In previous posts, we've discussed the fact that there are few things more frustrating to auto dealerships than losing precious recurring service business to the aftermarket. Fortunately, several strategies are available to help auto dealers to build service retention programs and to profit from them. Our recent post, "Keep Service Business at Your Autodealership", discussed using pre-paid maintenance plans, and well as service rewards and customer loyalty programs. Just as with pre-paid maintenance plans, customer loyalty card programs keep car owners coming back to your dealership through the life of the vehicle, allowing you to cultivate long term relationships with your customers and ultimately create repeat purchasers and referrers.

You can also use social media as a very powerful tool to draw service business back to your dealership!

There are many reasons you should be using Twitter to help market your auto dealership and build your brand, but did you know that Twitter also has a free SMS (text messaging) service? The best part is your customers do not have to have Twitter accounts. They can simply subscribe to receive your Twitter updates via text message, which are then received directly on their smart phones. What a great way to alert customers of service specials, remind them seasonal of service checkups, as well as promote other specials throughout the dealership.

Here's how it works:

1. Create a Twitter account for your dealership. Once you have setup your account, you will have a Twitter handle.  For example, @NJCarDealer.
2. Market your text alert service with signage at the dealership, in your ads, and in your other promotional materials.
3. Your customers use their smart phones and send a text message to shortcode 40404 that reads FOLLOW NJCarDealer (replace NJCarDealer with your actual handle). Notice there is no mention of Twitter here ... your customer does not have to have a Twitter account. This service is called Fast Follow.
4. Once your customer subscribes by sending this text message, they will receive anything you post to your Twitter account as an actual live text message on their smart phone. 

Why is this so powerful?

Besides the fact that Twitter makes this available to you free of charge, consider some of these stats from Anchor Mobile and LogMyCalls:

1. 98% of text messages are read vs. 29% of Tweets vs. 12% of Facebook posts vs. 20% of emails.
2. 90% of text messages are read within three minutes of receipt.
3. SMS coupons are 10x more likely to be redeemed than mail or newspaper coupons
4. 70% of all people in the U.S. said they would like to receive offers on their mobile phones.
5. The average person looks at their phone 150 times each day.

You already know that ngoing interaction with satisfied customers through the life of the vehicle builds relationships and customer loyalty. Considering giving Twitter a try!

About Novera Payment Solutions

Learn more about Loyalty Cards and Service Rewards Programs for your dealership:

• Get started with Novera's Loyalty & Service Rewards Program for Auto Dealers and increase your customer service visits

• Use the Loyalty & Service Rewards Program to bring customers back to repurchase

• See dramatic savings on your credit card processing fees with Novera's flat fee, transparent processing rates for auto dealers

Google and Your Business

Business owners are often excited when they “Google” their business name and see their website at the top of the search results. 

FACT: You should be dominating Google for your business name!

Unless your website has no content directly referecing your business name or your website address, you SHOULD be the number one result in Google when someone is searching for your business name.  Not only should you be the number one listing, you should DOMINATE the entire first page of results.

These results should include:

• Your website home page
• Secondary pages of your website
• Company press releases
• Business social media pages
• Your company page on LinkedIn
• Reviews

If this is not happening, it's probably time for you to beef up your social media presence, review the on-site optimization of your website, and start asking your customers for reviews online.

The real question is, what if people are NOT searching for your business name, but for your service or product instead? Where does your business rank?

Ensure your website optimized for the primary search terms related to your business.

Search is local.

Yes, it’s important that you come up on page one of Google for your business name, but you should also be working toward ranking well for the primary search terms for your service or product.  Let’s say you are in the auto dealership in St. Louis.  A possible Google search by someone looking for your business type may be “auto dealership in st. louis”.  Notice that we used “St. louis” in the search term.  People search locally. While Google can still target your location by your internet service provider, a general query for “auto dealership” may display various national results if the user is not signed in to Google.

For best organic search results, localize the on-page optimization of your website.

By localizing, you have a much greater chance of ranking near the top of page one on Google for your target consumer. This can ultimately lead to higher conversion rate through your site.

