For Auto CMOs: 3 Recommendations to Grow Your Sales in Today’s Digital World

As a CMO, you know that digital is transforming marketing. As a graduate student at Northwestern University in the Medill School of Journalism's Integrated Marketing Communications program with an interest in digital marketing, I have found two articles highlighting the digital trends in the automotive industry.

The first article, titled “10 Digital Marketing Trends and Innovations For 2019” by Alex Membrillo published in Cardinal summarizes some coming trends and innovations for 2019. In addition to AI and AR/VR that marketers may be familiar with, other technologies and tools such as Email and Marketing Automation, Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) and Progressive Web Apps (PWA) are also mentioned. The article also includes the benefits and importance of these innovations and why marketers should apply them into their digital marketing portfolio.

Image from Urjja Digital Transformation in the Automotive Industry

The second article, written by Chanell Turner and titled, “Five Digital Marketing Stats Dealers Should Focus On”, from CBTNews narrows digital marketing to the automotive industry. In this article, Turner gives five statistical facts, for example, “forty-two percent of car buyers search inventory on a dealership website as a result of watching online video”. Turner hopes to get automotive marketers started to understand the landscape and develop a digital marketing strategy by looking at these statistics.

Drawing on these two articles and my experience as a graduate student of Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University, I come up with three recommendations that may help you grow more sales in today’s digital world.

l   Be everywhere: You should create a seamless omni-channel experience - online, offline and everywhere in between at every stage of the automotive consumer journey.

l   Be personalized. Personalization is the key in making customers spend more and it can be applicable to all your marketing efforts.

l   Embrace the power of videos. Video is a powerful marketing tool that can bring more immersive scenes to shoppers, and thus prompt them to take real-world actions.

Next time when you are thinking about developing your digital marketing strategy, remember these three recommendations as a way to grow your sales in this changing digital world. Take these digital marketing trends seriously, otherwise you will get left behind. 

My name is Jane Chen and I am currently a graduate student at Northwestern University studying Integrated Marketing Communications from the Medill School of Journalism. I am graduating in December 2019, and looking for full-time employment in digital marketing and data analytics. Feel free to reach out or connect with me at LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram.