ad each month. Or the additional 12-15% of website traffic she gets each month from the professionally managed AdWords campaign.

Want to generate those kind of quality leads & conversions?  Want to grow your website traffic by more than 10% each month?  Want  thousands of LOCAL Powersports enthusiasts to see your ad each month (for free…because you only pay when they click)?  If so, give us a call today at 877-242-4472 and we can tell you more about Google AdWords and how it can help grow your business, increase sales and generate a positive ROI on your hard earned marketing budget.

SHARP SHOOTER BOOK & TRAINING PROGRAM

Our FREE book program supplements the current Sharp Shooter campaign training we offer each week.  When you sign up for a Sharp Shooter campaign, we’ll train your staff to be ready for the event with our live ‘Campaign Kick-Off’ webinar.   View the training times and log in details by visiting our Training Calendar here.

In addition to getting your team motivated to provide outstanding service to your customers during your event, dealers who attend the Campaign Kick-Off Training prior to their event will receive one FREE motivating business/life book each month they attend.

Following is the list of FREE books for 2015:

Have you ever heard the old anecdote about a father trying to read the Sunday newspaper, but is constantly being distracted and pestered by his young son?  The dad tears a map into small pieces and offers the son an ice cream if he can piece the map back together. He figures he’s bought himself a good 2 hours or so.  The kid’s back in 10 minutes. “How’d you do that?” the puzzled dad asks. “There’s a big photo of a man on the other side,” his son replies.  “I used it, and it was easy. When I got the man right, the whole world was right, too.”  That’s pretty wise, and in a way, your dealership is like that. When you get yourself right, it can make your entire dealership a more enjoyable and profitable operation. 

Of course, that’s easier said than done. To be an effective D.P. or G.M. you must be an expert in Sales, F&I, P&A, and Service as well as Human Resources and Accounting. It’s almost as if you’re running 4 separate businesses under one roof, and it takes years of experience, quality work habits, and a high level of ability to become a proficient and successful operator. But wait, that’s not all… the nation’s highest performing operators have mastered another super important skill, and that is the ability to make it rain customers. Yes, I’m talking about marketing. 

If you don’t have an effective marketing plan in place, then your customer list is likely getting colder and colder and smaller and smaller without you even realizing its happening. 

Here’s why you lose customers:

•    1% Die
•    3% Move Away
•    5% Influenced by Friends or Family
•    9% Lured by Competitors
•    14% Bad Experience
•    68% Indifference

All too often dealers forget they aren’t entitled to customers just because they’re either located within their OEM assigned territory, or because they are past and present customers. It is your responsibility to stay in touch with your customers, not the other way around.  You can’t control who dies or moves away, but you can heavily influence the other 96% of your potential lost customers before it’s too late. If you’re not regularly marketing to the riders in your buying base, they will eventually get a feeling of apathy, as if you don’t care about them and ultimately drift off. 

Personally, I put great effort into advertising for this company, as well as for our dealer clients. It’s not easy, it’s not always fun and new, and it often turns into a grind. In fact, I have a quick 30 minute meeting two days a week with my leadership team where we cover our non-negotiables. Most of this meeting is dominated by deadline driven deliverables related to our outbound marketing efforts. I put this system in place years ago, because I had identified that when the swirl hit (and it always does) marketing was the area that would be conveniently set aside. 

There was even a time when I was young and naïve that I briefly thought advertising was a wildly creative exercise done by the lazy who weren’t willing to do real work. I found out the hard way (and the expensive way) that creating a one-off fancy branding campaign was about as effective at generating business as trying to change a tire with a set of nunchucks.

Eventually, I learned from my mistakes and became a true student of the advertising and marketing world. I discovered that there seemed to be 2 very different religions in advertising. Direct Response marketers and Branding marketers. The direct response camp is all about creating a compelling offer with a call to action and a deadline, and having the ability to measure results and ROI. The branding folks will tell you the purpose of your advertising is to get your name out there and create top of mind awareness.