What are some tools to help you look at what people are searching for?

There is a great keyword research tool to help you examine what keywords people are using  when they search Google for your business type.  Go to www.googlekeywordtool.com and click on the Google Keyword Tool link.  Use this tool to see how many people monthly are searching for a particular term. Talk with your webmaster about optimizing your website around these terms, as well as targeting locally.

Google is where your customers will find you online.

Google is by far the most utilized search engine in the world.  By making smart and informed choices on how to properly optimize your business website, you have a better chance of obtaining page one results.  If you throw in a great content and social media strategy on top of it, you'll not only dominate the page one results for your business name, you'll also have a great chance of ranking on page one for your primary, local keyword search phrases.

About Novera Payment Solutions

Novera Payment Solutions is well known as a leader in the credit card payments industry and is committed to helping auto dealerships and other businesses improve their bottom line by providing significant savings on credit card processing fees through our innovative flat fee pricing model.

Novera Payment Solutions Advantange

• Novera Payment Solutions's consultative approach allows us to thoroughly educate our clients, equipping them to better understand this complicated industry.

• We take the mystery out of the credit card processing business.

• We work with all types of businesses across the country, and one our specialties is auto dealership credit card processing.

Contact Novera to learn more about how we work with small businesses, auto dealers and auto dealer associations to provide the most fair and transparent pricing structure available on the market today for credit card processing.

According to a study by Cone Communications, 80% of consumers say they have changed their mind about a purchase based solely on negative information they found online. It's no surprise that having negative reviews about your business online can significantly impact your bottom line.

So, what should you do if you find a negative online review about your auto dealership?

There 6 key steps you should considering taking when responsing, but before you attempt to respond be sure you've claimed your social media profiles. This enables you to respond to reviews directly as the owner of the business. "Claiming" your profiles varies by service, but generally it involves creating the account and verifying your ownership. Start with Google+, but also include Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Yelp, and FourSquare, at a minimum. Be sure to check out our recent blog post featuring "7 Sites to Monitor to Protect Your Auto Dealership Online Reputation" for others.

Once you have an account that allows you to respond as the owner of the business, considering taking these 6 steps when responding to a negative review.

1. Thank them for taking the time to provide feedback. The person writing the review has done business with you and presumably has spent some money. You should also understand your reviewer is likely vocal and opinionated (otherwise they would not be writing the review). They are taking their time to let you (and their friends) know about the experience. Right or wrong on their end, it's important to acknowledge and thank them. Remember, this doesn't mean you necessarily agree with the feedback ... you are simply thanking them taking the time to provide it.
2. Acknowledge their frustration. We've all been there as a consumer. Acknowledging the customer's feelings (again, right or wrong) shows empathy and can help diffuse those feelings. It can be a simple statement like, "I am sure this made you incredibly frustrated."
3. Apologize, if the review is true. If in fact the negative review is warranted based on an actual experience at your business, a simple apology can go a long way. A sincere "I am truly sorry you had this experience at our dealership," let's the reviewer know you acknowledge the problem actually occurred and that it matters to you.
   
4. Address any adjustments you've made as a result of the feedback. For example, if someone writes a negative review because they waited too long in the service area, perhaps you've added another mechanic during peak hours, or added free WiFi or beverages to your waiting area to help pass the time. Or maybe you've implemented a stronger communcation process so customers are better informed of the time it will take for the service.
5. Offer to discuss the issue further. You've thanked them for the feedback, you've ackowledged their frustrations, you've apologized, and you've let them know that a change has been made as a result of the feedback. Now, if they have any questions or concerns let them know that you would personally like to assist them offline and provide a good way to contact you (or you can contact them if you have their information).
6. Close with your commitment to excellence. Close the response with your committment to excellent customer service and thank them again for providing information to help your business improve.

Always, always, always take the high road.

Remember, many times when someone writes a negative review, they are doing so because they are at their wits end and don't think they will get satisfaction any other way. They may also be angry when they are writing it. No matter how inappropriate the commentary or the language, as the business owner, you should take the high road of complete professionalism. This will prevent things from spiraling into further online commentary.

