Dealer Brand Consistency & The Guys Making it Happen

In this episode of Word on the Street, we sit down with Justin and Ben from Agile Creative Solutions, a boutique digital marketing agency transforming how dealerships approach branding and marketing. With decades of experience as dealership marketing directors, Justin and Ben share their expertise on building consistent messaging, leveraging digital and traditional strategies, and addressing key industry challenges like used car acquisition and staffing. Tune in for actionable insights and fresh ideas to elevate your dealership's marketing game in 2024!

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Transcript

[Andrew]

Are you interested in learning from a couple of guys who were marketing directors at dealerships for about twenty years before launching a firm that is becoming best known for helping dealerships with consistency across platforms, across marketing messages and dialing in their brand? you're in the right place. That's what you wanna hear because I've got Justin and Ben from Agile Creative Solutions who I came across by reputation. A couple of dealerships, groups that I worked with that had really sharp branding that was really consistent across all their stores pointed to these guys as their secret to keeping the consistency and staying on top a lot of their marketing initiatives. So without any further ado, Justin and Ben with Agile Creative Solutions.

[Andrew]

Well, Justin and Ben, I'm happy to have you both here. We started to do this before we started recording, but could you guys do just maybe like a quick intro for how you guys started Agile and where you guys met? 

[Ben]

Sure. Go ahead, Justin. I'll let you start us off here. 

[Justin]

Yeah, so Ben and I have been working together now for almost twenty years. We got our start in the automotive industry back in two thousand four, two thousand and five at a large, successful Toyota dealership outside of Boston. We formed our first digital marketing agency in twenty eleven. That was a true dealer to dealer digital marketing agency, grew that business and then ultimately launched Agile Creative Solutions, a boutique digital marketing agency in twenty twenty one. 

[Andrew]

Very cool. And, and what, like what put you guys on my radar is like, and, and our line of work, kind of like you guys, we've had an opportunity to talk with countless dealers, like thousands of dealerships about their pain points and what can we do to be creative, to help them from our end. And I'm always asking them, like, what are you guys doing right now? That's working really well. Like what's helping solve some of these problems? What have you guys tested out that didn't work well? What are some other solutions or vendors or products that have been helpful? And then like, if you weren't kind of like allocating your energy and time over here and money over here, what would you try to check out? What would, what would you think would be interesting? And Chris few second, you know, another dealer, like a couple of people who I listened to and I talked with for a while, who I really started to grow a lot of respect for the way that they look at their business and look at their industry mentioned you guys. And I'm like, Okay. Can, can you bridge an introduction and just hear, like, I'd love to hear what they're up to and what he, what Chris had said is like, no, we've got these, we've got these guys. They're not huge, but they're really good. Like they're really specific and they've nailed our brand across the board and consistency, um, with what we're doing in an industry where there's a lot of inconsistencies and like puzzle pieces that don't fit together. Um, Does that feel accurate? Does that feel like an accurate description of kind of where you guys have honed out your niche? 

[Ben]

I think so. Yeah. I mean, really, in many instances, we really like to see ourselves as the marketing arm of our dealership clients. And it's particularly true for Village Automotive Group outside of Boston. Chris Fosick is the director of sales for them, as you just noted. So we've been partnered with Village for many years. And even just for example, this was last week, one of their stores, Honda Village, celebrated its fiftieth anniversary. And we were in attendance of that celebration event, celebrating with them, conversing with them. I think we were the only kind of partner, vendor partner that was there as part of that event, may have been the only one invited to it. But really, we see ourselves as an extension of, of our dealership clients. Um, maybe it sounds a little bit cliche, but it's genuinely the truth. And so having that relationship and yeah, really understanding who they are as a dealership, uh, how they want to position themselves, how they wish to brand themselves, really who they are, what makes them tick, um, and how they should position themselves, present themselves to their clients and customer base. Um, yeah, that's really what we aim to do and really where we feel we excel for sure. 

[Andrew]

And it's tricky. Like it's tricky to keep that level of understanding of customers as you methodically grow and not just ramp up a zillion dealers and then become like commoditized cheap cost per click. That's been my experience. It's like, okay, at some point you're going to start losing that human touch. And just like, it sounds like being a little ingrained in the culture of the group where you know about the fiftieth anniversary even. Much less be there much less help, you know, cater some marketing efforts around it and, you know, go, go be onsite and, and get creative with some ideas to, to make it meaningful for their customers. But, um, it sounds like, so like with getting all that creative running, getting the marketing arm, where are you guys finding like your time is best spent with your dealers? Like what, what areas? 

[Justin]

I mean, I think it's having conversations with them and having the partnership be collaborative. So, you know, with the business, we've intentionally kept it on the smaller side. So it can be very hands-on and very boutique. And I think, you know, the best partnerships that we have are with those clients that are most engaged. So being able to collaborate with them and really understand what's important on a monthly basis and really be able to kind of help them tell their story. So it's not just all about price, price, price. 

[Andrew]

Yeah. Is there something right now that you're hearing from a lot of the dealers that's a pain point for them that they're struggling with? 

[Ben]

I mean, I think on an operational standpoint, sales specifically, used car acquisition kind of has been and maybe continues to be. I think for most brands, kind of, you know, new car inventory, those inventory levels going back a year, year and a half, two years, right? And the inventory shortage, that's kind of worked its way out, resolved itself in most instances. So I think used car acquisition continues to be a challenge in that market too is very dynamic. That sort of price sensitivity there, acquisition costs versus the retail pricing margins that are there. I think generally speaking, you're kind of seeing a little bit of a contraction with margins, both on new and used sales, but also then making sure that service and fixed operations that when and where you can, margins are healthy while at the same time still providing really good value to customers. So I think that's kind of where we see some of the challenges and issues operationally. I think also staffing, when I was noting, say, fixed ops, I think hiring, sourcing, hiring, finding quality technicians and staff in general, but specifically technicians within service base, service drives, continues to be a challenge. I know that you, Andrew, are working closely with Justin and one of our other clients on a campaign to address that and are doing quite well there. So those are two kind of challenges that I see kind of top of mind 

[Andrew]

yeah and it's tricky like it's it's interesting too like as you were just mentioning like you know a lot of time having instructive consultative conversations with dealers but also having it revolved around strategy and share clicks and visibility and you know view through attribution and whatever digital marketing can look at but it's like what meaningful things can the marketers do to help with what's going on at the dealership? So like right now, like I've heard a handful of dealers have issues with tech recruiting and it's kind of like hurting their CSI score. It's hurting their customer loyalty rate of people purchasing and ending up coming back in for services because it takes two weeks or two months to schedule services. And so it's like, okay, this is kind of cool. Here's an opportunity for like, your team and my team to like be able to to put our heads together and say here's a real problem what can we do from our end to like be creative to help out okay let's buy data of people who went to uh trade school or let's target other dealerships and let's do lead generation or let's try to flow people through the website where they can go through the application and is it working okay now let's we're getting the traffic, but it's not converting. Can we spiff it with a signup bonus? And, you know, I think this is cool. This is where it moves marketing back to what, you know, marketing has always been. And it's not just clicks, you know, it's not just let's get the cheapest VDP views, but it's like, let's actually talk about who we're going to market to, what we're going to say, how we're going to track them. Now it's making an impact on our loyalty. Now it's making an impact on our customer scores. And it's a lot more nuanced than, you know, just being a provider that's getting cheap VDP views. Is there something else that you're finding with hiring that's been helping at all from what you guys are doing? 

[Justin]

Uh, you're saying for our dealer clients, other, well, you know, I think the video content that we put together for Lexus of Watertown was, um, impactful and, you know, getting those folks that have worked there for a long time. Um, even folks that haven't been there for a long time, maybe just a few years. talk about their experience working at the store having that live on the website you know we always say with video creation it doesn't have to be a hollywood production right the authenticity is is key so You know, the dealership shot three or four videos, sent those over. We took a stab at editing them. They live on the careers page. Your team pulled out some sound bites as well. So in the way that those were sort of baked into the ad itself, I thought was really clever. So I think anytime you can use video to kind of tell your story and promote your message, it's a good thing. 

