Make your website your No. 1 salesperson

We don’t think we need to convince dealers that a great dealership website is important. As we near the end of 2018, most people realize how much of an impact a website has on the success of a business. The majority of online shoppers will visit your dealership online before they ever step foot in your store. So, the question becomes “Is your website a good salesperson?”

It may seem funny to think of a website as a salesperson, but the entire purpose of your website is to sell. With the absence of an in-person interaction, it’s crucial that your site has a clean and organized layout, is easy to navigate on any device, and contains all the information that your customers need. But even if your website has all those things, there is still a huge chance of missing out on sale opportunities if you don’t have Marketing Automation.

Marketing Automation does a lot of the same work that a salesperson would do for you. The best part? Marketing Automation always knows what to say and doesn’t make any mistakes, because it’s completely automated.

First, Marketing Automation identifies your website visitors and begins to collect information about them. This includes things like the contact information your visitors fill out in a lead form, the pages they visit, the buttons they click on – it’s all tracked.

Lead scoring is based on what a website visitor does and how important those actions are to your business. This process makes it easy to see which leads need follow-up and in what order of priority.

A good salesperson approaches a prospective customer with a well-crafted sales pitch. It’s thoughtful, personal, and unique to the needs of that prospect. A good salesman wouldn’t start talking to his prospect about wakeboarding boats if the customer was browsing the fishing gear. Without Marketing Automation, it’s difficult (if not impossible) to know how to start a conversation with a website visitor. But with Marketing Automation collecting information about a prospect’s actions and behaviors, it’s easy to provide relevant follow-up. Not only does the prospect receive the right message, but they receive it at the right time – because Marketing Automation automatically initiates it.

A good salesperson makes every customer feel seen, understood, and valued – and while that can be challenging to accomplish in person, it’s nearly impossible to do with online leads. Marketing Automation bridges the gap between online interactions and your business. It fills in the blanks for your sales team to learn what is important to each lead and how to best encourage them to follow through with a purchase. Marketing Automation takes the mystery out of online leads and gives you the tools to turn those leads into customers.

Marketing Automation may be offered through your web provider. While there are third party companies that offer this service as well, our first recommendation would be to check with your web provider – there are many moving parts in the Marketing Automation process, and full integration with your website platform enables this service to run most efficiently.

Lauren Labunsky is the public relations manager for Dealer Spike, a company that provides innovative websites as well as a suite of powerful online advertising solutions that help marine dealers help increase sales and service profitability. For more information, visit www.DealerSpikeMarine.com or call 800-288-5917.