The AWA review team recently had the opportunity to get a firsthand look at the upcoming TK Carsites technology roadmap as well as some of the new features that will be released in Q1 of 2011. Their new platform will give dealers unlimited design and layout choices, which seems to be a direction that the industry is heading. That said, their current platform was impressive.

It is exciting to see the wave of change that will be coming to automotive websites in 2011 and TK Carsites is part of that Tsunami.

TK Carsites was a dual award winner in the 2009 ASMA Awards and so we were very interested to see how they have improved on their website platform. This article is not a full review of their technology however TK CarSites will be evaluated in the 2010 AWA Whitepaper that will be released on October 12, 2010 when the award winners for Search Marketing, Design and Technology are announced.

Readers of my blog know that in recent weeks the concept of POD Score™ has been developed to place score on the control a dealer has on Google Page One for a search on their name. This score was developed to help car dealers understand the importance of managing Page One results since it impacts all car dealer advertising investments.

We had a chance to see the latest updates and strategies on the TK CarSites Power of Five technology which gives car dealers a primary website and four additional microsites. These microsites can be created to increase fixed ops revenue, used car sales, car financing, or any profit center the dealer wants targeted. Car dealers using the Power of Five technology control more Google Page One listings because all sites are also optimized for the dealer’s name.

Power of Five in Action

A popular example of the Power of Five in action is to conduct a search for “Marlboro Nissan” in Google. In addition to their main TK website appearing one Page One which is www.marlbornissan.com, you can also see other TK sites that include www.nissan-service.net, www.nissancarsmass.com, and www.usednissanboston.com. The control of Page One is shown below in red:

TK Carsites is not the first to utilize microsites for car dealers but they are the only vendor we reviewed this year that has a pre-packaged microsite solution offered as a standard marketing strategy for car dealers. In this example, Marlboro Nissan controls Google Page One with the remaining spots being taken up by the social media accounts, blogs, and their Dealerrater page that show hundreds of positive reviews.

In the past year TK Carsites has continued to update their inventory listing module which is search engine friendly. Years ago TK has a framed inventory solution that was not search engine friendly so for dealers that have not looked at their technology recently, there has been many changes worthy of a second look.

One of the other things that impressed our team was their move away from custom flash sites which has two benefits. One, flash technology is not support on all mobile devices and secondly, it has lowered the costs of TK Carsites products to car dealers. According to TK, their websites which once had a premium for custom flash programming, are now streamlined to give dealers flexibility of design and a much lower cost.

Keyword Targeted Home Page Banners

Another feature that we liked on the TK Carsites home page was the ability to have customer banners based on what the consumer searched. For example, if a consumer typed into Google “2010 Altima Boston” and arrives on a TK website, the home page banner can show the dealer’s current Altima sales promotion or lease payment. According to TK, this has increased page views and lead conversion by taking consumers right to the offer page and inventory listings.

As we reviewed a number of TK CarSites examples, we found that the navigation was clean and the quote forms required minimal data from a consumer. Studies by PCG Digital Marketing has shown that putting too many fields on quote forms reduces conversion so we liked the simplicity of their website designs and their efficient use of space.

TK Carsites has a reputation of building websites that leverage the power of Automotive SEO strategies to generate unparalleled search visibility . From what we have seen with their current platform, anyone looking to upgrade their Page One visibility should keep TK Carsites on their short list of vendors to call.

Once the industry darling of automotive websites, back when car dealers raced to purchase Flash based websites, Dealerskins has had a challenge recently re-energizing their brand.  In fact you might say that the company has been laying low for the past year and I think I understand why.

Over the past two years I have witnessed the industry move away from 100% Flash websites and this has impacted Dealerskins’ cutting edge moniker.

In the early days of Flash based websites, the Adobe technology was a hindrance for obtaining strong organic search visibility.  In effect, the original Dealerskins Flash websites were not easily optimized using proven Automotive SEO strategies.

In the past, my reviews of the Dealerskins platform from an SEO perspective have not been flattering to say the least.

Today, I will be the first to raise a toast to the website “Phoenix” that has risen with renewed focus that will surprise its former critics.  This bird is hungry and hunting!  Existing Dealerskins clients are in for a nice surprise and according to company executives; Dealerskins has a great new story to tell!

This is not a full review of the Dealerskins SEO architecture and search marketing strengths of the new platform but a peak at what is coming.  The latest technology from Dealerskins will be included in the 2010 Automotive Website Awards, which will be presented on Tuesday, October 12, 2010 at 8:00 am at the Mirage Hotel.

Moving Towards A Primary HTML Platform

The first point to acknowledge is Dealerskins’ willingness to rebuild their CMS platform and technology while keeping their existing customers in business and thriving.   That is not an easy task! The platform that we reviewed in August is a bridge to their full Content Management System (CMS) release that will be announced in the coming months.

The development team at Dealerskins should be congratulated. Their current hybrid Flash and HTML platform actually performed better in our search marketing architecture analysis this year than many of their peers.  In short, this is NOT your parent’s Oldsmobile.

Automotive Inventory Optimization

The current Dealerskins website technology fixed the biggest complaint that I had in the past; their inventory module was practically invisible to the search engines and not in conformance with my SEO best practices.

The new Dealerskins platform has optimized website pages for every car in inventory with unique page titles and META descriptions for each car.  I also liked their breadcrumb menu on each inventory page shown below:

You can see an example of their new inventory page by visiting this link for a 2009 Volkswagen Routan.  The final version of their optimized inventory technology will be unveiled in their next CMS release but the current version is performing very well in our testing.  I would like to see more car details integrated into the inventory URL string.

