As a production company with a long track record of making very successful films for the automotive industry, we were interested in a recent report by Google emphasising the impact video content has in the car purchase decision-making process.
The report is based on the American market, so while not everything is relevant to our market, as is generally the case, online trends in the US typically reverberate across to the UK.  Called “The 5 Auto Shopping Moments Every Brand Must Own” it states a few very interesting things for automotive marketers.
– 70% of people who use YouTube as part of their car buying process were influenced by what they watched.
– Views on YouTube of test drives, features and options and walk-throughs have doubled in the past year.
Consumers are visiting showrooms less than they were before, but the dealer experience remains a key part of the purchase process – and people will generally want to take a test drive of course.  It’s just that video marketing has never been more important when it comes to selling cars – the report states that only 22% of buyers purchase a car from the first brand they searched for, which gives marketers a huge opportunity to gain potential sales.
According to the Google report there are three main points to help you with this.
Be online – This goes without saying. If you want people to look at your cars then you must have a strong online presence. Act as a customer trying to buy a new car.  Are you there every step of the way? Do you have a good mobile presence as well?
Be useful – Make it as easy as possible for your potential customers to find out information about your cars. Videos can convey a huge amount of information quickly, and in a very engaging way.
Be quick – With the advent of mobile phones we’ve become a very impatient species, expecting everything to be done as soon as possible all the time. Make sure all the information you think your customer needs about the car is available is right there on your website, easy to find and quick to load if they need to click around.

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