If you’re a car enthusiast like me, the image of this car caught your eye as you went through your newsfeed. For a brief moment, it drew your attention. That is all you have in social media marketing. A fraction of a second. You only have a fraction of a second to grab the customer’s attention before they scroll right past your ad.

When I first started in this industry, I recall that dealerships used a lot of traditional advertising. Before the days of online marketing to “in-market” buyers. Dealers couldn’t narrow down the crowd to simply those who were out shopping at the time. This resulted in a large number of “emotional” customers, or people who saw the ad and thought it was time to buy because of it.

The competition has been fierce as dealers spend more and more money to generate these “in-market transactional” shoppers. Customers who come via this advertising strategy want you to give them the car and, in many circumstances, lose money on the transaction. Dealers are pressured to keep lowering their costs or risk losing these clients to a competitor down the line. How much longer will we be able to keep lowering prices?

This does not have to be the end. We don’t have to drive our industry to extinction in this current race to the bottom. “How can we do something about it?” you might wonder. The solution is straightforward. Rekindle Your Passion for Automobiles! Stop seeing at clients as transactional and only advertise to those who are transactional.

This is how I always explain Facebook Lead Gen advertisements.

IT’S LIKE A MONKEY THROWING LEADS AT YOU ALL DAY ON EVERY ROAD IN YOUR TOWN.

SIMPSOCIAL has now produced over 200,000 leads in the automotive market through Facebook Lead Gen advertisements. One thing we’ve discovered while examining the data is that the leads are predominantly “emotional buyers.” We estimate the data to be 80% emotional and 20% transactional based on our analysis.

So, now we can all just use Facebook ads to market and the problem will be solved? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no The majority of today’s dealerships are set up to work with transactional buyers. People who have already decided to buy a car and are only looking for the best deal.

These Facebook emotional buyers are an entirely other kind. To get them into the store, you’ll need some dexterity. They require us to return to liking the vehicles we sell and letting our customers know it through our phone and in-person pitches.

They require you to slow down and relearn how to sell. I’m not a taker of orders. You can’t use the same scripts and strategies with transactional customers. This new type of buyer requires a modification in your method, which isn’t really new to those of us who have been doing this for a while.

Customers still adore automobiles. They’re out there somewhere. All you have to do now is track them down and make them fall in love with the vehicle. The benefit is that your gross and bottom lines will reward you at the end of the month.

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