It’s Time for a Social Media Strategy Review

The calendar year is starting to dwindle. The busy summer season may be over, but it’s your dealership will be busy this winter, too – though perhaps more with truck or equipment service than sales. Now that there’s a bit of a lull in the action, it is the perfect time to take a close look at your social media interactions.

How you use social media (and, how well you use it) could play a key role in determining your end-of-year success. It’s never too late to sharpen your social strategy, and that starts with a status review.

Below, you’ll find some tips to ensure your social media strategy will bring you the best, for the rest of 2019 and on into the new year. You may have addressed some, or even all, of these issues to kick off the year, but things change — with your business and with marketing trends. You have to be flexible. Besides, a review now will also point up any areas where your social marketing needs adjustment. Even if it’s delivering good results, we know you’d rather go for great.

What should you review?

Two crucial areas: content strategy and advertising strategy.

Content

Ask yourself:

• Are we focusing on the types of content that have performed best for you in the past? And, conversely, have we eliminated (or revised) content that has not performed well? Every impression you make with prospective or existing customers via social media should be timely, relevant, and useful (or, occasionally, just for fun). Too many random, pointless posts can damage your brand instead of reinforcing your dealership’s position as an industry leader and valuable resource.
• Are we using all our analytics tools? One of the worst mistakes you can make is guessing, assuming, or relying on “your own judgment” to decide what’s working and what is not. Data tells a true, unbiased story about your social media performance. Along with your other marketing analytics tools, you can use an app such as Sprout Social to capture post- and tweet-level data from each of the platforms you’re using.

Nice as it is to know what content topics, formats, etc. work best for your dealership, the biggest problem you face is creating that content. Top-notch material is critical, but it takes time, specialized skills, and experience to get it right. The smartest move you can make is to partner with professionals. Choose the right partner, and you can be confident you’re getting quality content and effective execution. (Hint: ADI Agency delivers double value, thanks to our dual expertise in marketing and dealership management.)

Advertising

To assess your advertising strategy, do the math. What kind of ROI are you getting for your investment? Look at:

• Cost per result
• Cost per impression
• Number of conversions

Do the key performance indicators you’re using still accurately reflect your business and marketing goals, or have you made changes that require tweaking your KPIs? Don’t forget to compare campaigns to one another as well as specific ad performance. And compare results to targeting. Perhaps an ad or campaign would do better if targeted differently.

Remember that social media advertising is not a stand-alone marketing tool but a companion to other marketing efforts. That can make it tougher to assess the direct value of these ads, but knowing what you want to accomplish will allow you to evaluate results to get useful actionable data.

Above all, don’t think of your mid-year review as a one-time exercise. Keeping your eyes on these details monthly will keep your content and advertising on track no matter what curves the rest of the year throws your way. That said, there are other things you can do now to boost year-end marketing effectiveness.

Keep Your Eye on Emerging Technology

Artificial intelligence is on the tips of our tongues these days, and one of these days it might be a must-have for your social media and other marketing. Simple chatbots may be more on point for now – they can be a huge boon, especially for certain customer service needs.

New marketing-related tools are constantly being developed. You need to know what’s on the horizon in order to keep your dealership up to date and ahead of the competition, but if a particular tool isn’t going to boost your brand and help your customers, save your money.

And speaking of your competitors

Keep an eye on how they’re using social media, too. You never want to copy them, but if they are running a campaign or paid ads that would also make sense for you, create ways to put your own special twist on the message. The goal, as always, is to maintain a social media presence that resonates loudest with prospects and customers.