Do consumers recognize and seek out your brand? Do they buy directly from you or go through an independent dealer network? If the latter is your case, read on.
Despite robust dealer relationships, I bet you lack the means of coordinating and synchronizing their promotions to coincide with yours. Consumers may see your promotions and want to buy your products, but finding that local store to purchase from proves elusive. How, then, to connect consumers to a dealer's store when you promote your brand?


Traditionally, cooperative advertising programs, where manufacturers allocate a percentage of sales volume or dollars toward dealer reimbursement of approved advertising or marketing, have been the answer. Dealers were the best judge of how and when to promote your brand. Results–based on reimbursement detail–lagged significantly behind actual expenditures and were difficult, if not impossible, to measure. Not to mention that monitoring brand consistency happened after the fact.
Unfortunately, traditional, hard to measure, impossible to synchronize coop programs, aren't connecting consumers, whose buying habits have changed, to dealers' stores for your branded product.
Enter Dealer Ignition LLC, a startup from Greenville, SC, focused on marketing in tandem with dealers, by optimizing the use of manufacturer coop funds to drive business using digital search techniques.
The Market Has Changed:
According to Steven Wagner, CEO and Head Ignitor of Dealer Ignition, these consumer changes make coordinating dealers' online sales efforts with yours that much more critical:

1. From window shopping to online pre-shopping [93% research product online according to Accenture; 68% search for information online before visiting a store according to Deloitte].


2. From separate channels to an eco-system of multiple complementary touch points. According to Accenture, 67% of those who research online prefer to complete the sale within a physical store.


3. From Internet at home to Internet in-store .... as a result consumers expect similar levels of convenience, speed, access and control in retail stores. They also, according to McKinsey & Company, spend 20% to 30% more than traditional single-channel customers.


4. From knowing more to buying more. Acquiring knowledge online engages consumers more with brands and products, and they spend more in-store per Forrester [45% of web shoppers spend on average $154 in additional purchases in-store] and ComScore [pre-shoppers spend 41% more than consumers who ARE not surfing the Internet].


5. From online to local physical stores via a search engine: according to Nielsen, Norman Group, 73% of users query a search engine [mainly Google] when asked to find a nearby location for a specific company.

The solution has to make use of digital resources and–more specifically–search engines to connect with consumers.
But, there's more! Not only might you match initial consumer interest with a dealer website and convert interest into purchase intent [with specifics on a local physical store], but imagine fully capitalizing on timely branded sales promotions and online advertising to increase awareness, consideration, preference and loyalty. And doing so while aligning dealer cooperative advertising programs with online advertising and managing, measuring, benchmarking and improving brand offers in real time–something that coop programs have never been able to do.
Situation in point:
Karastan Carpet and Rug, an 80 year old manufacturer of high-end luxury branded carpet and rugs, faced this very situation and hired Dealer Ignition.
Karastan has a strong connection with its consumer base. Yet, it depends on independent dealers with widely varying websites and digital knowledge to generate product sales to end consumers. As the Karastan field force discovered, most dealers don't even co-promote online the twice yearly Karastan promotional events. In other words, dealers haven't optimized their websites to support the brand, taken advantage of search marketing advertising nor connected with consumers actively searching online for Karastan product: missed sales opportunities for all!
Solution:
A Dealer Promotional Network software platform that digitally connects dealers and Karastan to maximize coop funds and improve sales.
The network geo-targets dealers [i.e., looks at dealers' immediate geographic vicinity to fine tune local search opportunities], monitors progress and benchmarks results. Relevant and timely promotions are seamlessly distributed and updated in a flexible, reusable, consistent and straightforward manner.
The Dealer Promotional Network includes Sales Ignition for Google search advertising, Sales Sync for sales promotions, and Sale email for easy to use branded email templates.
Sales Sync focuses on synchronizing promotions–that dealers can readily customize–across the dealer network. Dealers simply load onto their website code that dynamically uploads new Karastan branded and approved content; it also tracks results. Promotions are designed to keep visitors on dealers' sites.
Sale email helps dealers communicate with their customers via a consistent Karastan branded look & feel. It, too, includes analytics.
How Dealer Ignition Works:
The Dealer Promotional Network includes robust analytics which constantly and consistently monitor keywords, landing pages, dealers' websites performance, how compliant ads are, and how local searches and paid search results affect customer conversion. The goal is to direct an online consumer, truly interested in purchasing, to a local store to buy that Karastan rug.
Dealer Ignition's Network automates the majority of the work, loading and disseminating relevant promotions, running them as scheduled, updating dealers via email about upcoming events or enhancements, transparently automating coop reimbursement, monitoring performance and recommending improvements. Karastan also monitors keyword trends, promotion results and regional variations through a dashboard–all in real time.
Results:
1,600 Karastan rug dealers were chosen to take part in the Dealer Promotional Network; they were fully integrated into the network in 15 days. Dealers large and small–all grappling with how best to benefit from search–expressed support for the program.
Through analytics, relevant, centralized information and resources, dealers measure how their online campaigns affect overall profitability; coop reimbursement happens automatically.
Karastan has a better financial understanding of the dealer base. By monitoring keyword changes, dealer performance, what works and what doesn't, they easily cascade information down to the field force for follow up. Not only has the value that coop advertising offers dealers increased significantly, but also the overall value of marketing programs. Karastan promotions, through search advertising, now drive consumers from dealer websites into local dealer stores: consumers who, not only purchase, but also spend two to four times more, arriving prepared, timely information in hand, comparison shopping done and ready to buy.
Karastan reports a significant increase in rug sales. Dealer Ignition translates that into a 15:1 return on marketing investments.
Final Thought:
Intriguing, isn't it, to contemplate Dealer Ignition's solution for igniting consumer-dealer sales. It simplifies the coordination of branded digital promotions, maximizes the value of marketing budgets, streamlines the administration of cooperative advertising, and it connects pre-qualified consumers with local dealers, generating sales.
Not bad in this environment.