Mercedes-Benz is a German automobile company, an international division of the German manufacturer Daimler AG, the Daimler Group is one of the biggest producers of premium cars and the world’s biggest manufacturer of commercial vehicles with a global reach. Daimler sells its vehicles and services in nearly all the countries of the world and has production facilities in Europe, North and South America, Asia, and Africa. Mercedez-Benz is known for its best in-class luxury automobiles, buses, coaches, trucks and internal combustion engines. The headquarters of the brand is in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Mercedes-Benz’s slogan is “Das Beste oder nichts” having an english meaning i.e. “The best or nothing”. The brand has always been one of the most popular and recognized automotive brands worldwide since its origin. Now the name Mercedes-Benz is considered embodiment of tradition and innovation all over the globe. Mercedes-Benz has won numerous awards worldwide.
Business Objectives
Client Background
Mercedes-Benz of Pleasanton has sold new and used automobiles in the Tri-valley area of California for about 20 years. This family owned business has used it impressive 15 persons sales team to become fastest growing Mercedes-Benz dealership in Northern California.
Previous Lead Acquisition Tactics
Before its partnership with IMA interative, M-B of pleasanton was paying a flat fee for its leads. The dealership would pay $400 for the contact information of someone interested in buying a new car. The fee represented a substantial chunk(20%-25%) on net margin taken on car sale. Looking to improve its profit, the dealership approached IMA interactive to lower its high customer acquisition cost. IMA is a full service digital marketing agency that specializes in Pay per click marketing, content creation, digital strategy and Search Engine Optimization.
Strategy adopted
Pay-per-click advertising is a well targeted and super effective medium to reach to potential customers who have already shown interest in your service/product. IMA interactive has successfully implemented Pay per click marketing to drive more leads for its clients, and also identified Mercedes-Benz of Pleasanton as a great candidate for Pay per clik advertising. Following are the tactics used by IMA interactive with Mercedes-Benz of Pleasanton’s PPC campaigns:
Extensive keyword sourcing: A large keyword portfolio creates a big possibility for a business to target more potential customers for less amount of money. IMA created a huge list of about 4000 keywords for the Mercedes-Benz Pleasanton campaign. These keywords both the more common phrases and the valuable tail keywords.
Customized landing pages: IMA was able to effectively target visitors by designing landing pages that incorporated customized messages and videos. These landing pages played the key role in improving the conversion rate.
Creative A-B test: In its text ads displayed on the Search Engines, IMA continuously tested the creative messaging . This practice increased the Pay per click campaign’s click through rate, a major metric to rate any PPC campaign success.
Large paid search network coverage: IMA displayed MBP’s ads on Google, Yahoo, and Bing, these all search networks cover 95% of all the internet search traffic, in order to reach as many customers as possible.
Call tracking: IMA was able to record all incoming phone calls that came from PPC advertisements, with the help of CallSource. This information was valuable for determining which calls were legitimate sales leads for auditing the effectiveness of the phone operators.
Web lead tracking: A form for the users was contained in all the landing pages to inquire about purchasing a new or used automobile. when this was submitted, Mercedes-benz of Pleasanton gained the potential customer’s contact information with more relevant information.
Results achieved
IMA interactive’s Pay per click marketing produces great results for Mercedes Benz of Pleasanton. Acquisition cost was plummeted and qualified leads was poured in. During the case study period spanned from August 2010 to October 2010, IMA interactive Pay per click campaigns generated 103 qualified sales leads, thus all this ultimately dropped Mercedes Benz of Pleasanton’s cost per lead from $400 to $53. Mercedes Benz of Pleasanton would have paid $41,200 for 103 leads under its previous method to generate leads. But after dealership with IMA interactive, the company saved over $35,000 in those three months. This translates to a saving of over $140,000 annually.
Learnings
Pay per click marketing’s best practices can have a great impact on the success of a paid search campaign, and should not be overlooked, either during the planning stage or during the actual management of the account. The easiest and most common way to examine which aspects of your Pay per click campaign require more attention is to experience more and more. Pay per click marketing is a relatively cheaper technique and any one can rank its site higher easily. This whole thing is pretty creative and effective use of search. Both the choice of keywords inventory and the ad variation should be paid maximum attention. The two most important features of Google AdWords are keywords and ad creativity that have maximum impact on the users.
Image credits: orioncreative.com, monkeyfishmarketing.com, webtalentmarketing.com