[Ben]

Yeah, and this maybe applies a little bit less to, say, service technicians, in part because of the technical expertise required there. But for a number of other positions, in many instances, we've encouraged our dealerships to consider their own customer base as a source for potential job applicants and employees. And so in a number of instances, we've campaigned and targeted the customer base to let them know that the dealership is hiring for various positions. Yeah, that has worked really well and hires have come as a result of that. So there's kind of one little tip there maybe for some of the dealers that are listening here. Yeah, consider your own customer base as a potential source of job applicants. They know you, love you, have done business with you. Perhaps they'd like to work for you. 

[Ash]

That's genius. I love it. Yeah. 

[Andrew]

And something that I've experimented with too is like, let's get... the right audience, whether it's the customers or people that went to these schools, and then maybe their network would be a good fit. So let's try to prompt them with, do you know somebody who's looking for a new service tech position? Or do you know somebody who would be a great fit for XYZ? So hopefully, if you're not exactly the right person, somebody in your orbit might be. And then you can share that message or you can start helping us market that role for us. Go ahead, Justin.

[Justin]

I just wanted to add to what Ben was saying. It's not on the digital front, but Um, you know, often it's, it's forgotten is it's good at the in-store opportunities. So, you know, um, there's quite a bit of in-store print that, that we do, even though we're a digital agency where there's a particular program or there's an incentive and you have a lot of foot traffic coming in for service and the showroom. So don't forget to, to make use of, of your brick and mortar as well, um, to, to promote, you know, those sort of career opportunities or special offers or why buy message, et cetera. 

[Andrew]

Yeah. I've seen some dealers that we've worked with do like some really cool stuff with print, like with print, whether it's direct mail or especially like with customers coming through the service department where they have like some full-time people that are putting the, the vehicle offers on their dashboard in a very elegant way of thank you for coming by for services. We're really interested in buying your vehicle. Here's what we think it's worth. And then people do a U-turn sometimes and just come back in and start the process over of buying a new vehicle. They get another trade in and it kind of like starts with somebody like you guys, like coming in and helping, you know, bring that idea to the table and then bring, bringing it to fruition. Cause sure. It's easy to just sit at home and behind your computers do digital stuff, but there's a lot of in-store stuff that, um, is a little bit more gorilla that works. That is easily overlooked, I think. 

[Justin]

Yeah. I'd say with Village Automotive, that's one thing that they also do with all their events is all the stores have easels. There's like this gator board style poster, hardback poster. So exactly what you see on the website matches the in-store experience. You get that consistency, that continuity from online to in-store. They have tabletop displays. for kind of all the events that they do. And it's really smart, you know, so that customer, regardless of where they saw the event, it's consistent each and every time. 

[Ben]

Yeah. As a kind of piggybacking on what you're noting here, Justin, again, continuation with village and we have, we have many more clients than just village, but so far it's, it's been maybe the group to discuss here, but we were talking with their McLaren store the other day and talking about, right, maybe some, within the service drive used car acquisition how do we maybe present this and you're discussing digital strategies but then yeah looking at print because as we were talking and i think personally in the case of kind of the the ultra luxury um how many times have you purchased some sort of real luxury good where it's very the item you get and then the fit and finish the packaging around it there's something very tactile there there's a tangible thing you're looking at to help you know this is a very different item from anything else you could have purchased. And it's virtually impossible to kind of do that digitally, right? You want to be able to tangibly hold something. So we were talking about, right, if we're to design some sort of kind of tangible print piece or whatever it might be, what does that look like? What does that feel like to present a true kind of ultra luxury that yeah, with pixels, you just can't quite do. So, um, Looking at kind of all things digital and then, and then traditional as well. And having that right sort of strategy and mix and understanding, right. What is the message? What's the audience and how do we tailor accordingly? 

[Andrew]

And yeah, like when you're, so when you're talking about like going after the customer base of the dealership, what's like, what I like is it's like, we're not introducing the dealership. You already, they already know you, they've already purchased from you before. Like what are some things that you guys are doing? Like what channels are you guys using to get back in front of them? 

