Useless Keywords for Localized Businesses

The debate on the power of dealer micro sites is on again.  I love the principal of them but feel there are much better ways to leverage their power if they are built using a CMS like Wordpress.  Even a single blog like this one about NJ bad credit car loans will give more value than one targeting a single keyword like nissan delivers.

If your business or affiliate properties have a local concentration then you would be far better off to target any content locally.  For example a page about Jacksonville buy here pay here dealers will do better as far as relevancy to a surfer than one just targeting buy here pay here.  Both can have a purpose but if you are marketing a Plainfield car lot give people looking for one relevant content.  Your traffic will convert better.  Having a site that ranks for Nissan delivers for a Texas nissan dealer is useless.

Now if you were creating a property to drive traffic to multiple dealers across the nation it would make more sense and provide better monetization opportunities.  Unless you are selling it to one dealer who just does not get it.

nissan delivers, dealer micro sites, palinfield car lot, buy here pay here

Winning in local markets - Opportunities abound

Affiliate marketers spend a lot of time chasing what they believe to be long tail terms such as collection agency.  These terms can be valuable but they do not convert well for the things taht mak money.  A ton of traffic without conversions is a waste of bandwidth.

If you go after terms like Plainfield used car lots and Kingsland used car dealers you will see better converting traffic.  It is targeted and the surfer has a specific problem they are trying to solve.  Especially the automotive industry where search markets have always been weak and with all of the turmoil the industry is suffering right now it is a great niche to start exploiting and have assets in place to domanate those local search markets.

Winning in a Down Market - Using Affiliate Techniques

Car dealers are always looking for ways to get traffic to their dealership website. We discuss many of these topics at Driving Sales. One of the things though that does not come up though is using long tail keyword marketing techniques. Because dealers have been drinking Kool Aid fed to them by automotive seo vendors for so long it may be impossible to help them make the shift.

Creating other properties away from the stores main site will help dealers find good converting keywords for them to target via long tail marketing. Some of the markets that I see being capitalized on right now are Tulsa car loans and NJ bad credit via long tail marketing.  I do not car how hard you try you just will not get an effective message across to buyers looking for these types of terms with a link to a credit application and a few bright shinny words or flashing images.

Just like when users search for used cars in Cincinnati they want to be taken to the right content not the home page of a dealerships website.  Dealer need to learn to capitalize on the long tail and none of the vendors in the main stream are going to show them the way.

long tail, seo vendor

Beating the Gap

Affiliate marketing and automotive blogging is a way of life for me. I do still work a little bit behind the scenes helping others bot with affiliate marketing and setting up blogs this is in addition to using squidoo for bum marketing. It is mostly a hobby and a past time than anything else.

Besides generating revenue through squidoo and interacting with the community there it does a great job in helping you identify crazy terms people will use to find things online. One thing that surprised me the most is how many people look for New Jersey car lots versus looking for car dealers.

I do believe that it is the type of customer that most dealership do not wish to attract unless they participate in special finance. However if that is their cup of tea it is an easy market to dominate.

special finanice, new jersey car lots

Discovering Very Unlikely Niches Using Squidoo

There is no doubt about it I love squidoo.  In helping a persona recently we discovered a niche that is prime for the exploiting by accident.  We created one lens targeted to buy here pay here and the traffic is incredible for what I thought was a worthless search term.

Not only is the traffic good the income from the affiliate networks is nothing to sneeze at either.  This coupled with the squidoo traffic and the earning power of squidoo this is definitely a tool that any bum marketer should utilize.  Currently I earn a little over $300 a month from squidoo.  Nothing to sneeze at.

Oh well time to figure out some some other niche to exploit.

Getting Your Visitors to Dig Deeper

I am not a web designer by any means. I can do some basic stuff on my own but at the end of the day things like scripting and GUI I have to outsource. It really is a better use of my time. I am a marketer, that is primary goal in life. To help others market their business or look at things in a different light.

Recently in a discussion with a Cincinnati used car dealership I spoke with them about their conversion problems on their website. One thing that was happening was that there was auto played audio on the home page. This had to increase their bounce rate. Sure enough after they turned it off their lead volume jumped.

Internet Marketing is not rocket science.  You just have to use effective copy writing to generate a call to action.  You do this by placing yourself in your visitors shoes and watch your conversions rise.

Building up a game plan

Being in the trenches at an automotive social network I am able to follow trends in the industry.  It also shows markets that are prime for the picking with affiliate programs.  There are a few niches that are really under served as far as competition.  For example ebay motors.  You can use the ebay affiliate program to build some neat properties.  Right now my protege is starting to attack the automotive auction market.

We are going to start by going after markets that have closed dealer auctions and create landing pages that will encourage click throughs for individuals looking for public auctions in those markets.  To start with we are concentrating on markets we know well such as Savannah auto auctions.  They have three dealer only auctions but individuals are constantly trying to figure out how to get in them.

So we will be presenting them with local ebay car auctions as an alternative.  This allows us to profit on the traffic in several ways.  Ebay affiliate commissions. auto loan lead programs, amazon and the money squidoo pays for traffic.  One page mutliole streams of income. 

dealer auctions, automotive auctions, savannah auto auctions