Customers have changed the way they shop for cars, which means your dealership has to change its automotive digital strategy.

No longer are you going to grab the attention of your customers with fancy ads that seem a bit aggressive but have worked, you need to be present and part of their lives to become the top choice for car shopping. Let’s look at some great ways to improve your online presence so that you can be the dealership your customers want to visit.

Are You Present in the Same Places as Your Customers?

It’s a journey from an online lead to a sale, but you have to start with that lead. To grab more leads from your local community, you have to be present where your customers are located. This is easier than you might think. Most shoppers today are online much more than ever before. With the increaseduse of mobile devices and engagement platforms, you can quickly be seen right where yourcustomers are.

Where do you need to be? You’ll want to make sure your automotive digital strategy allows you to be present online through your website, your blog, and various social media platforms. Your ads need to appear on posts related to the vehicles you sell, you’ve got to have videos that showcase your dealership, and you need to show a human side that customers can relate to.

Does Your Automotive Digital Strategy Consider Multiple Devices?

What does it mean to consider multiple devices? This means that your website showsup and is useful on every device. You’ll want to make sure you include responsive design in the strategy you build. This allows your site to appear just as useful to a visitor on a computer as it does on their smartphone. Most of your customers are using more than one device during their searches.

In fact, the numbers show that more than ninety percent of users will switch from one device to the other during the day. Smart devices used today save searches and can bring them up on either device for a potential customer. This makes having a responsive website a priority for you when you want to grow leads and reach more local customers.

Is Your Content Customized for the Platform?

You’ll find several social media platforms that can help direct potential customers to your website. Each one of these platforms has features and qualities that make it possible for you to offer content that can be enjoyed. The challenge you’ll have in your automotive digital strategy is creating the content that’s right for each platform. When you do this, you’ll reach a larger audience and engage more customers.

The post you make on Twitter needs to be different from what you have on Snapchat. You’ll need posts filled with images and videos on Instagram and a fulllist of the models you have for sale on Facebook Marketplace. This is a big challenge for your team and one that you need to tackle so that your audience can engage your dealership on any platform. This may be one area where you spend a lot of time tweaking and updating your process.

Your Automotive Digital Strategy Must Be Backed by a Website that Can Keep Up?

This aspect of your strategy will impact more than whether or not you can be found by your potential customers, it also has to do with the page load speed and how much traffic is coming to your site. Customers are shopping online now more than ever because they want to make the experience at the dealership as short and simple as possible, the more engaging and useful your site is, the easier it will be for your customers to find you.

How can your site keep up with your needs? It must allow customers to feel they have a cohesive experience no matter the device being used, it has to support the goals of your shoppers, and it must meet the expectations of the user. Create the website that does these things and let it be the backbone of your online strategy.

It’s Not Simple, but it’s Worth the Effort

The investment into what you’ll need to be able to market your dealership may have a lot more to do with time spent rather than dollars. This means you can create the content and website your customers will want to see with more sweat equity and an affordable budget. Put these tips to work and let your automotive digital strategy bring leads to your dealership.