Dallas, Texas November 11, 2009 (reprint from official John Eagle press release)

The John Eagle Dealerships are pleased to introduce an all-new, fully integrated automotive shopping website at JohnEagle.com.

John Eagle, President and Chief Executive Officer of the John Eagle Dealerships said, “With more than 80% of car buyers starting their internet shopping experience online we wanted to make sure that our customers had real-time access to the latest and greatest information about each of our amazing products in real time.  We’re excited to bring more than 2,500 high quality vehicles into one website for customers to consider.”

The brand new website integrates virtual inventory from each of John Eagle’s 15 franchises and multiple locations to deliver quick-loading, visually appealing information that will help customers to make better purchase decisions.  The virtual showroom delivers a wide range of multimedia that includes, among other items, video displays for used inventory and 360 degree interior and exterior views for new inventory.

Rene’ Isip, Chief Operating Officer of John Eagle Dealerships and Dealer Principal of a Toyota and Honda dealership said, “Our goal is to be leaders in 21st Century Marketing and this website is focused on extending the positive experiences that our customers have at our dealerships into an online environment.  This website takes us to the next level by allowing customers to compare new and used vehicles from all of our makes and models and each of our locations.  At the end of the day it will help us reach more customers, secure more market share and sell more vehicles.”

The new website delivers access to credit applications and service appointments as well as details about store locations and contact phone numbers.  Customers will be able to take advantage of cutting-edge capabilities to quickly and intuitively submit leads and search inventory by body style, make, model, color, year, mpg and desired price range.

Len Critcher, President and CEO of eCarList, said, “The automotive marketing landscape is rapidly evolving.  John Eagle Dealerships are setting the benchmark for customer-centric online solutions.  We are honored to work with this group to provide our suite of integrated solutions and assist in growing their online presence.”
(more…)

We recently launched a remarkable new product that automatically keeps your website up-to-date with the latest new vehicle rebates and incentives from the manufacturer.

Check out my quick video demo….

Download PDF: eCarList Automated Incentives

Real-time rebate and incentive data automatically matched to your website inventory.

• eCarList automatically updates your website with comprehensive incentive information tied to specific vehicles in your inventory.
• Display all programs available in your region within hours of release by the manufacturer.
• Instantly upgrade your website content to correspond with manufacturer advertising.
• Incentive information is displayed directly on your inventory and vehicle pages without frame-ins or pop ups.

DALLAS, Apr 01, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) –

Dave Hanson has been named vice president of Interactive and Creative Services at ecarlist, a leading software provider to the automotive industry.

Prior to joining ecarlist, Hanson was director of Brand Marketing at Yahoo! Inc., where he led partnership development and interactive engineering to produce marketing programs for the company and its top advertisers.

Hanson will be responsible for ecarlist’s full-service interactive and creative division, according to ecarlist CEO Len Critcher.

“Dave combines strong creative and interactive leadership with great expertise in online consumer experience,” said Critcher. “I am thrilled to add him to our executive team. With Dave leading our interactive group, ecarlist will be positioned to grow its online product offerings and provide unparalleled creative services to our increasing dealership base.”

Hanson noted that ecarlist is considered to be one of the most innovative companies in the industry.

“I am very excited to join a team that is already producing such dynamic and visually stunning websites,” Hanson added. “I look forward to bringing an even higher level of functionality and usability, while streamlining operations to support the company’s rapid growth.”

The Interactive and Creative Services division will serve as an in-house agency offering custom website design, video production, online-media-campaign creative services, search engine optimization, automated specials integration, interactive lead capture and a full suite of online website capabilities tied to ecarlist’s inventory management software.

“Consumers today turn to the web as their primary source for research,” explained Hanson. “As a part of that process, their impression of your company is determined almost immediately. We will produce websites that are effective in converting web traffic to qualified leads, while building trust in the dealership’s brand, which in turn drives revenue for the dealership.”

(more…)

ecarlist dealer websites with custom design and features.  For examples of our work, please visit:
www.ecarlist.com

As most of us say ‘good riddance’ to 2008, it seems everyone has a heightened sense of awareness going into 2009. In regards to strategy, Dealers are making more careful choices and wiser decisions.  Ambiguity has been replaced with accountability, trust is synonymous with proof, and vendors are being audited.  But above all, the dealers who will survive in 2009 and beyond will be those who fundamentally shift their beliefs about the Internet.

During the housing boom, money was flowing.  It seemed one out of two vehicles on the road had paper plates.  Meanwhile most dealers were still trying to figure out the Internet with many refusing to believe it was a lucrative means of reaching existing and potential customers because..well, they were selling cars.

Also remember, the tech bubble had burst shortly before the housing bubble began…so the theory of the Internet taking over our daily lives was in question.  But what emerged from the tech implosion was a leaner, more viable Internet.  The fat fell off and the Internet was exposed for its most essential offerings - email and search.  And with more data showing Internet usage increasing and car shoppers looking online to start their research, dealers started moving their Internet efforts higher on the priority list.  Yet although dealers were starting to embrace the Internet, they were still unwilling to relinquish their old habits.  According to NADA - in 2005 dealers on average spent $177,992 on newspapers, $72,821on radio, $58,631 on TV, $30,132 on direct mail, and $25,844 on the Internet.  As the old saying goes, “I know my advertising budget is working…I just don’t know which part”.

So now that 2008 has proven that over 90% of people planning to purchase a vehicle start their buying cycle online, what do you plan to do with that information, and are you thinking of reallocating your budgets according to proven user behavior?

(more…)

As a dealer vendor in the online advertising/marketing sector, it is your innate duty to justify the money your dealer gives you.  That’s what makes online marketing different - the accountability.  It’s easier to take radio or newspaper dollars and chalk up the lack of accountability to “branding”, but with the Internet it all comes down to Cost-Per-Lead and the ability to match leads to vendors.

Yet there are many vendors competing for the same justification of the same existence. An example - my previous company sold SEM/SEO services…but we didn’t provide the actual website. So we built “microsites” in order to segregate our leads and say “look at these great results…we deserve what you pay us for”. No harm done, but in theory why would a dealer want two different websites and who were we really helping by separating SEM visitors from the dealer’s Direct website visitors? That’s right, ourselves. We needed to justify the money our clients spent with us regardless of the TRUE value to the dealer. Allow me to be clear – I’m a huge fan of accountability…but at the end of the day, SEM visitors ARE Website visitors, and with proper analytics a dealer has the ability to track and separate out SEM visitors from their Direct or Organic visitors. But…we felt good about telling our clients they received X many leads because of us, and in the end our dealers wanted to know their ROI specific to Search.

So let’s look at a deeper-routed problem, and the real reason for this post. There are plenty vendors out there that seem to be riding coattails and molding data solely to justify their existence no matter the true value of their product. Online chat, sweepstakes providers, certain media services, talking avatars and even pop-up lead forms are all giving the dealer a report back that says “hey look what I brought you…now pay me”. Frankly some of it is just plain insulting, and below are a couple enlightening examples.

A) There’s one very large SEM provider whose sole responsibility is to manage their clients’ Paid (more…)

(much of this post is re-produced from articles found online and from Google.com)

One technique, known as black hat SEO or spamdexing, use methods such as link farms and keyword stuffing that tend to harm search engine user experience. Search engines look for sites that employ these techniques and may remove them from their indices.

The term “search engine friendly” may be used to describe web site designs, menus, content management systems, URLs, and shopping carts that are easy to optimize.

(more…)