That’s when I stumbled onto a book called ‘Ogilvy on Advertising’ by legendary marketer, the late David Ogilvy, who was widely hailed as, “The Father of Advertising.”  Quite the character, Ogilvy created one of the biggest ad agencies of all time. Here’s what he had to say about the two different camps:

“There is a yawning chasm between you Generalists and we Directs. We Directs belong to a different world. Your gods are not our gods. You pride yourselves on being creative - whatever that awful word means. You cultivate the mystique of “creativity.” Some of you are pretentious poseurs. We humble people who work in direct do not regard advertising as an art form. Our clients don’t give a damn whether we win awards at Cannes. They pay us to sell their products. Nothing else. We sell -- or else.”

That resonated well with me, and the more I studied and tested direct marketing compared to branded marketing, the bigger believer I became. When executing direct marketing the proper way, branding is always a happy byproduct anyway. 

As mentioned, getting the man right is not easy, but pnce you do, the rest of the world falls into place. So, choose your religion carefully.   

Headingley Sport Shop is no stranger to high performance and incredible service.  In fact, their dedicated team of professionals has made Headingley Sport Shop the most trusted Powersports dealer in Manitoba. Their primary goal is to ensure the highest level of service by building lasting relationships with their customers.  And, they’ve done business each day since 1969 with that very goal in mind.  Operations Manager, Mindy Cole, knows that word of mouth from happy customers is critical to their business’s success. But, she is also aware of the fact that digital marketing has now also become a non-negotiable.  So, like many other Powersports dealers, Mindy’s objective was to use her digital marketing budget to yield the highest ROI possible.

Being an ‘operations’ minded person, Mindy isn’t wooed by fluff or gimmicks.  She’s a clever business woman who wants to see the hard facts supported by data.  So, while she was content with her previous vendor for her digital marketing solution, she met with our team and looked at the performance of her current campaigns. She then decided to give our team a chance to manage the Google AdWords PPC campaign for Headingley Sport Shop. Mindy worked closely with us to ensure the expertise we bring to Google AdWords melded together profitably with the knowledge she has of her market and her specific business details. 

Through this collaborative partnership, the Headingley Sport Shop AdWords campaign has generated an average of 40+ conversions every month. Not just clicks, but conversions. That means that someone: 1. clicked on their ad 2. visited their site 3. requested a quote, completed the contact us form, requested a demo ride or filled out a finance application. More than forty times per month. And even more compelling is that their average cost per conversion is only about $13 each. That’s in addition to the 100,000+ people in her market that have seen the Headingley Sport Shop ad each month. Or the additional 12-15% of website traffic she gets each month from the professionally managed AdWords campaign.

Want to generate those kind of quality leads & conversions? Want to grow your website traffic by more than 10% each month? Want thousands of LOCAL Powersports enthusiasts to see your ad each month (for free…because you only pay when they click)? If so, give us a call today at 877-242-4472 and we can tell you more about Google AdWords and how it can help grow your business, increase sales and generate a positive ROI on your hard earned marketing budget. 

H-D of Indianapolis’ history begins back in 1976. Picture this: Gerald Ford was the president; “One Flew Over the Cockoo’s Nest” won Best Picture at the Academy Awards; “Send in the Clowns” by Stephen Sondheim was Song of the Year; and the Dellen Automotive Family took its first step into the world of motorcycle sales.

For thirty five years, Harley-Davidson of Indianapolis has been a family-owned business. One of the leading dealers in the Midwest, they take pride in ‘going the extra mile’ to provide the best possible experience for their customers and it shows. 

To keep customers loyal, H-D of Indianapolis knows the importance of giving their customers compelling reasons to come back time and time again. This is especially important for a Midwest dealership in the 4th quarter and H-D of Indianapolis has put a plan in place to stay in front of their buying base during this critical time with a Halloween, Black Friday and 12 Days of Christmas Campaign. Between Halloween and Christmas, the average American household will spend more than 70% of their entire annual discretionary budget in those few short weeks. Where is that money going? Retail. Good news: We’re in the retail business! Billions of dollars are going to be spent online, at the malls and the big box stores. It’s your job to capture as much of that wallet share as possible. 

