When a shopper visits Cox Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Wilson, N.C, it’s not uncommon for the staff to spot the local newspaper sitting in the front seat of the individual’s car, flipped open to an ad from the store.

Sandwiched between two of the state’s larger TV markets in Raleigh and Greenville, the dealership finds that newspaper advertising is the most effective way to drive traffic, Internet manager Marshall Crumpler told Auto Remarketing on Monday.

Though Crumpler acknowledges his store goes “against the grain” of the advertising strategies that an increasing number of dealerships are using, recent data from CNW Research suggests Cox might not be alone.

In fact, the “old standby” of a newspaper ad might not be so obsolete for dealerships, said CNW president Art Spinella.

CNW reports that 55 percent of dealership visitors in the first six months of the year reveal their reason for making the trip was primarily due to a print or online newspaper ad.

“There is no doubt that newspapers are losing their grip on the auto retail market to an assortment of electronic media, but when it comes right down to the final push to get folks into a dealership, the old standby continues to reign,” said Spinella.

“(Shoppers) also said that they had pre-shopped online and through social media before considering a vehicle acquisition, but it was the dealership ad that spurred the decision to take a real-life look,” he added.

For the Cox store, advertising regularly in the local paper — The Wilson Times — and The Goldsboro News-Argus in nearby Wayne County have been quite effective at either enticing shoppers to pay the store a visit or pick up the phone and ask about a car.

“We find that our newspaper advertising actually works better than some of the big-market dealerships find right now. We actually hit a targeted prospect. They actually see more newspapers in this area than almost anything right now,” Crumpler said. “So, in essence, we actually go against the grain."

Interestingly enough, the dealership generates more phone calls from these newspaper ads, though, than store visits.

“Out of the Goldsboro area, we get a lot of phone calls out of the ads that we run down there,” he added. “But in the Wilson paper, we actually find it 50-50 as far as phone calls and (shoppers) coming in. We might see the newspaper in their car. They don’t bring it in, but we’ll see it sitting in their front seat, turned to the ad.”

Breaking down CNW’s data on floor-traffic generation, the 55-percent rate for newspapers is down slightly from 2009, but it still leads other media by a wide margin.

Among the other categories, Web influence (excluding newspaper websites) has climbed 1.2 percentage points in the last two years, CNW noted. Just fewer than 20 percent of shoppers said they were pulled into a dealership by that medium.

Meanwhile, spot TV was static from 2009 (under 10 percent). Yellow Pages’ influence came in at 6.6 percent, down from 10.6 percent in 2009.

Floor-Traffic Trends

Though floor traffic at Cox Chrysler Jeep Dodge has been static in September, Crumpler said dealership’s local advertising and the automaker’s national ads have helped raise awareness of Chrysler’s product offering and drawn more new-car shoppers to the lot.

What’s more, the dealership’s closing ratios on both used and new walk-in traffic are relatively steady from August, and up substantially from year-ago levels

These trends, however, don’t exactly mirror what appears to be happening across the national landscape. CNW Research discovered that floor traffic for dealers in September is up 1.23 percent from a year ago, but down 1.33 percent from August. Moreover, closing ratios are off 1.7 percent sequentially and down 5.62 percent year-over-year.

“This is a normal circumstance as parents find themselves under time pressure with children returning to school and the usual after-school activities beginning to eat into the weekends,” explained CNW president Art Spinella.

“Closing ratios were also off slightly from August for pretty much the same reasons and statistically about the same as the decline in floor traffic,” he added. “The year-ago comparison, however, is a bother because it shows a resistance to pricing and an increase in cross-brand shopping.”

In explaining his closing ratio gains, Crumpler pointed out his store’s area was one of the last to get hit by the recession (and was hit quite strongly), and subsequently, was one of the last to emerge from the recession.

But once his area moved out of the economic downturn around this same time last year, the store blossomed, picking up major momentum and staying strong ever since, Crumpler emphasized.