[Justin]

Uh, you're saying in terms of just all, all marketing or email, email, direct mail. Yeah, I don't think we're not really doing any direct mail. I think we've maybe designed to help clients. Again, it's about the consistency and the continuity, right? So we might help with a direct mail piece or personalize it. There's a dealer group in New Jersey. the prestige collection and they have two Volvo stores, Polestar, Lincoln, and they just developed an offsite service center. They wanted to develop a why service message. They work with Epsilon. Epsilon needed help to like personalize that direct mail piece. So we assisted in that way. But yeah, through email marketing, I mean again, ensuring that the offers that are online, are matched identically in the email campaign. The email is fully responsive, looks great in every mail client, it gets delivered. So we're doing a lot of testing there, typically using the dealership CRM to campaign those audiences. And then we work quite a bit with the dealerships SEM provider from like a consultative standpoint to make sure the ad copy promotes the event for that month. The lease offers are represented as headlines. and those model specific ad groups. So again, that consistency everywhere with that promotion and that message. 

[Andrew]

I wish that there was more dealerships that had people like you guys that were kind of helping grease things that way of making sure that the right hand knows what the left hand is doing, you know, because it's easy for each one to be in a little silo. And then there's different reports that look wildly different that a dealer is like, I guess like this is what our competitor did. They use this vendor and they beat us last month. So now we're doing like but just to be like, OK, here's from this not long conversation, but from a from a eleven minute conversation with the dealership. Here's what it sounds like is on your radar this month with Black Friday coming up. and with the market conditions, with your inventory levels, here's some things I want to do, some initiatives. Let me make sure that the vendors have this on their radar. And here's the font and the design stuff, just so it looks the same. So if we're going after our customer base, it's like, it looks the same in your newsfeed, in your stories, in your inbox, in your mailbox, in your SMS, to where it's like, okay, if... There's one thing that they know about us this month. It's that we're doing a vehicle buyback push and a Black Friday discount on all remaining twenty twenty fours. And it's like I think it's so possible, but it's really challenging for a dealer to be able to execute that and keep that consistency between vendors. And I like that. That's like one thing when I first started talking with you guys, I'm like, dang, this is, this is it. Like this is the level of service that I think a lot of vendors can be able to provide if they start working together. 

[Ben]

For sure. Yeah. That sort of consistency and coordinated approach. And I think, I think some dealerships, a lot of dealerships maybe, you know, understand that, but in terms of kind of executing and implementing, and I think what can happen in maybe some instances is they might partner with a provider who says, I can do all of that, or we do offer all of those services. And so you just need to let us know that thrust or whatever is that focus and we'll kind of take care of it from there with all of these channels. Um, but, but it's, no one can be the best at, at every single thing as, as we well know. And so we'd like to be able to, have our dealer clients encourage them to consider folks like yourself other providers who have a real core competency at a particular service or here's what we do or maybe the few things we do and we do them exceptionally well and then piecing all of those providers together and then being yeah for the dealership kind of responsible for making sure all of those vendors are aware of what is the thrust what is the focus where should they direct their efforts and then let them really kind of you know, leverage their expertise and maximize the results there from that. So that I think, you know, really encouraging dealerships to not think about to gain sort of consistency and cohesive messaging, the need to use a single provider. In fact, it's using providers who are really experts in their given field. And then, you know, setting yourself up either internally or with a, you know, consultancy or an agency like ourselves who can then, ensure that those vendors are all on the same page. That's really what we recommend and suggest dealers do versus, let me just get that one vendor who says they can do everything for me. Andrew, are you there? 

[Ash]

I think he's frozen, but no, I totally love that. When I was at Germain, we worked with a marketing agency similar to you guys and everything was so cohesive and on brand down to the font. So I love that. Keeping that all together is so hard for so many people because they just don't have all those pieces in place. to be able to pull those levers and say, here, this is what we need. And, you know, the agency is going to do it and coordinate with all the other vendors. 

[Ben]

Yeah, it is a challenge for sure. And, you know, you guys at Germain were familiar with Shaun, with NIFF. So I think it's with NCM now, but Pryor was, you know, there with you at Germain and know just, yeah, what sort of operation and group you guys are, what Germain is. Jermaine was fortunate to have you and Niff there. So and yeah, not all dealerships, particularly, you know, independent, you know, smaller ones, or maybe one or two stores, challenging to structurally feel like they can accomplish that. But we're here to say you absolutely can. And it's really in your best interest, too. So looks like maybe Andrew is back here. 

