We have grown up with a different concept of advertising. The way we have marketed ourselves over the years has been far too ‘push’ and not enough ‘pull.’ So when a new medium such as social media presents itself, many believe it is just a new platform we should deliver ‘push’ advertising through. Understand, though, that this is spam. Social spamming.
Countless dealers have created Facebook pages and begun the slow, arduous task to understand it. However, those two tasks should happen the other way around. Instead of comprehending the needs, wants and wishes of their online social sphere of friends and followers, they just start more ‘push’ advertising. It is akin to turning on the car and driving off… when you are 13 years old… before you have a license or even understand how to operate the vehicle… just because you saw it on TV and it looks doable, doesn’t mean it is without training and knowledge.
Prices and deals and Interest rates, oh my. You can still see dealers sadly posting their inventory to their Facebook walls, tweeting out about the new model in stock, and offering below invoice pricing on their pages. None of these ways work. It is not the right vehicle to promote your vehicles on. It isn’t the right medium. Not for your followers. Your Facebook page cannot be a new version of your newspaper ad. Twitter and Youtube cannot be the where radio station-style ad spots are blasted out.
Look at how you are engaging in discussion, creating awareness of topics that are important to your followers. Nobody gives a good gosh darn (that is me being civil) about the awesome deal you have on the 2005 Camry. Not on the social networks they don’t. Post those types of content and in-your-face advertisements on a social landscape and you will be discarded like a Viagra ad in an email inbox. You are social spamming them.