Local Online Marketing

Find Success at the Nexus of Consumer Needs

June 10, 2015

Any marketer not aware of the tremendous growth across three key dimensions might be accused of living under a rock in 2015, but it’s in tying them together where we understand them in context. The three dimensions here are: Device, Intent, and Content.  (Aka Mobile, Local, Video)     Mobile: The biggest force in online […]

Use Online to Drive Retail Results

March 31, 2015

We published a blog post in late 2012 entitled “Majority of Sales will be “Web-Influenced” in 2015” which reflected on research by Forrester comparing online only, retail only, and web-influenced retail.  Given how many have historically characterized the impact of online as “only e-commerce” which is small in comparison to traditional retail, it was worth […]

Auto Dealers’ use of digital marketing is the canary in the media coalmine

November 21, 2014

We’ve been tracking the advertising behavior of small and medium businesses (SMB’s) for years, noting the dramatic increase in social media and promotions instead of traditional advertising spending (see recent videos and blogs).   A recent report published by Borrell Associates on the Automotive Advertising outlook adds fuel to the fire. Here are some highlights: […]

Protect Your Brand in the Tricky Hand-Off to that Dealer Website

September 2, 2014

Many manufacturer brands are following a “lesser of two evils” strategy when managing their dealer locators, or developing PPC landing pages for their dealers.   On one hand, brands link directly to their dealers’ websites, and risk a poor experience that damages their brand.  Classic examples of this are competitor brands showing up, competitor promotions […]

Your brand experience increasing involves software

February 11, 2014

Back in the last century, Bill Gates (paraphrasing here)said that we would know the Internet had finally arrived when we stopped talking about it.  I believe that day has arrived, as we think nothing of researching, buying, interacting, posting, checking in, etc. online.   It’s pervasive.  What we need to keep thinking about is how […]

Why are co-op programs lagging so far behind in offering digital options?

October 31, 2013

Any new idea must provide advantages to all parties in the ecosystem where it lives, or else it won’t be adopted. We saw this in the late 1990’s with a new idea: Digital Print.  It was a compelling idea, but printers didn’t want to decrease the volume on their offset presses.  Agencies said it was […]

Now Even Older People Choose Online Over Printed Newspapers for News

July 15, 2013

There isn’t much good news for printed newspapers when it comes to their remaining relevant to today’s consumers.  The last hope seemed be that older people (55-plus) were still loyal to print and that fact has kept a lot of advertisers spending money in print. A recent study now may be breaking down that last […]

Owned Media is a Big Hit with Dealers

May 10, 2013

Local advertising is changing in many ways and Borrell Associates has been tracking the way local retailers are spending their local advertising dollars and the move to spending on local promotions is very clear from this chart. You can download this chart here and from the Executive Summary you’ll read where Borrell Associates feels that […]

Paywalls Still in Doubt

April 29, 2013

If you’re involved in local advertising you’re naturally interested in the viability of local newspapers. As consumers move online and away from the printed copies of newspapers, the papers built great internet sites for consumers. Unfortunately, the banner ad revenue never equaled the decline in print advertising so they went to the idea of paywalls […]

Dealer Websites as Important as Brand Site

April 22, 2013

Many brands spend lots of time and money on their brand site and leave their best dealers to fend for themselves when it comes to online content for their sites. Here is an interesting chart from an article on eMarketer.com that shows that consumers shopping for a car are as likely to be influenced by […]

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