[Andrew]

There's a house under construction a couple of doors down from me and I don't know what just happened, but I'm on a, I'm on whatever. I'm on a hotspot now. Do I look okay? As far as like the, okay. I feel good. Yeah. Excellent. Sorry about that. But yeah. Like you, I cut out when you were just talking about just getting, you know, the brand to have a consistency and, and, Yeah, not, you know, you can go with a one-stop shop where it could, you know, oftentimes end up pretty cookie cutter and a lack of creativity versus having like somebody like you that can help kind of control the strategy and control the dials working with like specialists. 

[Ben]

Yeah, in the twenty plus years that Jess and I have been doing this, the best providers we've come across, wish to partner with, recommend, et cetera, are, you know, folks like yourself that really have a core expertise in one or two areas and just are able to really deliver in that, in that, in that given field and, you know, combining all of those providers together and then amplifying the results. 

[Andrew]

So what, is there anything specific on your radar, like moving into next year, going towards  NADA, changing an administration, anything that's popped up that that's kind of catching your dealer's attention or your attention? 

[Justin]

I mean, I think that, you know, the big thing is AI and having AI, you know, handle your incoming sales calls and service calls and assist your dealerships with communicating with their customers. It's kind of funny, even some of the sales managers at some of the dealerships are, you know, you can tell like they're using AI when they communicate with me and we're just emailing about offers, but like, you know, It's like clearly AI wrote this and you're talking to the dealer principal and they're like, why are they using AI to communicate with you? But there's that, and there's a product. Our friend Todd Smith has developed this company Core AI, Q-O-R-E-A-I. And we were looking at that recently. I thought that was very interesting. where he's able to kind of pull all of your customer data within his dashboard using AI. And I think he also uses Experian as well to group these folks. You can ask certain questions of the data, put those folks in a certain bucket, campaign them through email, through social, through text or what have you. That was pretty interesting. So I think like kind of all things AI as it continues to develop on a daily or minute, maybe minute by minute basis.

[Andrew]

That, okay, that's, I think that is like the coolest application of AI right now in our business. It's not necessarily like coming up with ad copy and, you know, there's some automation and machine learning for deploying ad campaigns, but the actual application to help dealers and especially the consultative vendors that are working with the dealers find and hone in on information quicker. and be able to have a further downstream conversation with dealers based on AI's interpretation of data. And it's Experian data, it's what people are driving, credit scores in their market, sizes of audiences. And here's a suggestion to have that conversation with the dealer, but also how to deploy things on top of what you're reading. What was the name of that company? 

[Justin]

There's core AI Q O R E AI and Todd Smith, I believe is the founder. Um, and so Todd's Todd's a great guy. We met him years ago. Um, he used to run active engage, um, you know, the chat text service that was many years ago, but, uh, he's developed this product and we have a client in, um, Southern California that we work with one of the stores, they have multiple stores as part of the group, but they're going to be rolling out for all of their stores. I believe the beginning of the year core AI. And the thing is though, and we're actually working with Todd actively on this, you know, the client wants to generate an email campaign. It's like, what do they do then or there? Because that particular company, They're not marketers, they're helping you with the data to segment the data, but then you need to find an agency to help, you know, create the email campaign or the message behind it. So we're kind of actively working with him on that as well, building a library of templates. But it's a very, very cool product. 

[Ben]

Yeah, but it was interesting, as you're noting, yeah, using, you know, so Todd's using AI to really be able to crunch that data and find, you know, the right type of audience, help the dealership find the right type of audience to campaign to. But then when it comes to the message, which is kind of where maybe in some instances, right, you kind of think maybe using AI in terms of crafting that sort of message, and it almost in some ways feel logical to use AI to define the audience and now, you know, help you shape the message. But Todd said, no, you know, I really still want someone like yourself, Ben and Justin, to help with the messaging that's there. So kind of using AI selectively and in a way that, yeah, makes sense, but still understanding the sort of messaging and still that sort of kind of human-to-human type communication and messaging and having us help him craft that. When we thought about it further, it's like, yeah, that does make a lot of sense, Todd. So, yeah, we look forward, as Justin's noting, to helping him kind of continue to develop his products. 

