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With any website related subject I like to start by asking, “What is the main purpose of your website?”

Most think the purpose of their website is to be an online brochure, or to be a glorified phone book where folks can find your phone number, address, and basic information about your dealership. Others would say it’s a virtual storefront where customers and prospects go to research the products they’re interested in. While all of the above mentioned may transpire on your website, none are its primary objective. 

The main purpose of your website must be to identify website visitors and generate leads.  All other functions are secondary. 

There are 3 primary ways you can identify more visitors and get more leads to follow-up with: 

1. Increase traffic to your website. The more traffic/visitors coming into the top of the funnel, the more opportunity it creates at the bottom.  The following are some ways to boost website traffic:

- SEM/PPC: Pay Per Click (i.e. Google AdWords) is a great way to attract folks who are searching for the products you sell. For instance, when someone who lives close to your dealership does a Google search for a “2017 Honda Recon” or for a “Harley Street Glide”… if you sell the product being searched for, you want to be as close to the top of the first page of the search results as possible. If you’re not doing PPC at some level, you’re missing a lot of opportunity. 

- Facebook Website Clicks Campaign: In the past, I’ve not been impressed with the thought of Facebook advertising. Unlike SEM/PPC where folks are actively searching for a want/need, a person is on Facebook to waste time and snoop into other people’s lives. However, the results our Digital Marketing Department is achieving are impressive to say the least. We’re getting more clicks/traffic and more conversions for less ad spend, ultimately driving more traffic to websites and creating a compelling ROI for our clients.

- Firestorm Email: The purpose of email has long been perceived as another way to create TOMA (Top of Mind Awareness) and build loyalty with customers. While it is good for those things, Powersports Marketing is revolutionizing the way dealers think about email. We’ve built the Firestorm Email System to not only make it easy to send a custom-built email full of incredible done-for-you graphics, but also to make ‘increasing website traffic’ the primary purpose of sending an email.  Every email theme gives users the ability to quickly add links to get more folks to your website. While that sounds rudimentary, once you’ve seen our Firestorm Email System you’ll get it. 

Tia, who writes an article on page 5, recently showed me some research she did for one of our clients. They had 6,151 website sessions in March, and 12.43% of their website traffic came from the Firestorm Email System.  Want a 12% increase in your traffic (or more)?  Call 877-242-4472 for a demo of our Firestorm Email System. 

2. Increase conversion ratios. The average dealership gets around 4,000 website visitors with a 1%-3% conversion rate, meaning between 40 to 120 visitors on any given month will fill out a form and identify who they are. We recommend a conversion point to be on every page of your website. While I don’t think you should utilize all of these because it’s overwhelming and feels gimmicky, here are some common conversion points: Quote Request, Schedule a Demo Ride, Parts Request, Service Request, Finance Pre-Approval, Trade Evaluation, Internet Value Package, Free Premium (T-shirt, etc.), Free Report, Join Email Newsletter, etc. 

Improving your conversion rate will make a big difference, but still 90% or more of your website visitors will be anonymous (unidentified), which leads us to number 3.

3. Utilize Firestorm Onboarding: Onboarding is a new technology that identifies some of the customers who are looking at new and used inventory, but who don’t fill out a web form.  

Imagine knowing that your customer, “Joe Smith,” has been on your website 5 different times over the past 2 weeks and that he’s looking at different variations of the same make and model, and yesterday he viewed 3 bikes that are in your inventory right now. If you had that data, it could make a big difference, couldn’t it?  

That’s what Onboarding does.  Every morning we send select members of your team an email that notifies you of who was looking at new and used inventory on your website yesterday, so your sales staff can see what they were looking at and follow up with them via email and/or phone call. 

Onboarding has helped our clients begin to sell additional units every month that they wouldn’t have otherwise even known about. 

To start fulfilling the main purpose of your website, or for more information on any of the topics above, give us a call at 1-877-242-4472.

- Tory