Many businesses get negative reviews, some warranted and others not. People do read them. They also read the responses from the business owners, when they are available. It is your response to that negative review that they will judge. Refrain from attacking the reviewer or being condescending to the reviewer, no matter how tempting it may be. If you work through the sevensteps above, you have a great opportunity to turn the negative into a positive for your auto dealership.

For tips on generating more positive online reviews, see "4 Tips to Get Your Customers to Write Great Reviews."

Who is Novera Payment Solutions?

Novera Payment Solutions is well known as a leader in the credit card payments industry and is committed to helping auto dealerships and other businesses improve their bottom line by providing significant savings on credit card processing fees through our innovative flat fee pricing model.

Contact Novera to learn more about how we work with small businesses, auto dealers and auto dealer associations to provide the most fair and transparent pricing structure available on the market today for credit card processing.

According to a Bazaarvoice survery, 76% of consumers regularly or occasionally use online reviews to determine which local business to use. The same study found that a desire to help others was the reason 90 percent of consumers write reviews. This is great news for your auto dealership (as well as other business owners).

The question is, how can you capitalize on this and generate more positive reviews for your business?

1. Build your social presence.
   In order to get positive online reviews, your auto dealership needs to have a presence in the social landscape. Setup your Google+ page, create a Yelp account, make sure you have business Facebook page, as well as a business LinkedIn page. These accounts are essential, at a minimum. Other platforms are also important in different industries (FourSquare, Trip Advisor, etc).
    
2. Promote your social presence.
   Make your customers aware of your social presence and encourage regular engagement with your brand. Interact with your customers online. The more enagement you have, the more likely you are to receive unsolicited positive reviews and feedback.
   
   To promote your social presence consider using:
    

• Email signature block
• Signage in your auto dealership and service area
• Social icons in any marketing collateral
• Social icons in any print ads and billboard ads
• Social icons and widgets on your website
• Social media addresses on the back of your business cards
   

Nearly 80 percent of new-vehicle buyers use the Internet during their shopping process, and nearly one-third consult online ratings/review sites when selecting a dealer, according to the J.D. Power and Associates 2012 U.S. Sales Satisfaction Index (SSI) Study.

To protect your online reputation, it's important to be aware of what's being said about your auto dealership across the web.  In a previous article, we discussed 4 Free Software Tools to Monitor Your Auto Dealership Reputation, but it's also important that you are aware of the various websites where consumers are writing reviews about auto dealerships.

7 Sites You Should Monitor to Protect Your Auto Dealership's Online Reputation

1. Google.com/+

Go to Google and search for your business name.

According to Google's Help/Support Area:

"Currently, you may see two types of pages on Google for a single business. These pages will either be business listings with scores and reviews, or they will be local Google+ pages with social features. You can distinguish the pages by the features available.

If below the cover photo you only see the tabs for About and Photos, along with scores and reviews, then it’s a business listing.  When business listings appear on Google Maps or in Google Search, clicking on more info or on Google reviews will take you to this type of page. Business owners can verify these pages from the Places for Business dashboard.

Some businesses may have also created pages in Google+. You can identify these pages if there are tabs for Posts, About, Photos, and Videos. If there isn’t the option to leave a review, the business owner hasn't verified this local Google+ page.

When a business owner verifies a local Google+ page, any existing listing for the business is merged with the local Google+ page to create a single page with a verified checkmark. Verified local Google+ pages have features of both pages described above–scores and reviews as well as posts from the business owner."

The important piece is that you claim your business listing by verifying your local Google+ page.  Once you have done this, you will have the ability to respond to any reviews that have been submitted, as well as flag inappropriate reviews.

 2. Yelp.com

Over 102 million people visited Yelp in Q1 2013 to make spending decisions. To help businesses get the most out of their online presence, Yelp Business Accounts offer a suite of FREE tools for businesses.

• Communicate with your customers-- privately and publicly

• Track how many people view your business page

• Add photos, a detailed business description, up-to-date information, history, and specialties

• Recommend other businesses

Go to Yelp.com and search for your business name to view reviews. You can create a free account with Yelp, which will then enable you to respond to reviews.

