Digital marketing in SA's automotive sector is continuing to grow and is fast catching up to global trends. This is according to Michael Walker, search and analytics director at Acceleration Media.
According to Walker, year-on-year search queries for vehicles are growing at over 16% across devices in SA, while social media usage and online video consumption is ramping up quickly. "This means we entertain ourselves, bank online, do our research, and reach out and get influenced by our friends, family and peers on social."
Walker notes the automotive sector is already one of the world's biggest spenders on digital marketing and advertising, with motor manufacturers and dealers worldwide constantly increasing the portion of their budgets they allocate to digital channels. "In SA, we are lagging behind in terms of international trends, but are catching up steadily."
He points out that the US automotive industry spent $5.07 billion in 2013 on paid digital advertising, according to an eMarketer report. "eMarketer reckons that the automotive industry will be the second biggest spender on paid online and mobile advertising by 2015, eclipsing the financial services sector."
In addition, a US study by JD Power and Associates has found that four out of five new-vehicle buyers use the Internet in their car shopping process.
Given that a motor vehicle is a big ticket purchase, it is hardly surprising that digital touch points have become so important to buyers, sellers and vehicle manufacturers, says Walker. "Buyers are spending more and more time online researching cars before they even walk on to a dealer's floor."
Walker says the percentage of marketing spend in SA that goes to digital is between 9% and 11%, compared to the 30% to 40% in the US. "But even so, consumers in SA are taking to the Web aggressively for researching and making purchases, including cars. [This] means that motor manufacturers should be investing in digital as an important part of the conversion funnel.
"Most of SA's big motor brands have followed their customers online, but we believe that they could reap stronger [return on investment] if they started to invest as much in digital conversion pathways as they do on offline customer acquisition and retention campaigns."
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