These guys are executing a consistent marketing plan to hit their buying base 52-104 times per year and in the process, they are increasing frequency of visits from past and present customers to impact retention and carve off new market share. By utilizing up to 12 multiple direct marketing channels per campaign, they’re guaranteeing their message is delivered several times, staying ‘top of mind’ with every real opportunity they have to sell a bike in their market area. As they continue to ‘warm up’ their buying base, they’re increasing traffic, leads and ultimately their ROI. 

Their last event on September 26th resulted in 253 people completing the survey, which included a total of 125 sales opportunities in Service, P&A and riding gear and 64 responses interested in getting a bike!
 
Despite not having the perfect weather, David Dellen, owner of H-D of Indianapolis said traffic was great and sales were up in all departments with several additional motorcycle deals working. 

Their holiday kickoff starts with a Halloween event, then the store will be gearing up for a Black Friday/Blacker Saturday Event and a 12 Days of Christmas Event.

Think you can’t beat the big box stores at their own game? You’re right. Trying to compete with the millions being spent over the airwaves and in print is, to quote Kenny Wayne Shepard, “blue on black, tears on a river, a whisper on a scream.” But, if you cut through the clutter and go direct to your buying base with several, compelling reasons to tell you who they are and what they want to buy from you, you can beat them. Don’t miss this opportunity to make a huge impact in your 4th quarter numbers. Check out the inserts for a few proven winners. To have Powersports Marketing build your dealership’s Buying Base and put a plan in place to hit them consistently for FREE, call me on my direct line at 877-242-4472 ext: 112 or chat us up at powersportsmarketing.com. Happy selling.

There is a huge temptation to stop advertising during the slower months of the year. For many dealers that means cutting off their advertising during the 4th quarter of the year and getting started again in the spring. This, however, is a huge mistake.

Dan Kennedy, who I refer to as the Godfather of Direct Response Marketing, says you have to “put a fence around your herd.” Customers are prone to wander from dealership to dealership like cattle are prone to wander from field to field. That’s why ranchers have to put up a fence. Your customers are only as loyal to your dealership as you are good at marketing to them. Staying in front of your customers (i.e. marketing to them) creates loyalty and puts a proverbial fence around them. You can even get to a place where you’ve immunized your customers from competitor’s offers. 

Don’t make the mistake of believing that your customers are ‘all yours’ just because they’ve bought something from you in the past. You are NOT entitled to their business, or anyone else’s business for that matter. This arrogant way of thinking will lead to a terrible culture in the dealership and staff that doesn’t care. Customer service flies out the window and your staff will stop caring. 

When you don’t market to your customers they develop a feeling of apathy, or indifference. You don’t care about them and they don’t care about you. In all things there is a law of sowing and reaping. You can’t reap what you don’t sow. You can’t have loyal customers when you don’t work for it, and reach out to them consistently. Even in the fall and winter.   

Also, the fact that so many other dealers are throwing in the towel this time of year creates a void in your market place. With both our Sharp Shooter and Local Web Dominator program we are able to reach the riders in your market area who’ve never done business with you.  So, while your competitors are sleeping, you can fill the void and gain new market share. 

To be clear, I’m not suggesting that every dealer can sell the same level of units, PG&A, and service they do in the spring and summer. What I am advocating is that you can sell ‘more’ and create a positive ROI on your marketing dollars. But, better than the profit is the loyalty you can build in the off-season and ensure a greater success in the spring and summer.

If you were able to create a positive ROI on your marketing while increasing customer retention and gaining new customers…. Why wouldn’t you take advantage of it?  Powersports Marketing will make this happen for your dealership, but the ball is in your court.

For more information call 1-877-242-4472, or chat with us at www.PowersportsMarketing.com.
 

Adwords and SEO are always really great topics at our Marketing Boot Camps, and I am sure this Fall Boot Camp will be no exception. As I write this article, Boot Camp is two weeks away and I am looking forward to my presentation because there are some new things going on with Google that I feel are real game changers.

On Google, there are two basic ways to get your message to potential customers: Organic search results (a function of SEO) or Paid search results (AdWords).

SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of affecting the visibility of a website in a search engine’s unpaid (organic) search results. There are roughly a bazillion different things that make up good SEO, from proper setup of your website architecture, to correct business listings, citations, social signals, etc. A lot of time, energy, and money are often spent to improve visibility in this way.

AdWords can be thought of as a “pay-to-play” kind of model. You set up campaigns, ad groups, and ads, and when relevant searches occur, you bid to jockey for a good position on the result page in an effort to get prospects to click on your ad and come to your site. 

Over the past few years, there has been a murmur in the digital marketing community that SEO is dead (or dying). I have never bought into this philosophy (still don’t), but the digital landscape is definitely changing, and we need to pay attention.

Google is in the business of providing the best possible results for a given search because doing so translates into user trust and PROFIT. Google is in the business of making money – and they are VERY good at it.

Historically, the layout of a search results page consisted of two or three AdWords ads across the top, organic results beneath them (usually 10 to 12 results), and 6-8 more AdWords ads down the right side of the page. This layout worked well for a long time, and it was pretty easy to see how SEO and AdWords were both pretty important. You want to be on page one, because everyone knows that the best place to hide a body is on page two of a Google search result.

With the rise of smartphone use over the past several years, the nature of search has changed pretty significantly, and consequently, so have search result pages.

Searchers are now looking for more immediate results. As in, I’m in my car going to look for a “________,” so I pull out my phone and do a quick search. Now they are looking for directions, hours, and/or click to call option – all for someone who is local.

The increase in local search focus has led to a restructuring of the typical Google search result page, along with a major change that they began rolling out in August. All searches, desktop or mobile, now look pretty much the same.
 
Instead of the historic layout, what most searchers will see is 3 AdWords ads across the top, then the new “Google Snack-Pack” (yes, they really call it that), and 6 more AdWords ads down the right side of the page.

So what is the “Snack-Pack?” It’s a group of 3 Google Maps-type listings. I say they are maps-type listings, because they are different in a couple of interesting ways. They don’t have a click to call option, the actual address doesn’t show up in the results, and there is no direct link to the web site. 

At first glance, the snack pack has some serious shortcomings. Hopefully, by the time you read this, they will have made some corrections.

Now, given the new layout, in most cases what searchers will see is all paid ads and 3 map-type results.  Any and all typical organic listings will be pushed below the fold. You’ll have to scroll to see them.

In essence, when you search your immediate results are Google products. Granted, at this point the map results aren’t paid, but there is some speculation about that in the future. 

So why worry about SEO? A couple of reasons. First, SEO best practices make it easier for search engines to understand who you are, how credible you are as a business, and if your site is of high quality. These are the things that help you rise to the top organically. These are also the metrics that will help you appear as one of the three map results. Very important.

Just as important, SEO will affect your AdWords performance. Using AdWords in today’s business environment is a non-negotiable. One of the things that AdWords does, is look at the quality of your site, the content of your site, and your online credibility. All these things (and over 100 more) are put into their algorithm that eventually help them determine how much it costs you per click in AdWords. 

Adhering to solid SEO best practices leads to a quality web presence, which bumps your organic presence and helps you save money on each click to your site from AdWords. 

With a good AdWords campaign, you drive quality leads to a quality site that (because of good SEO practices) is well structured and leads to more conversions and a higher ROI.

It’s really not a question of which is more important, SEO or AdWords, because they work together. Both have to be good. So even while it might seem like an exercise in futility to pay attention to SEO practices given the way that AdWords results are 9 of the first 12 things you see on the average search result page now, it’s how you can appear in one of the other three spots and lower the expense of appearing in the first 9. 

Talk soon.
 

OPE Kawasaki is central New York’s only exclusive Kawasaki dealership, and the #1 Kawasaki dealer in their district. These guys have a racing background and are enthusiasts themselves, which means they get that this is a passion-based industry and truly understand what makes their customers tick. OPE’s biggest focus is making great connections with their customers and providing that ‘wow’ customer service experience.

