HERNDON, Va., and OVERLAND PARK, Kan. -

Successful dealers have a wide array of skills. They know how to acquire inventory, appraise trade-ins, work out contracts in the F&I office and more.

Getting a handle on social media? That’s a store operation which principals and managers are still wrangling with, especially when it comes to improving the situation in their used-vehicle or service department.

“It’s a very tough medium, particularly for auto dealers, to figure out a successful strategy,” said Scott Fletcher, vice president of account services at Tier10 Marketing, which has a large stable of dealer group clients that are looking to leverage social media’s potential.

“Social is forever evolving, and it moves very quickly,” Fletcher continued. “I would say in general, most dealers aren’t even thinking about how do I adapt or change strategy for mobile, because they’re still just trying to figure out what is my strategy in the first place, what is the best way to take advantage of this medium and this way people are interacting online.”

In an attempt to help dealers sharpen their social media strategy, both Fletcher and Joey Little, social media manager at VinSolutions, approached the topic from different angles to give a host of recommendations for any size store or dealer group.

Turning Users into Store Advocates and Loyalists

Before Little explained four ways dealers can leverage social media to turn consumers into advocates and loyalists for a store, he first clarified what he meant by these segments of social media users.

Little pointed out that more than half of U.S. residents have an account on Facebook, and many of these same individuals also use sites such as Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and Pinterest. He highlighted how dealers want online consumers to work their way down what he called the “social funnel,” evolving from prospects to fans and friends to those vital loyalists and advocates.

“Advocates and loyalists will speak for your dealership online,” Little said. “These loyalists and advocates you create and bond with,  so when you do have negative publicity online or somebody does have a bad review or a bad experience, you have these loyalists and advocates that will respond to those before you can even move or type a response. They’ll stand up for you.”

So how can dealers gain such critical online champions? Little emphasized four ways.

First, Little stressed that dealers must keep their social audience engaged with compelling content, not just how great a current sale might be or how many units of a particular model might currently be in inventory.

“If you sit there and just talk about your dealership, specials, sales, you’re going to lose a lot of your community,” Little said. “It’s like a bad first date. If you talk about yourself too much on that first date, you’re probably not going to get a second. Make sure you keep it fun and engaging.”

Little recommended sometimes the content can be about puppies or children, “things that people want to comment on, like and share. They like stuff on Facebook they can feel happy about.”

Little also mentioned how dealers can be “industry leaders” in the community, highlighting tips about tire rotations or other maintenance topics.

“Your dealership name is attached to that content,” Little said. “The more times that gets shared or liked or commented, the more people are going to see not only your logo and brand, but your dealership name, too.”

Next, Little implored dealers to ensure their social media content always pushes users back to the store website.

“I can’t tell you how many dealers have asked me on the road about how they can sell a car on Facebook,” Little said. “Social media is not built to sell you a car. It’s there to create an emotional connection with your community to get out news, best practices, but not to sell. Your store website was built to sell cars.”

Moving on, Little noted how great social media content and subsequent traffic going to the store’s website boost another crucial element — search engine optimization.

“It’s going to add more clicks for people to find you,” Little said.

Finally, Little touched on social media is vital to online public relations. To stress the point, he gave an example of how a dealer might react if a former customer was protesting on a sidewalk down the street from the store.

“If there was someone near your dealership with a bullhorn and one of those sandwich boards talking about your dealership hurt him and his family, you’re going to drive down and have a talk with that person and find out what went wrong and how we can make this better,” Little said. “But they’re not doing it online. These reviews are not being addressed.”

Little said industry data he has seen indicates that 90 percent of negative reviews are not responded to by dealers. Even worse, 95 percent of positive commentaries aren’t acknowledged by dealers, either.

“You have to get that lower,” Little said. “This is a way you can turn that customer into an advocate for your dealership because you’re showing that you care.”

Leveraging Social Media Data for Specific Campaigns

Fletcher agreed about how engaging content can benefit dealers’ social media strategy. But he admitted that what excites him even more about what dealers can do with social media is leveraging the data that’s contained in both a dealership’s DMS and what social media sites collect.

To illustrate his position, Fletcher highlighted an ongoing campaign Tier10 is doing for a franchised dealer. The firm is taking information from the store’s DMS about customers who have six months or less remaining on their current vehicle lease.

Then Tier10 is matching that customer information with user data collected by Facebook in order to send that specific individual targeted advertising about bringing the leassor into the store to discuss trade-in options.

Fletcher emphasized how this example is using social media to complement what a dealership might do already via email, phone calls or direct mail.

“Those people don’t necessarily like this dealership’s Facebook page but because of the data, we’re able to target those customers with a message that’s relevant to them,” Fletcher said.

“I think so many dealers are focused on their own Facebook page and building the community. But the value I see in selling cars and service especially is being able to target these consumers through that medium,” he continued.

Besides approaching the potential off-lease customers, Fletcher mentioned how some dealers are scouring their DMS for consumers who are due for service because they haven’t been in the store’s service department for a year or longer.

Again meshing together the information from the DMS and Facebook, Fletcher’s team created a campaign that pushed content directly to a user’s news feed and blended together with other service drive initiatives.

“You should be talking to those customers, trying to reactivate them. It’s just another way to engage those people,” Fletcher said. “Once you make them an active customer again, then try to sell them a car and get them out of their current vehicle.

“Instead of looking at social as this silo form of marketing, you’ve got to look at is as part of the entire mix,” Fletcher added.

Nick Zulovich can be reached at nzulovich@autoremarketing.com. Continue the conversation with Auto Remarketing on both LinkedIn and Twitter.