Page 13 - sept-oct 2021

What Propane and Heating Oil

Companies Can Learn from Car

Dealerships About Digital Marketing

by Cathy Pedrayes

uel companies and auto dealerships share a spend a majority of their marketing dollars on traditional
remarkable amount in common Many are family advertising What’s more, they are not taking advan-
owned, in business for generations Both are essen- tage of many of the more sophisticated tactics that
Ftial businesses, selling products to consumers who can significantly boost response, in part because they
have many options from which to choose They need don’t understand them
to battle to retain customer loyalty and to attract new
customers Both are seeing increased consolidation Proven Marketing Strategies to Explore
and the emergence of large competitors with deeper Based on successes he observed in the auto-
pockets And both are facing radical changes in the motive industry, Lindsey shared four opportunity-making
ways their customers evaluate their options, find people marketing strategies that have proven successful
to buy from and buying decisions 1. Build mobile-first responsive websites.
It is this last point—how customers make buying As of October 2020, over 48% of all web traffic
decisions—where one of the key differences has start- came through on mobile phones In 2010 that number
ed to emerge After a slow start, auto dealerships have was less than 4%, so we’ve seen a drastic increase in a
fully embraced the power of on-line and social mar- short period of time In order to win at the digital game,
keting and shifted the vast majority of marketing dollars fuel companies need websites that are friendly for
to digital tactics Fuel delivery and service companies mobile phones, tablets and desktops In addition, com-
have been much slower to make that shift panies need to run litmus tests ensuring that the web
The recession of 2008 upended the automotive design and code is beautiful yet error free when load-
industry and accelerated its pivot to digital marketing ed by multiple operating systems Finally, they need
in order to recover Cayce Lindsey, who is now regional to build these sites bearing in mind that inevitable,
sales manager at Warm Thoughts Communications, frequent updates will surely affect how their customers
started working in the automotive industry during this interact with their websites
shift He helped dealerships throughout the country 2. Implement a robust blogging and SEO
take advantage of on-line tactics that could generate strategy.
leads and sales more effectively, at lower cost He also One key element in Lindsey’s automotive expe-
helped enhance service profit centers. rience was helping companies win the search engine
optimization (SEO) competition to rise in Google’s rank-
Familiar Territory ings Lindsey said that when working with auto dealers,
When Lindsey joined Warm Thoughts at the “the goal was to have a significant majority of website
end of 2020, he didn’t expect to see much overlap be- traffic be driven by organic search. It’s like having a
tween the two industries In speaking with propane and sales and marketing team that works 24/7 ”
heating oil companies, Lindsey finds that although they “Effective SEO is complicated, and, frankly, it
have much in common, their approaches to marketing baffles many typical business owners. Plus, Google of-
differ “The fuel industry is several years behind the au- ten changes the ground rules They don’t focus nearly
tomotive industry,” said Lindsey, specifically referencing enough effort and dollars to make this a strength But
their digital marketing strategies in many respects, it is the most effective way to ensure
He recalled that when he began working in you are ‘in the conversation’ when a consumer de-
the automotive industry nearly a decade ago, “the cides they want to buy something or make a change ”
marketing spend was split, with 70% spent on traditional For auto dealers, blogging was a big part
media and only 30% on digital ” However, when he left of their marketing strategy, as well as using effective
the auto industry in 2020, those numbers had shifted to “keyword” strategy in the copy and structure of their
an “80% spend on digital with only a 20% spend on tra- websites “Auto dealers learned that Google owns the
ditional ” In Lindsey’s experience, this shift in spend was board, and you’ve got to play by its rules if you want to
accompanied by growth, particularly in lead genera- get in the game,” he said
tion through traffic to company websites. Fuel companies, Lindsey finds, are way behind
Warm Thoughts recently conducted a bench- in this regard “Many of the propane and oil compa-
mark survey of 60 fuel companies The results revealed nies I talk to don’t even realize that their company isn’t
a split reminiscent of where the auto industry was about
eight years ago Most propane and oil companies still continued on page 14...

13 Alabama Propane Gas Association | September / October 2021