Buying a car begins like most purchases, with a simple search on Google. As a car dealership, it’s important to have good visibility and increase awareness of your brand online. The first place you want to show up is page one of the search results. However, the first page is only reserved for the top ten. Most people don’t go beyond the first page when they are searching for something specific.
So, if your brand is not on page one, what can you do?
You can pay-per-click (PPC), also known as search engine marketing or paid search ads. These ads appear on the first page with the top ten results much in the same way—except for the fact that it’s distinguished by the word “Ad” listed with the link under the heading of the listing.
Now, if you already have digital marketing efforts in place, what is the need for this? Why bother with PPC advertising? Here’s why:
You’re in Control
With PPC advertising, you have control over many things—the first being keywords and placements you choose to target. You get to dictate how precise or random your ads will be. If you want it to be excluded from certain searches, “negative keywords” will ensure that you do not appear for those searches.
You also have a lot of wiggle room in terms of budget. PPC advertising is the practice of bidding on keywords so that your ad and content can be featured on search engine results pages (SERP). This practice allows for flexible budgeting depending on your goals and the insights you have on your customers.
Of course, for a car dealership, it can mean the difference between getting noticed and getting the sale, being left on later pages instead. PPC advertising gives you room to experiment and pull back or go all in when you need to—giving you total control.
Boosts Your Marketing Efforts
PPC and SEO work great together, especially when content marketing has dominated digital marketing. Good content is not enough to support and build your brand. You also need to put in the effort to boost your content.
Good content takes a lot of time, money, and effort to produce alone. Google Ads serve to drive visitors to your content faster and improve the return on investment (ROI) from those efforts.
In addition to that, the data gathered from your Google Ads, like clicks, impressions, conversion, and more can give you greater insight into your customers’ experience, interests, and buying behaviour—all of which can help to improve your marketing and overall business.
Stay Consistent Through Change
Google’s algorithm is always changing and evolving. This can be both a blessing and a curse. Because while you’re creating strategies and content designed to take advantage of or flourish with the new system, anything can happen.
When things change, you might be left wondering what happened to the great strategies and content you came up with? Why aren’t you ranking higher?
Although PPC can’t accomplish everything alone, it does provide more certainty. The rules might change, but your dealership is guaranteed a spot on the first page whenever your bid wins out.
The Bottom Line
PPC advertising can do great things for your car dealership. It can increase awareness for your brand, help get more engagement, sales, and more. If you already have a digital presence and a marketing strategy in place, using paid search ads can only serve to strengthen your strategy and boost your efforts.
If you need assistance navigating the world of AdWords for car dealerships, allow us to help you. New Digital Marketing Agency is a data-driven marketing agency. We aim to help you elevate your brand and grow your business through focus and data-driven solutions. For more information, contact us today!
