Automotive Intelligence^TM Weekly automotive insights from Compete

GMC SCORES A TOUCHDOWN IN SPORTS-MINDED SEGMENT

By: Randy Rubin

February 18, 2007

GMC teamed up with ESPN’s Monday Night Football to sponsor the “Keys to Victory” promotion, using an integrated marketing campaign to attract more sports-minded people to their brand. Compete measured traffic to gmc.com from people engaged with online sports content (Sports-Minded behavioral segment) as a percent of total OEM website traffic from the segment.

GMC’s “Keys to Victory” promotion succeeded at increasing the OEM’s online traction within the Sports-Minded segment. Prior to the NFL season, GMC’s average monthly share of sessions from sports-minded visitors was 5.6%. During the NFL season, GMC share nearly doubled. From September through December, gmc.com captured 10.9% share of sessions from this behavioral segment.

Further analysis could determine if these sports-minded consumers were actively engaged on gmc.com, and identify opportunities for sustaining GMC’s Sports Minded Segment share after the football season. Tracking online automotive behavior and surveying these visitors would provide additional insight into the effectiveness of this promotion.

QUALITY, NOT QUANTITY (WHEN EVALUATING RIVAL SITE TRAFFIC)

In 2006, OEM-Branded site traffic increased 10% from 2005 despite a 2% decline in sales during the same period. The average number of vistors to the OEM-Branded site catagory was a record 13 million per month. Compete ranked the Top-10 OEM sites for 2006 based on percentage growth in average monthly visitors from 2005 and compared this to changes in sales performance.

Compete’s analysis shows that there is more to enabling sales growth than the quantity of visitors to an OEM site. Only four out of the Top-10 OEMs increased both site traffic and sales in 2006 – Suzuki, Toyota, Kia, and Land Rover.

Beyond site traffic at a high level, OEMs need to understand how to effectively drive automotive shoppers toward active engagement online including purchase requests, dealer contacts, and configurators in order to drive sales growth. By examining site and online media effectiveness, OEMs can optimize online advertising and search investments to drive more active engagement on their respective sites.