OPE is no stranger to direct marketing. In fact, they have historically done six direct mail campaigns per year with mixed results. One of the missing ingredients was focusing on the Right Message. Most dealers think that in order to drive sales, they have to have a sales event. The challenge with focusing your message on the sale, is that it alienates the 99% of folks who didn’t have, ‘buy a bike’ on their top 5 things to do this list week. Our message focuses on the party. By focusing on the event details at the party, you’ll still get those guys, you’ll just get everyone else too, plant seeds for future sales and hold higher margin since you won’t be discounting. We all know your customers are like kids in a candy store once they’re in your store, so get them there, show them a good time and impulse purchases will happen. This is exactly what OPE focused their message on for their last event. Jason Britton came and performed a stunt show at the end of the day, they had food, demos, and even more.

Steve, OPE Kawasaki’s General Manager said, “We’ve been in business for 11 years, and this was the best event we’ve ever had. We have to credit the Powersports Marketing team and the support that you guys provided…it helped make it a greater success!” How

great? Steve said, “We had over 500 people show up. It was packed from when we opened until we closed. There were motorcycles parked all up and down Route 5, the main drag that goes up and down in front of the dealership. The lawn in the back of the dealership, every inch of it was packed with cars. And it was the media that you produced, how it went out, the schedule it went out on.” He particularly loved the impact of the recorded call blast. When it went out they, “…developed a ton of fans and a few haters, but that’s ok. Our phones rang back for probably an hour and 45 minutes! The whole staff helped answer the phone.”

Steve continued, “We didn’t just end up having a large crowd show up for the free stuff, we did a mountain of business over the counter. I think we sold 4 machines and planted a ton of seeds.”

OPE Kawasaki ended up having 214 completed surveys, which generated a total of 181 sales opportunities in Parts & Accessories, Service, Apparel and included 65 new and pre-owned unit sales. 

Steve said the leads were awesome and helped contribute to the residual impact of the campaign. He said, “I don’t always expect to seal the deal the day of the event, but the two weeks after the event, we killed it in sales. Not only were our numbers up, but our margins were up! When does that happen?”

These guys are creating affinity with their buying base by executing a consistent marketing plan by hitting the Right Target Audience with the Right Message. The other key to their success, was not hitting them with just one media channel (direct mail), but strengthening that direct mail with two integrated emails, an integrated call blast, event signage, web banner, fliers, and survey site. All this combined media gave their customers many more opportunities to respond, which drastically increased their response rate. Sent out at just the Right Time before the event, and you’ve got a winning formula.

October means Halloween! Tie a themed party like Halloween to the secret sauce of the Sharp Shooter Program and its scary how well it works. Halloween kicks off the 4th quarter, a time where consumers spend more than 90% of their annual discretionary budget. It is your job to capture as much of that revenue as possible and keep these folks out of the big box stores. By starting early, you plant seeds for Black Friday & Christmas. Don’t miss this opportunity to make a huge impact in your 4th quarter numbers. Check out the inserts for a few more proven winners. To have Powersports Marketing build your dealership’s Buying Base and put a FREE plan in place to hit them consistently, call me on my direct line at 877-242-4472 ext: 112 or chat us up at powersportsmarketing.com. Happy selling!

Most advertising is set up for failure from the beginning. This is due to the mindset of the advertiser which is, “How do I sell?” I’ve seen this critical mistake made from amateurs to so-called experts for as long as I can remember. The profound question that must be asked isn’t, “How do I sell?” but instead, “Why do people buy?”

The fact is that your customers absolutely LOVE to buy, but don’t want to be sold. The psychology behind this is that we BUY for desire of gain, which is a positive emotion. But when we’re sold the perception is that it could be something we don’t really want or need. Therefore, we have a fear of loss, because we bought something we didn’t need and have now made a ‘losing’ investment (side note: this is also why salespeople often have unwarranted negative images).

Big dumb companies will actually spend millions of dollars investing in teaching sales people “how to sell” and launching “salesy” ad campaigns without ever even asking the “why do they buy” question, which is all that really matters. 