3. DealerRater.com

DealerRater established the first car dealer review website worldwide to help consumers find the right automotive dealer online when purchasing or servicing their cars. They enable consumers to search for car dealerships, read and write reviews, and find car deals through the site’s classified ads. The service is free for consumers. Dealers can create 4 levels of accounts with DealerRater. The cost varies.

4. Edmunds.com

Edmunds.com has a section for Auto Dealer Ratings & Reviews. Consumers can review a dealership in two areas: sales and service. Each review contains an area for the consumer to: write about their experiences, list the pros and cons, state whether they would recommend the dealership to other, and then score the dealership’s sales or service department in five areas on a scale of 1-5, or “not applicable”. Edmunds recommend that dealers become personally involved in their community. They allow you to comment on reviews and provide additional information. Dealer Ratings & Reviews

5. MyDealerReport.com

MyDealerReport.com allows consumers to write reviews on auto dealerships and rate how them for: Buying Process, Sales Associate, Vehicle Selection, Finance Dept., Trade-In Process, Service Dept. and Sales Press Level. As a dealer, you can request an account here:

http://www.mydealerreport.com/dealers/index.php

6. CarDealerCheck.com

Car Dealer Check  informs consumers which car dealers honor their promises, their online price quotes, treat their customers with respect and dignity and generally provide a quality service. Users must register to write a review or to respond to a review.

7. DealershipRatings.com

Much like the other sites listed here, DealershipRatings.com enables consumers to review auto dealerships across a variety of areas. DealershipRatings.com does not require the user to register before posting a review, however. There is no specific area for a dealer to create an account to respond to specific reviews as the dealer. Instead, you simply go to your listing (as the consumer would) and click on "Rate this Dealer".

Know What Consumers are Saying About Your Auto Dealership

It's important to take the time to monitor what people are saying about your auto dealership online. Be sure to check the sites above regularly for new reviews and use the 4 Free Software Tools to Monitor Your Auto Dealership Reputation discussed in our previous blog post to help protect your online reputation. Being an informed business owner is being an empowered business owner, and enables you to address reviews (good and bad) in a timely manner. In coming articles, we'll discuss how to respond to negative reviews and how to solicit positive reviews.

About Novera Payment Solutions

Novera Payment Solutions is a leader in the credit card payments industry and is committed to helping auto dealerships and other businesses improve the bottom line by providing significant savings on credit card processing fees through our innovative flat fee pricing model.

The Novera Advantange

• Novera’s consultative approach allows us to thoroughly educate our clients, equipping them to better understand this complicated industry.

• We take the mystery out of the credit card processing business.

• We work with all types of businesses across the country, and one our specialties is auto dealership credit card processing.

Contact Novera to learn more about how we work with small businesses, auto dealers and auto dealer associations to provide the most fair and transparent pricing structure available on the market today for credit card processing.

It's more important than ever to be aware of what consumers are saying about your auto dealership. Negative online reviews can cause tremendous damage to your dealership’s reputation and sales.

Consumer reviews may include both positive and negative commentary regarding price, customer service, as well as overall quality of their vehicle and their experience with your dealership or service department. Positive reviews are fantastic and we'll write a blog post in the near future about how to acquire more written positive reviews online. It's the negative reviews that you need to know about quickly, however, so you can properly address them before they do harm to your dealership's reputation.

Fortunately, there are some great free software tools available online to help you monitor your auto dealership's reputation. Here, we highlight four of our favorites.

• Google Alerts

Google Alerts are free email updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your queries. You consider setting up Google alerts for your business name, the names of key team members, and your website address, at a minimum. Simply enter your query string, then select the result type(s) that you would like to receive, how often you would like to receive alerts, and how many alerts you'd like to receive. Google will then send you emails alerting you to any mentions concerning your business, as well as any other alerts you setup.

http://www.Google.com/alerts

• Social Mention

  Social Mention allows you to easily track and measure what people are saying about you, your company, a new product, or any topic across the web's social media landscape in real-time. Social Mention monitors 100+ social media properties directly including: Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed, YouTube, Digg, Google etc.