In an interesting balancing act, the Dealerskins design team kept the Flash navigation menus to add some sizzle while adding HTML navigation links and editable text areas on key website pages.   In the near future, the Dealerskins homepage will be 100% Flash free which will resolve any complaints of operating systems that are not Flash friendly.

The addition of HTML content pages will also increase the search visibility for existing Dealerskins customers.  According to the company, approximately 50% of their existing customers have been converted to the new platform.

Website Administrative Tools Lagging For Content

The administrative tools for car dealers do not currently allow dealers to add their own content pages on the fly.  A call to customer support will create as many blank pages that a dealer needs and then a dealer can add or edit content.    In the final version of the platform, more robust content editing tools and a blog are scheduled to be included.  As car dealer focus more on content writing in 2011, a robust content publishing platform will be a requirement for success.

The Dealerskins platform includes their own analytics technology that provides an independent audit for car dealers who have hired third party companies to run their Adwords or SEO campaigns. Their development team addressed a common concern of dealers who are paying thousands of dollars a month only to trust their vendors are being truthful about traffic, clicks and lead reports they send.

Marketing Intelligence and SEO Ranking Tools

The Dealerskins team also demonstrated some of their impressive digital marketing tools which included built-in SEO ranking reports and something that dealers should look at called the “Psychic Sales Tool” (PST).   The tool shows dealers all the pages and cars that the consumer visited on the Dealerskins website prior to submitting a lead.  PST gives the dealer more information about any shopper before they contact them.

HTML 5 Mobile Sites

Dealerskins has also created attractive mobile websites that are based on the new HTML 5 standard.   You can see their slick mobile technology by visiting www.gentiliniford.com from your iPhone.  The mobile interface is one of the best that I have seen and very fast.

The Silence Is Broken

The previous silence from Dealerskins?  They were hard at work surveying their customers and getting their new release out the door to customers.

Car dealers using the old Dealerskins platform are encouraged to give their account manager a call and see about the upgrade path to this more powerful website technology.

Hats off to Dealerskins for moving to address the most immediate needs of their user base.  According to the Dealerskins team more features and enhancements are coming, so listen up when your Dealerskins representative calls.   SEO pundits will not have the DS dog to kick anymore!

The PCG Digital Marketing team was given the opportunity to see the latest features and functionality of the VinSolutions platform and we were impressed with the breadth and depth of the integration they have achieved over the past year.  In 2009 VinSolutions was recognized as one of nine companies to receive the 2009 ASMA Award for Industry Leadership.

This article is not a full review of the latest VinSolutions platform but in just a few weeks the 2010 Automotive Website Awards will be presented along with our 150+ page report on the search marketing strengths of 45 website platforms.  The awards ceremony is scheduled for October 12, 2010 at 8:00 am.  The awards will be presented at the Mirage Hotel in  Las Vegas at an industry breakfast hosted by PCG Digital Marketing.

The VinSolutions Website Platform

VinSolutions is a juggernaut; adding new functionality to their platform at a blinding pace to stay ahead of the competition.  The demonstration that we sat through showed our team just how busy VinSolutions developers have been over the past year.

The first thing that hit our team was the home page design and the ability to configure the page to meet the dealer’s marketing objectives.  We liked the way the home page was divided into regions and how simple it was for the dealer to change the home page banner and calls to action.

Since the majority of organic searches deliver consumers to the home page, the VinSolutions design templates seek to direct traffic to the right place with the least amount of clicks.   The home page quick links felt “just right” to satisfy the most common search tasks that consumers have when shopping for a car.

Search Marketing Architecture

Since the 2010 Automotive Website Awards (AWA) will focus on design, technology, and search marketing, we took extra time to delve into the foundations of our work which is the Automotive SEO architecture of the website.  We were pleased to see strong URL designs for all pages on their website and their inventory detail pages were some of the best that we have reviewed this year.  Hats off to the VinSolutions design team.

One of the most exciting developments to witness was how each car detail page was targeting up to three local cities.  We are a firm believer that car dealership websites need to be optimized for the key towns in their PMA.

The VinSolutions inventory module was ahead of its peers in achieving an automated solution for targeting multiple local communities for search.  We also liked the clean design of the car detail pages which are the primary pages visited by ready to buy consumers.

Where VinSolutions broke new ground was to integrate customer sales and service data to automatically create website pages optimized for the town where the customer lives.

This was a very impressive content feature and has powerful potential for content publishing.  Without any extra effort from the dealer, content pages can be created that target popular geo-based keywords for sales and service for cities that surround the dealership.

VinSolutions Mobile Integration

VinSolutions also demonstrated an attractive mobile application, which was easy to navigate, and integrated with their backend CRM tools.   The VinSolutions development team has been hard at work to create a seamless consumer shopping experience, whether they choose to access a dealers website via their mobile device or desktop computer.

One of the strongest aspects of the VinSolutions digital marketing platform is that it is a complete end-to-end software suite.   VinSolutions provides software and technology that starts with the dealer’s ability to photograph their inventory and load it in real-time all the way through the lead management, sales, and customer service.

VinSolutions Summary

VinSolutions is a comprehensive website platform that stands alone in its ability to deliver an integrated digital marketing solution for car dealers. Automotive retailers who seek the simplicity of having a single point of contact for their digital marketing needs will find that VinSolutions has the potential to make them smile.