By Jim Boldebook, Founder, CBC Automotive Marketing

Cut to the chase! Quick! Today, too many ad copywriters are wasting valuable ad dollars and precious listener/viewer moments beating around the bush. Your mission is to give a potential buyer a reason to buy a vehicle from you or at least consider you.

Start your ad with the ‘bottom line’ or a strong tease that keeps eyes/ears tuned. Here are a few examples:

• “NO WAY you can offer a brand-new truck for 29,999! That’s what my competitors said when we advertised not one…but 15 new trucks for 29,999! And the good news is, we’ve just added 10 more trucks with the same price now through Monday night! But you know these are going to sell just as fast as the first 15 did…”
• “If you can afford $249 a month… repeat… 249 a month for a brand-new car with a full factory warranty, let me tell you what we’re doing this week…”
• “Last week we sold a 2017 Mustang for $14,000…about 10K less than book value. We sold a 2016 BMW 5 series for $18,500. About 12K less thank book value. This week we will sell at least 22 vehicles at crazy below book prices because we’re overflowing with late-model trades.”
• “She couldn’t believe it! One of our customers got price offers from CarMax and TrueCar for her used Ford Explorer and we beat the offers by TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS. We’re not only driving the local competition crazy…we’re beating the biggest nationwide public companies and internet dealers with our pricing, our trade values, and our amazing financing programs.” 

More and more of Internet and OTT insertions are placed in an environment where the customer can skip your ad in 5-10 seconds. You need to grab attention right out of the chute to earn the next 20-50 seconds of time/space you’re paying for. And it doesn’t always have to be a price/payment offer. 

Here are a few examples:

• “We don’t deserve your trust unless we earn it! If you’re shopping for a new Ford or any used vehicle, shop us first! Get our price. Then go ahead… shop us. Even if you end up buying somewhere else, you’ll know what kind of deal you’ve got. We make it easy by giving you our best offer upfront. Without a runaround. Without the games…”
• “We have more new and used trucks on the ground right now than four of our closest competitors combined! Who’s going to work harder to give you the best deal? The dealer with 30 trucks… or the dealer with 470?”Make a call to action early. Don’t wait until the end to give a phone number, website, etc. Here’s an example:
• “A brand-new Toyota for $239 a month? Click on Todd Toyota dot com right now and see the car… see the details… value your trade! Or call 1 800 Todd deals. Now Here’s the legal disclaimer for this amazing offer…”

Don’t advertise more than three vehicles in one advertisement. Repeat the offer several times. You only need to put a legal disclaimer once. Throw it away early in the ad. Then repeat the payment/price several more times.

Remember that less is more! A lot of today’s ad copy is rushed gibberish with far too many words. The human brain can thoughtfully digest around 150 words in 60 seconds. And research has proven that both ad effectiveness and retention increase as the number of words decrease. Ideas become more powerful when preceded by…and followed by pregnant pauses. 

Deliver your message to just ONE person. No matter how many thousands or millions of people might see or hear your ad, focus your message in a personal way to just one person. Just like you do if a customer is standing before you in the showroom, on the phone or chatting with you online.

Use both audio and visual messaging in videos for online and TV ads. A large percentage of ad viewers mute sound during commercial breaks and when viewing videos online. Your message should make key points in text on the screen, as well as the audio voice over. 

Develop a meaningful tag line and use it in every piece of copy. Whether it’s a slogan or quote, it’s the element that builds share of mind into our brand. 

Always include both a phone number and website URL in every ad. This is not only important for attribution and tracking purposes but to make it easier for a customer to follow up.

About the Author

JIM BOLDEBOOK is founder of CBC Automotive Marketing, an advertising/marketing agency working with some of America’s most successful dealerships. He has been in the broadcasting, advertising and marketing fields for almost 50 years.