Reasons Why Your Dealer Website Will Never Rank In Search For Some Queries
Google ranks your dealership’s websites for the keywords it deserves, not the ones you wish to show up for. This is why no SEO company can guarantee certain rankings for some of the keywords you want to rank for. It’s the simple truth.
The usual culprit is a bad SEO strategy or none at all. If your web pages are not optimized for organic search, how do you expect them to get found in Google results?
If you have a stellar SEO company or team in-house doing the work, but you are not showing up for specific keywords or phrases, chances are your expectations are unattainable. No amount of search engine optimization will result in your website ranking for some very niche aka short words.
Using The Wrong Search Engine Optimization Strategy
Many SEO companies will create strategies to target single or double word keywords. While this produces results for most industries, it does not for dealerships. If they are familiar with the automotive marketing industry, they would never target them. Long-tail keywords are much better for a localized search engine strategy. It allows you to focus on your actual customer base located within your designated marketing area.
Making some subtle changes to your SEO strategy by focusing more on phrases specific to your dealership will improve your organic traffic’s ROI. The goal is not always to get more people to the website, it’s to get better matched consumers to the website.
Car Make and Model Search Phrases – Discovery Searches
The ultimate dream for every GM at every dealership in the United States to rank #1 for the makes and models they sell in their showrooms. Unfortunately, it’s impossible. Your OEM holds those top positions in organic results.
Ranking For Car Manufacturer Target Keywords (OEM)
Google gives dominant preference to car manufacturers for keywords specific to current models and makes. A local dealership or dealer group will never rank for niche OEM search terms unless they pay to display ads in search results.
An example of a keyword a dealership website will never rank organically for:
A local Ford dealership expecting to land in page 1 results for the keyword “Ford” or “Ford Mustang.
It won’t happen. Google will always serve the official Ford website followed by links to their social media pages, resources and other mainstream sources like Car and Driver or Wikipedia.
Now change that to a long-tail keyword and your chances go up.
An example of a long-tail OEM related keyword that dealership websites may rank for:
A local Ford dealership creating an SEO strategy to target “Ford dealership near me” or “Ford Mustang Miami for sale”.
By adding in a geo-location into the keyword target, your site has a much better chance of matching the search query and Google showing it on page 1 results.