How to Successfully Post on Craigslist
Craigslist has become one of the biggest lead generators in the automotive industry. Its very popular in the United States and can brings a lot of leads to your website. As you may already know its also free! So why is it so difficult to post an ad on their site? If you have ever tried to post an ad and keep it live, then you know what I am talking about. There are two things that can happen. Your ad may go live and everything is good but then for some reason it gets flagged, now your ad is gone. The ad may be flagged just because someone doesn’t like it. The second scenario goes like this. Everything is going well, you submitted your ad, now you go and try to find it but its nowhere to be found. It even shows that the ad is live on your account page but in reality its not. This is because your ad was ghosted.
Craigslist is constantly updating their ghosting protocol. If your ad is similar to other ads or if you post too often then your ads may become ghosted. This becomes very frustrating. To find a successful formula for posting can take a lot of time. Craigslist likes unique ads, but to create a unique ad for the same vehicle will also take time. This is exactly why we created a solution for this problem. Our solution allows you to successfully post your vehicles within craigslist terms of use.
Our new module allows you to post your vehicles directly from the DMS to craigslist. There are also new features like Custom Random Text.
This feature stores a list of random phrases that you provide and then uses them randomly in the body of your ads. This way your ads will always be different.
The random title phrases feature makes your titles different for each ad. It stores phrases that you added and uses them randomly. This will help make sure that your ads are always unique.
These are just a few of the features that are offered with this module. You can fully customize your entire template. This includes the title, body, different colors, different layouts, gallery and much more. Our goal is to help you take advantage of craigslist’s massive traffic. Just because its not easy to make your ads stay on craigslist doesn’t mean you cant do it. Call AutoXloo today and get your ads to stay.
read moreSmart and Resourceful Dealers Sell More Cars!
A quick shout out to Mike at Park Auto Mall for his nice (and unsolicited) comments about AutoXloo on his blog, Show Room Logic.
Car dealerships have always prided themselves on being resourceful sales guys, always with new ideas on sales promotions to entice customers to their dealership.
Internet marketing offers endless opportunities for these smart and resourceful dealerships to stretch their sales skills online. Low cost, immediate results, and measurable effects, and quality leads. What could be more compelling? Every car guy’s dream.
Mike recognizes this utopic vision does require some nuts and bolts, roll up your sleeve work, determination, creativity, analysis and adjustment as he works to increase sales for ParkAutoMall. AutoXloo is up to the challenge of going toe to toe with him and other dealers in helping them creatively leverage AutoXloo’s software solutions to support their local car sales.
ParkAutoMall.com does a great job of leveraging the AutoXloo technology to increase their local presence and connect with customers when they visit their website. Look at the ParkAutoMall.com website and some of the proactive things they are doing:
- An active, engaging blog
- Pictures, video introductions, complete contact information of sales staff
- Detailed information about vehicles
- Customer testimonials
- Search friendly, relevant content
- Information to help car buyers make decisions
The time invested in their website pays off on a daily basis. A large percentage of their floor traffic comes from their dealer website, and this number has been growing for several years.
read moreThe Power of Customer Testimonials
Customers trust the words of other customers. More than they trust a company spokesman, owner, or salesperson. We encourage you to use the words of your customers to help sell more cars.
Take a look at how some of our customers are using our tools:
Powerful Dealership Video and A ProActive Internet Team
ParkAutoMall.com has a proactive Internet team that engages before, during and after the sale. Authentic video is an integral part of their customer connections and it is a regular part of their day-to-day activities.
http://www.parkautomall.com/customer-testimonials
Built In Tools for Success
AutoExpoStore.com is more systematic and strategic with their customer testimonials. They have a permanent camera set up in their dealership sales office to capture customer feedback at the point of sale. Brilliant and easy.
http://www.autoexpostore.com/testimonials/
Long Term Trust, One Customer At A Time
ClassicMotorCars is systematic about how they handle testimonials. This dealership has earned a trusted advisor status in the West Allis Wisconsin community, and regularly uses the automated tool built into their AutoXloo website to solicit customer feedback. It’s easy to see they are a great company to do business with.
http://classicmotorcarsinc.net/index.php?pg=testimonials
read moreDealership Internet Marketing – Location, Location, Location
Search continues to be an evolving and controversial topic among dealerships. A “search” lead is a valuable, pre-qualified lead, because a searcher is demonstrating “intent” and “specific interest” when they search. On the other hand, dealerships have had mixed results with search campaigns, and many have spent thousands of dollars monthly on SEO consultants, with varying degrees of success.
AutoXloo continues to evolve our website architecture to be search friendly. Our detailed vehicle descriptions are structured to be relevant to search engines, and helpful to car shoppers. For car shoppers using Google and Bing to search for vehicles locally, our dealer websites naturally provide excellent search relevancy. And car shoppers love our vehicle description reports, available on all AutoXloo websites. AutoXloo’s technology can help dealerships make giant strides in achieving good search results without having to spend thousands of dollars on SEO consultants.
The “up and coming” online opportunity for dealers is the mobile market. Mobile is big and will be bigger than most of us imagine. It is the fastest growing Internet platform in the market today. Smartphones represent 50% of all phones sold, and represent a fast growing and evolving platform. Coupled with GPS pinpointing of location, the opportunities presented by barcode scanning of QR codes, there are interesting possibilities for strategically driving qualified leads and customer engagement. Talk to AutoXloo about the products we offer that support mobile initiatives by dealerships.
The most underused and most cost effective search tool available to all car dealerships is Google Places (previously Google Local). A complete profile built here can improve Google Maps visibility (1st page search results), provide better organic search results, and relevant information to your customers. Google Places supports customer feedback (testimonials), which are viewed as more credible and trustworthy than any other information you can provide. Integrating a proactive solicitation of customer feedback from happy customers at the point of sale, is the most effective and cost effective thing you can do. This single action improves Google search ranking and provides helpful information that other prospective customers WILL read.
When we work with dealerships, we encourage an attitude of “decide, implement, adjust”. There is no magic bullet online – it’s an iterative process and there is no one size fits all. Choosing what’s right for your dealership and trying and measuring different tactics helps in developing an effective long term strategy.
read moreAutomotive Retail Industry- Six technologies that will facilitate change
Consumers in the automotive industry have been asking for changes. Changes that can improve how they will shop, how they buy, and most importantly their overall experience and satisfaction. Car dealers understand the changes their customers want and truly recognize the opportunities being created. Showroom shopping, online browsing and customer relationship management abilities are becoming more congruent. The six pieces of technology are positioned to speed up the historic change currently happening within the automotive retail industry. Car buyers are a powerful segment, with a strong voice. Dealers are wise to consider adoption these ideas sooner, rather than later.
Let’s list the six pieces of technologies here. First is Real-Time Search, for example, Google, Bing, Twitter, Facebook. Customers benefit is having access to real-time content which will help shoppers confirm a smart decision much faster. Second, Geolocation Service which is GPS- style functions within mobile phones, social channels, and smart phone apps. Customers will benefit because they will have an opportunity to create better relationships with dealerships while having fun. Third, Mobile Video, customers will benefit because it is very convenient. Shopping is what they want and where they want it. Forth, HTML5. Gives opportunity to improve online experiences, adding rich applications, video, animation, Flash, and Silverlight. Customers will experience shopping online more robust as new content delivery methods emerge. Fifth, Social centralization, direction of car dealer social networks and the value-added services they will provide automotive professionals. Customers will benefit from the rapid increase in the sharing of best practices which is about to overcome the retail industry. Competition will increase as the bar is raised to prove a better, more impressive shopping experience. Last, Number six, is Social CRM.
The entire CRM segment will be shaken up in 2010. Customer benefit will be greater communication and information flow with regards to items such as vehicle service and care care will become more important as ownership continues to increase.
read more15 Google Interview Questions That Will Make You Feel Stupid
Google search plays an important role in the Internet strategies of the dealerships with whom AutoXloo works. If you have a few minutes, take a look at questions asked during Google interviews.