Additionally, many dealers have been taught that the purpose of advertising is branding: to get your name out there, build your brand, and create top of mind awareness. While this may be effective if you’re a mega consumer brand like Nike, Bud Light, or Ford with millions of dollars to throw at mass media, it’s simply not the most effective way for small to medium size businesses to invest. Branding, as in your logo front and center as the primary message of your marketing, definitely doesn’t answer the “why they buy” question.

However, it does take consistency to create a responsive list. Most dealers don’t understand that a list that hasn’t been marketed to will usually be a very cold list, meaning it will not generate a good response. Consider this, if you receive a communication from a business that you’ve done business with in the past, but they’ve never marketed to you before you can be caught off guard. Especially if the message is, “Hey! Wanna buy a new bike?” (even though you’re likely not in the market). 

Compare that with the feelings you have when you receive marketing from a business that you’ve had a relationship with and they reach out to you with friendly, beneficial messages on a regular basis. In this case, the list goes from cold, to warm, to warmer, to even hot. 

We recently had a dealer who had been in business for 50 years but didn’t even have a customer list. No emails, no physical addresses, no phone numbers. This was a huge red flag and a clear indicator that his customers never heard from him. As I’ve said in this newsletter for the last 5 years, and I will continue to do so until I’m blue in the face, your customer list is the biggest asset you have. 

Why do your customers buy from you? As you’ve likely heard, people buy from people that they know, like, and trust. In fact, years ago the University of Wisconsin did a study and found that 50% of sales are due to feelings of friendship. 

As Jeffery Gitomer says, “If you make a sale, you can earn a commission. If you make a friend, you can earn a fortune.” 

For these reasons, here at Powersports Marketing we believe strongly in one-to-one, relationship-building, direct marketing from a real human being, to a real human being, with a relevant and compelling message inviting your customers to your dealership.

The way we construct our Sharp Shooter marketing campaigns are so that even if your customers can’t take you up on your offer at this time, they feel a sense of gratitude that you’ve reached out to them. They appreciate hearing from you, and therefore as time passes and consistency happens, your list gets warmer and warmer, with responses increasing consistently over time. 

So with Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas quickly approaching (three great excuses to reach out to your customers), don’t ignore your customers, they want to hear from you. They LOVE to buy from you, but don’t want to be sold. So, contact us today for a FREE market analysis and we’ll show you exactly how to execute a 3-step “Hallow-Thanks-Mas” marketing campaign that will warm your list right up without the hard sell! 877.242.4472 

The true purpose of your advertising shouldn’t be branding or to get your name out there, but rather direct response marketing to get your customers to visit your store, your website, or pick up the phone and call you. When you do this the right way, branding is a happy byproduct. And when you do this the right way, you create affinity with your list; they begin to like you and trust you even if they haven’t actually met you in person. This affinity is also a happy byproduct of a proper direct response campaign. 

However, it does take consistency to create a responsive list. Most dealers don’t understand that a list that hasn’t been marketed to will usually be a very cold list, meaning it will not generate a good response. Consider this, if you receive a communication from a business that you’ve done business with in the past, but they’ve never marketed to you before you can be caught off guard. Especially if the message is, “Hey! Wanna buy a new bike?” (even though you’re likely not in the market). 

Compare that with the feelings you have when you receive marketing from a business that you’ve had a relationship with and they reach out to you with friendly, beneficial messages on a regular basis. In this case, the list goes from cold, to warm, to warmer, to even hot. 

We recently had a dealer who had been in business for 50 years but didn’t even have a customer list. No emails, no physical addresses, no phone numbers. This was a huge red flag and a clear indicator that his customers never heard from him. As I’ve said in this newsletter for the last 5 years, and I will continue to do so until I’m blue in the face, your customer list is the biggest asset you have. 

Why do your customers buy from you? As you’ve likely heard, people buy from people that they know, like, and trust. In fact, years ago the University of Wisconsin did a study and found that 50% of sales are due to feelings of friendship. 

As Jeffery Gitomer says, “If you make a sale, you can earn a commission. If you make a friend, you can earn a fortune.” 

