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For automotive dealers, the holidays are one of the busiest times of year. An Autotrader.com report says that buying a new car at the end of the calendar year is still a good strategy; in response, people will be primed for automotive buying during the 2016-17 holiday season.
At Riverside Volkswagen, the way to bring customers in the door during the holidays is with direct mail marketing. Malcolm Dougan, General Manager of Riverside Volkswagen, utilizes the San Clemente-based firm Kennedy Marketing Group to produce his direct mail campaigns for year-end sales. “I have now done eight direct mail campaigns with Kennedy Marketing Group,” Dougan says. “I started working with them in December of 2013.”
Since then, he has seen sales increase substantially – not just during the holidays, but all year long. “I’ve been averaging four campaigns per year with Kennedy Marketing Group,” he says, “and I normally do 10,000 pieces per order.” By doing these campaigns four times per year, Riverside Volkswagen almost always increases its customer score index. “On average, we sell a minimum of 25 cars,” Dougan says. “It can be on up to as many as 40 cars when we do these pieces.”
Kennedy Marketing Group’s digitally printed mailers include a handwritten note to the recipient, with a manager’s business card inside. The mailer is packaged in a hand-addressed envelope with a first class postage stamp. According to company president James Kennedy, those small efforts can make a big difference to prospective customers in the highly competitive automotive sales industry. “People expect direct mail from car dealers to be all digital, with no personalization whatsoever,” Kennedy said. “So when they go through their mail and they see something from an auto dealer that was hand addressed by a real person, they take notice. In fact, it will probably be the only piece of mail that doesn’t go in the trash that day.”
His company has provided this “retro” marketing service for more than 500 auto dealer franchises in the United States. “It really increases their bottom line,” he says. “Dealers have told me that new customers are walking in and telling them how impressed they were by the mailer. Sometimes, that personal touch is all people need to make a buying decision.”
Dougan agrees. “We always see a positive increase in numbers from the people that come in on the mailers,” he said. “They are happy with the mailer piece and how it is presented to them.”
Riverside Volkswagen is located at 8330 Indiana Ave, Riverside, CA 92504. Auto dealers that are interested in the year-round direct mail marketing programs from Kennedy Marketing Group can contact James Kennedy at (866) 226-1049.