STRENGTH is the liklihood that your brand is being discussed in social media. A simple calculation is used for this: phrase mentions within the last 24 hours divided total possible mentions.

SENTIMENT is the ration of generally positive commentary to generally negative commentary.

PASSION is the measure of likelihood that people who are talking about your brand will do so repeatedly.

REACH is a measure of your range of influence. It is the number of unique authors referencing your brand divided by the total number of mentions.

You simply go to the website, enter your business name (or other query) and Social Mention will return the results (with links) to all the mentions across the social platforms. It also returns (with greater detail) the data outlined above.

http://www.socialmention.com

• Mention

Mention is similar to SocialMention.com in that it queries the social media channels for your brand mentions. Create alerts on your name, your brand, your industry and your competitors and be informed of any mention on the web and social networks. The nicest feature of Mention is that it is accessible across all devices (desktop, laptop, tablet, and smart phone). It also provides real time alerts. This can be invaluable when it comes to negative mentions of your brand, because you are alerted immediately.

http://www.metion.com

• NetVibes

NetVibes is a pretty powerful dashboard, allowing you to monitor your brand across Google, the blogosphere, and the social platforms. The free version (somewhat limited) allows you to enter your business name and view real time results. NetVibes does have an option to upgrade which includes some pretty powerful analytics.

http://www.NetVibes.com

Consider This

A Consumer Survey (2012) indicated a positive shift in consumer trust of online reviews. 72% of consumers surveyed reported they trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations. 52% indicated positive online reviews make them more likely to use a local business. Additionally, the survey revealed 65% of consumers read between 2-10 reviews before they felt they could trust a local business.

Clearly, regardless of the tool that you select, it's critically important to be proactive and monitor your auto dealership's reputation online. In upcoming posts, we'll share ideas for  soliciting positive reviews online, as well as how to proactively and effectively deal with negative reviews.

About Novera Payment Solutions

Novera Payment Solutions is a leader in the credit card payments industry and is committed to helping auto dealerships and other businesses improve the bottom line by providing significant savings on credit card processing fees through our innovative flat fee pricing model.

The Novera Advantange

• Novera’s consultative approach allows us to thoroughly educate our clients, equipping them to better understand this complicated industry.

• We take the mystery out of the credit card processing business.

• We work with all types of businesses across the country, and one our specialties is auto dealership credit card processing.

Contact Novera to learn more about how we work with small businesses, auto dealers and auto dealer associations to provide the most fair and transparent pricing structure available on the market today for credit card processing.

There are several misconceptions in our industry that lead to confusion about credit card processing rates and fees.

Here we highlight the reality of the top 3.

1. One Low Rate

Misconception: More often than not when a payment processing account executive presents their services they may only quote one rate that sounds something like 1.29% and 15 cents. This can lead the business owner to assume that this is the only rate that will ever be charged for all payment acceptance.

Reality: In most cases there are many different rates applied. These rates are applied depending upon the type of card and how that card is accepted for payment. For example, a corporate credit card has a higher cost than a personal debit card and a swiped  transaction generally is less than a non swpied transaction.

2. Free Equipment

Misconception - Account executives for payment services may tell business owners that they will give them card swiping equipment for “free” when they switch to their processing services. They may make this equipment appear to be worth much more than it actually is so it appears like they are giving the business owner a great deal.

Reality - Most things in this world are seldom free. That pricey piece of card swiping equipment most likely can be purchased elsewhere for significantly less than what most Account Executives will lead you to believe it is worth.  Usually the higher processing rates, and other fees, cause many small businesses to end up paying for their equipment many times over throughout the term of their contract.

3. Fees

Misconception - Fees such as statement fees, data security fees, batch header fees, monthly minimum fees, and a host of other fees are necessary administrative costs to keep payment processing services operating.

Reality - There are costs to maintain processing services. However, many fees are there to create additional margin and further cutting into the businessowners profit.

There's no doubt the credit card payment processing industry has become increasingly confusing, and many auto dealerships (and small business everywhere) are being unknowingly taken advantage of in this complexity. As a result, many business owners are paying more than necessary for this critical service by thousands of dollars per year. Novera’s transparent and innovative flat fee pricing is changing all of that

The Novera Advantange

• Novera’s consultative approach allows us to thoroughly educate our clients, equipping them to better understand this complicated industry.
• We take the mystery out of the credit card processing business.
• We work with all types of businesses across the country, and one our specialties is auto dealership credit card processing.

If you accept credit cards at your auto dealership, you've surely heard the buzz word, "PCI Compliance", but what exactly does it mean?

The basics of PCI Compliance are similar to the standard business practices you already use to safeguard your own business. You lock your doors as a matter of course, right? Well, to protect your customersʼ information, you also need the proper “locks” on your credit card processing system and network.

A recent study  of US and European businesses by Forrester Consulting, revealed activities that may put cardholder data at risk:

• 81% store payment card numbers
• 73% store payment card expiration dates
• 71% store payment card verification codes
• 57% store customer data from the payment card magnetic stripe
• 16% store other personal data

The Payment Card Industry (PCI) standards were established to help you safeguard customer information—and protect your business.

If you accept credit cards at your auto dealership (or any other business for that matter), you are required to be PCI compliant.

12 Key Requirements for PCI Compliance

Build and Maintain a Secure Network
1: Install and maintain a firewall configuration to protect cardholder data.
2: Do not use vendor-supplied defaults for system passwords and other security parameters

Protect Cardholder Data
3: Protect stored cardholder data
4: Encrypt transmission of cardholder data across open, public networks

Maintain a Vulnerability Management Program
5: Use and regularly update anti-virus software
6: Develop and maintain secure systems and applications

Implement Strong Access Control Measures
7: Restrict access to cardholder data by business need-to-know
8: Assign a unique ID to each person with computer access
9: Restrict physical access to cardholder data

Regularly Monitor and Test Networks
10: Track and monitor all access to network resources and cardholder data
11: Regularly test security systems and processes

Maintain an Information Security Policy
12: Maintain a policy that addresses information security

As a merchant, you are at the center of credit card payment card transactions so it is imperative that you use standard security procedures and technologies to thwart theft of cardholder data.

If you need help navigating the PCI Compliance maze for your auto dealership, Novera Payment Solutions can help. We take the mystery out of the process and requirements, as well as help ensure that your business is fully compliant.

In recent auto dealer news, according to a comprehensive MediaTrac study of 72 auto dealerships and over 6 million repair order transactions from January 1, 2010 through February 29, 2012, "customers chose to stay longer, spend more, and repurchase more often at dealerships that reward their patronage."

Not surprisingly, MediaTrac's study showed that auto dealership customers who were enrolled in rewards and loyalty programs visited their dealership every 4.26 months versus every 6.82 months for non-members. The average annual member spend paralleled the increase in service visits with a 97% increase. Additionally, retention of loyalty/reward members was nearly 60%.

Given these statistics, an auto dealer loyalty program with service rewards can be the difference between growing your business or losing to the competition.

According to Jeff Harden, President of Mohawk Honda and a client of Novera Payment Solutions, “The Mohawk Honda Service Rewards card has been very well received by our customers. Every new customer gets a card preloaded with points at delivery, a sure way to get them coming back to our dealership for service, instead of the national chains.”

Sean Grace, President of Novera Payment Solutions, and a leader in the auto dealer payment processing industry encourages auto dealers to take what is in essence a “tax” on the auto dealership (credit card processing) and turn that commodity into a powerful marketing tool through the use of loyalty card programs. This helps auto dealerships sell more cars and get additional service business from existing customers.

Learn more about Loyalty Cards and Service Rewards Programs for your dealership:

• How to get started with Novera's Loyalty & Service Rewards Program for Auto Dealers and increase your customer service visits

• How to use the Loyalty & Service Rewards Program to bring customers back to repurchase

• How (combined with the Loyalty Program) you will see dramatic savings on your credit card processing fees with Novera's flat fee, transparent processing rates for auto dealers