In this day and age, search engines are utilizing AI to help them crawl and collect information from pages and blogs on what to feature on their Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). Because of this, it’s more important than ever for dealerships to keep their content fresh and engaging. Part of this is also because it shows your dealership has an active presence online, as well as is a trustworthy source of information that potential customers can shop with. As mentioned above, with fresh and relevant info easily grabbed by AI features to show customers who are searching for related queries, whether it be in traditional search engines or Large Language Models (LLMs), fresh content also helps boost traffic to your dealership website.
As such, our team at EDealer has put together this handy guide to help you keep your content fresh with actionable tips, including creating a content calendar, how to find ways to refresh and update your content, as well as making your content AI-friendly, and more! Read on, and stick around until the end for great deals on what our EDealer team can help you with when it comes to content marketing for your dealership.
Create a Content Calendar
First, before anything else, creating a content calendar is a great way to have a clear direction on where and what content you are planning to post for your dealership. And, if your content is done by a team of people, having a calendar helps let everyone know what point of the process the content is in. You can then implement what content you create based on real-world events, the behaviour of buyers, industry trends, and your previous content’s performance. This will help you stay on top of what people are actually searching for, which will make your content easier to find, which will draw more potential customers to your website. Such is the crux of content creation for dealerships: you want to create content with the exact relevant and topical answers to what users are searching for. This helps you better stand out from your competitors, and keeps a steady stream of potential customers interacting with your dealership.
Refresh and Update Your Content Beyond Just the Words on the Page
An extremely important part of keeping your dealership’s content fresh is looking not only at the words on the page, but what else can be improved! This could mean updating the design of the page or the information itself, such as pivoting from paragraph after paragraph to a more digestible bullet point presentation. Refreshing your content allows it to regain the attention of potential customers, and better match what those users are looking for, along with what search engines and LLMs like more at the moment.
To refresh your content thoroughly, take these three steps:
- Combine and consolidate pages with similar content. This will help streamline your website so that the content is easier to find and follow along with, and will not spread the same content thin across multiple pages.
- Find pages that are underperforming by looking at their data, and reworking them to fix gaps that are making them not perform like they once did. This could be anything from outdated information on the page, to a poor design.
- Make sure you’re keeping your foundational pages like your Service, Parts, and Financing Department pages updated and fresh with your latest dealership info. About and Team pages should also be updated regularly so that customers will be up-to-date with your latest dealership info.
Make Your Content AI-Friendly
You should always be writing first and foremost for your human customers and their interests, but also be mindful of the changing landscape of our online world. With more and more AI features being populated in search, not to mention the numerous LLMs available to users, content needs to cater to AI as well. Thus, when you create or refresh your content, keep in mind these AI content strategies to make your landing pages and blog posts more appealing to these AI tools and features:
Lend an AI-Appeasing Touch to Your Human Content
There’s nothing better than content that has been written by humans for humans. Similarly, there’s nothing humans and AI both like more than getting straight to the point and a clean structure. Ensure you're leading with answers and the prime information of a page, and you’re not burying it way down below. Further, take the time to listen to the questions your customers are asking while in your dealership and use it in your content to make sure you are answering the most relevant questions to potential customers in your area. Keep in mind search engines and LLMs are specifically designed to find answers, so adding FAQs to your pages can be a great way to showcase the breadth of knowledge your dealership has by putting it in a format that’s easily digestible for both AI and humans.
Utilize the Expertise of Your Staff
AI content production en masse is not a good strategy, as it just puts out content for the sake of putting out content. Your dealership is staffed with experts in their field who know the ins and outs of your brand models, service and repair, parts, and so much more. Go into detail in the information you’re putting on your website, and feature content from these experts and their point of view, with expertise you couldn’t find anywhere else on the web. Stand out from the same repeated content on the web and cement your dealership’s expertise and authority in your content by utilizing the people who make it run day in and day out. This lets potential customers get to know your specific dealership better, and establishes a trusting relationship before they even step foot into your dealership. Giving your dealership a human voice as well is incredibly important in this new AI-focused age, as it helps your dealership better differentiate itself from the thousands of similar content that AI keeps producing. It also showcases your dealership’s expertise and approachability more to both AI and potential customers.
Go for Quality, Not Quantity
As outlined above, putting out lots of content might seem like the best way to get attention to your dealership, but it can actually bog down your website. Focus on the quality of your content. While a set schedule with an editorial calendar is helpful to stay on track, there is no magic amount on the number of times or even when you should post content. Do so when you have a unique, quality piece of content to share, and not just to fill a quota for how much you want to turn out every month.
Keep an Ongoing Blog
Your website is the main point of contact for your dealership online, so keeping it fresh with your latest news and notes can be beneficial for your customers, along with having informational blogs that can draw in new customers. Feature local events your dealership is taking part in, tips for purchasing vehicles, helpful information on the features of the vehicles in your inventory, and promotional material for your dealership, such as your latest offers.
Optimize Load Times & Update Security
Take the time to test your website’s load times and mobile-friendliness to see how long it takes to access the content on your website, as poor load times can drive customers away before they’re even able to engage with your content. Further, ensure you’re consistently updating any plug-ins and security features to ensure your website is up-to-date with the latest online safety measures.
Enhance Your Google Business Profile (GBP)
The other main point of contact for your business online is its GBP, so ensure it is updated and maintained with regular new photos, posts (from your latest vehicle and service offers to new model additions and more), review responses, and filling out/utilizing every feature available on your profile. Think of your GBP as a second website, which, thus, should be consistently updated to show the latest information about your dealership to serve customer interest at the current moment in time.
Reviews online are super important, so take the time to respond to any reviews on the profile (as well as any other place you receive reviews online). People favour businesses that have a strong reputation online and, of course, these same people value not just positive reviews and recommendations, but also being present and considerate to negative reviews. Fresh reviews, and thoughtful responses, are extremely important to building trust with your customer base online and in person, and also help to maintain visibility across the web.
Keep Your Dealership’s Content Fresh from Our Team at EDealer
If you want to keep your dealership’s content fresh, but just don’t have the time, expertise or want to do so, we have a team of expert SEO & Content Strategists who are ready and waiting to do it for you! Whether that be new vehicle-focused content, content based around your fixed operations departments, or optimizing and keeping updated your Google Business Profile, we have an SEO package for you. When you’re ready to get started, just get in touch with us, and we’ll have your content fresh as a daisy in no time!