[Andrew]

Okay. I'm super fascinated about like this area that you guys are talking about and what, what he's working on. Cause it's not too dissimilar from, from the platform that we've developed and from the same, you know, CDPs that a lot of other companies have started developing, but, um, you know, being able to have like a simple prompt that overlays all the data. So you can simply say, um, pull up all my customers who still live in my city who purchased from me, who aren't doing services, you know, and now here's a list of seven thousand people. And so that's not super expensive for us to market to on display or on social or maybe even like direct, you know, like, but for it to be able to pop that up quickly and deploy things and then like, you know, something I'm finding on like the messaging side and the the creative aspect of whether it's like design or especially like copywriting, but like what's his name? Scott Meyer. He used to own nine clouds. That was like a marketing agency and automotive. He got out and now all he does is AI like trying to make it more accessible for people. And he's got a cool approach where like his analogy is like the prompting is just like a sandwich. Where the bread is the AI and then the, or the, the meat in the middle is the AI and the bread is you, where you're coming up with a good prompt. saying, here's what you are. Here's what I'm trying to find out. Ask me questions until you feel comfortable about giving me this answer. And then the machine does the stuff, but then at the bottom, you're the bread again, where you're editing. So you still go in and you make sure like that could give you jar jar you in an eye, a direction for an idea for some ad copy or creative or like a fun, uh, way to do a buyback event at the dealership. that came up with ideas for posters and ideas for table displays and handouts and things you put in vehicles at the service department. But you just kind of take that and use that as gearing some ideas. I kind of like the idea of just like, you know, where to apply you as the human to the AI. And something else about like the product you guys are, that product that helps to crunch the data. Are you finding dealers will get on and start to mess with it themselves or are they expecting you guys to do it or expecting the vendor to do it for them? 

[Justin]

Yeah, so it's still early on. With that dealer group that I was mentioning in Southern California, they're going to launch at the beginning of the year and we may have an opportunity to kind of play around more with the product at that time. We had another client look at it last week And think about the application of that for his business. So we can't say in this moment that we have clients that are using it. I think it's still early for them too. I think they have less than a hundred rooftops in total. But we're pretty excited about that product and being able to work with our friend as well to kind of further develop the message. 

[Andrew]

Totally. Um, guys, I, I mentioned this at the beginning, but like, I have a lot of admiration for what you're doing for the industry. I feel like it's people like you two and what you guys are doing for your stores that, um, you know, it, it helps make a good name for everything surrounding automotive from the dealer to the customer. And especially like with what you guys are doing to, to be a responsible vendor and make sensible marketing for the dealerships. And it's like in the reputation that it generates and the feeling that the customers have is like evidence of what you guys are doing. So I appreciate you guys coming here and agreeing to have a conversation. Okay. If dealers want to reach out or other vendors want to reach out, you know, if there's openings, I imagine you guys are busy, but what's a good way to get in touch with you guys? 

[Ben]

Yeah. So first we'll just say, well, thank you for those kind words, Andrew. And kind of in the words of a former GM of ours and a close friend, it's nice to be part of the mutual admiration society. So kind of right back at you as far as kind of how you guys handle and work with dealerships at DealerOMG. So we really appreciate and respect what you guys are doing as well. Kind of with that, Justin, I'll let you kind of, answer Andrew's question about how to get in touch with us or how dealers can get in touch with us. 

[Justin]

Yeah. I mean, they could just simply shoot us an email. It's Justin and Ben at gowithagile.com. Probably the easiest way to get in contact with us. Justin and Ben at gowithagile.com or our website, gowithagile.com.

[Andrew]

Love it. Well, guys, thanks a ton. 

[Justin]

Thank you, Andrew. 

[Ben]

Yeah, our pleasure. This has been a lot of fun. This was our first podcast for Justin. We mentioned earlier, we've done it fortunate enough to do a number of kind of, you know, live presentations and some other webinars throughout the years, but this is the first podcast of its kind. So appreciate you inviting us on and letting us do this with you guys.