Something I’ve noticed over the years is that so many site owners want to take the easy way out on content. Maybe the worst offenders are Auto dealers. Auto dealer websites tend to be some of the worst I’ve come across in my 13 years in this business. So, I’ll use that example in this post, but the concept applies to any site marketing products they don’t manufacture. The reason they do this, I believe, is 2 fold. First; it’s not cheap to add all of that content, especially in an industry where the whole product line changes every year or so. Second, it’s too tempting to take advantage of either the free website the Auto manufacturers will give them or to just link to the manufacturer’s site for details.
In my opinion, the Auto Manufacturers are just enablers in this arena. Either by justifying to their dealers that it’s really OK to link back to their site for details, or by handing out cookie cutter, poorly built websites to their dealers that have little to no chance of helping them separate themselves from every other dealer that has the same site.
Whether you’re a car dealer, or you’re a dealer of any other manufactured product, before you take the cheap way out and rely on what the manufacturer will give you, consider these points:
- Linking to the manufacturer is sending the visitor away from your site; giving up the conversion completely.
- Using a website that a manufacturer supplies you; makes you look exactly like your competition, not any better.
- Not having the content within your domain affords you no opportunity for natural search engine rankings.
- Using the same exact content as everyone else, also limits your ability to rank and adds little value to your users.
So, if you’re going to take the web seriously, build a professional site. Make sure that your site has all of the information a prospect needs to become a customer. Take the extra time to make that information unique to your site. It’s OK to add in all of the content that the manufacturer supplies you, but it’s better to enhance that content. Add your thoughts, your opinions and your expertise.
These are likely the reasons people buy from your dealership in the off line world. Is there any reason the same principles would not apply online?