Creative Ways to Build Brand Awareness for Your Dealership
With car sales more competitive than ever for both new and used vehicles, as well as car shopping trending toward the online space, keeping your dealership top of mind at every stage of the car buyer journey may seem challenging. Fortunately, the right tools and best practices can help your dealership increase its brand awareness, which is basically how familiar consumers are with your brand. The more familiar consumers are with your brand, the better chances you have of converting them into customers.
So, how can your dealership increase its brand awareness?
- Update your online presence.
Since car buyers are likely to engage in shopping online prior to visiting the dealership, having a solid web presence is key to increasing and maintaining your dealership’s brand awareness. Marketing Evolution has some good tips on how you can do this. - Create relevant content that educates car shoppers on every stage of their car buying journey.
Developing blog articles, social media posts and other relatable content that can help consumers during their car buying journey can help increase brand awareness by establishing your dealership as a credible resource. - Build the brand through your salespeople.
Since your sales team is constantly interacting with potential customers in your dealership, why not allow them to represent your dealership online as well? According to Marketing Evolution, doing this will not only strengthen relationships with customers and put a face to your brand, it will also help your salespeople feel recognized. - Provide quality customer service.
Customer interactions with your dealership play a major role in your brand awareness. From politely greeting customers upon entering the dealership to offering them a beverage or snack during their visit, ensuring a positive customer experience will most likely result in more repeat-and-referral business, which is directly tied to increasing your dealership’s brand awareness. - Monitor customer reviews online.
Because car shoppers will most likely check reviews of local dealerships during their car search, it’s important to monitor and respond to customer reviews online. If you are providing quality customer service (see No. 4), your customer ratings and reviews should reflect that. If you receive some negative reviews, don’t worry. Acknowledging the customer’s concerns by responding to the review can go a long way in establishing a positive reputation for your dealership.
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