For these reasons, here at Powersports Marketing we believe strongly in one-to-one, relationship-building, direct marketing from a real human being, to a real human being, with a relevant and compelling message inviting your customers to your dealership.

The way we construct our Sharp Shooter marketing campaigns are so that even if your customers can’t take you up on your offer at this time, they feel a sense of gratitude that you’ve reached out to them. They appreciate hearing from you, and therefore as time passes and consistency happens, your list gets warmer and warmer, with responses increasing consistently over time. 

So with Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas quickly approaching (three great excuses to reach out to your customers), don’t ignore your customers, they want to hear from you. They LOVE to buy from you, but don’t want to be sold. So, contact us today for a FREE market analysis and we’ll show you exactly how to execute a 3-step “Hallow-Thanks-Mas” marketing campaign that will warm your list right up without the hard sell! 877.242.4472 

Answer:

For many big corporations branding is the major focus of their advertising. We see branding every day… everyone knows that Coca-Cola is “The Real Thing”. Gillette is “The Best a Man Can Get”. McDonald’s slogan is “I’m Loving It”.  KFC is “Finger Lickin’ Good” and so on.  

From a branding perspective each of these companies has to stand out and they do so by spending millions of dollars… literally millions. Also, their products cater to the vast majority of people. 100% of people drink every day, pretty much all men shave, and everyone is a prospective customer of a restaurant because every person eats.

Speaking of restaurant, I have a mild obsession with a restaurant that’s named Chick-fil-a that started in Georgia.  (Okay, okay... it’s actually more than a mild obsession. I’m addicted.) Chick-fil-a has incredible food, some really good healthy options, and I love the character/values of the corporation. 

Their advertising consists of cows holding up signs that say “Eat Mor Chikin”. It’s catchy – cows certainly don’t want you to eat beef. And why the misspelled words? Cows aren’t very smart I guess. Their advertising stands out and is hard to forget. Check out one of Chick-fil-a’s “Eat Mor Chikin” billboards. 

These billboards are all around the southeast. Chick-fil-a spends BIG money catering to the masses, and it makes sense to some extent because people typically eat more than once per day. For a Powersports dealer, however, the majority of people don’t ride. In fact, only 3% to 6% of Americans are Powersports enthusiasts, so a dealer’s mass media, no matter how creative the ad is, is wasting over 94% of the budget reaching folks who don’t ride and never will. 

And before you say it’s creating new riders… marketing doesn’t do a good job of creating new riders. Especially at the dealer level where there’s not a multi-million dollar budget. You can count the number of people on one hand who started riding because they heard or saw an ad.  The number 1 reason a person starts riding and becomes a Powersports enthusiast is the influence of friends and family. I know it’s why I started riding, and it’s most likely why you started riding.  Ask all of your friends and customers and it’ll also be why they started riding… it’s NEVER advertising.

And again, you don’t have millions of dollars to spend on branding your dealership. You can’t compete with the budgets of the big corporations, and the good news is you don’t need to. You’d only be wasting your money.
I wanna be clear here, branding and top of mind awareness (TOMA) isn’t a bad thing. It just needs to be a happy byproduct of your response generating marketing. So what should you do? Here is what we do for our clients here at Powersports Marketing:

•Target the folks in your market area who ride and buy Powersports products and gear. This includes your past customers, and sourcing a list of conquest prospects who already ride, but have never purchased from your dealership. 

•We take that list of every enthusiast in your market area and go after them with several different media. Direct mail, email, phone calls, web banner, signage, etc.

•Instead of a branding message we utilize a Direct Response message that tells prospects how we want them to respond and incentivizes them to do so, which dramatically increases response rates. 

•We drip out different media over a 10 day period so that we get more saturation. This also improves response rates.

We typically promote events at the dealership because the ‘message’ applies to everyone. Everyone likes to be invited to a party. And from a branding perspective, prospects remember being invited to a party way more than they will a sales message, or a branding message (if they ever even get to see or hear it).

To learn more about our marketing system call me at 1-877-242-4472 ext. 101, or join us at our Boot Camp in Atlanta October 26-28. Visit 

powersportsmarketing.com/boot-camp for more info.