ZANDERGREY • AUTOMOTIVE MARKETING

WE KNOW THE CAR BUSINESS. NOT JUST THE AD BUSINESS.

For more than twenty years, ZanderGrey has helped automobile dealers become better known, better remembered, and better positioned to sell.

We understand the advertising. We also understand the dealership—the inventory, incentives, OEM programs, co-op requirements, sales goals, service drive, competitive pressure and occasional Thursday-afternoon fire drill.

In other words, you won’t have to teach your agency how your business works.

ANYONE CAN ADVERTISE A CAR. MARKETING A DEALERSHIP IS DIFFERENT.

The manufacturer tells people what to buy.

Your marketing needs to tell them where—and, more importantly, why they should buy it from you.

That distinction matters when the dealer across town has many of the same vehicles, many of the same incentives and, quite possibly, the exact same stock photo of a smiling couple standing beside an SUV.

We help dealerships develop a recognizable position, a genuine personality and a reason to be chosen that goes beyond this month’s offer.

Because offers expire. Reputations don’t.

WE’VE SPENT MORE THAN FORTY YEARS MARKETING VEHICLES.

We didn’t learn automobile retail from a webinar, a dashboard or a white paper titled Seven Ways to Accelerate Your Sales Funnel.

We learned it by working with dealers.

We understand how quickly inventory changes. How manufacturer programs affect the message. How one rooftop can have very different needs from another. How sales, service and fixed operations contribute to the health of the entire dealership.

Most importantly, we understand that marketing has to work in the real world—not merely look impressive during a presentation.

BUILD THE BRAND. MOVE THE INVENTORY.

Dealership marketing has two jobs.

It needs to create demand today while building preference for tomorrow.

Concentrate entirely on short-term offers and your dealership becomes interchangeable. Focus only on brand and you may create a beautiful campaign that ignores what needs to leave the lot this month.

We connect both sides: long-term positioning and immediate retail opportunity.

The result is marketing that gives people a reason to remember your dealership—and a reason to visit it now.

THE PROOF IS IN THE PLAY BUTTON.

We could write several more paragraphs about ZanderGrey’s automotive production experience.

Or you could watch it.

Our automotive portfolio includes years of original work for Chevrolet, Subaru, GMC and Buick dealers—from fast, funny retail spots to cinematic brand stories and long-running campaigns.

Different dealerships. Different vehicles. Different voices.

Because automotive advertising should be recognizable as yours—not merely recognizable as automotive advertising.

WE KNOW WHAT HAPPENS AFTER THE CLICK.

Clicks are useful. Engagement is lovely. Impressions can be very impressive.

None of them has ever signed a finance contract.

We look beyond surface-level activity to understand how marketing supports actual dealership performance: stronger awareness, more qualified response, better customer conversations and more opportunities for sales and service.

We measure what matters. We just don’t worship the dashboard.

ONE DEALERSHIP. ONE RECOGNIZABLE VOICE.

Customers don’t experience your television, digital, social, print and showroom messages as separate marketing channels. They experience your dealership.

That experience should feel consistent wherever they encounter it—from the first commercial to the website to the moment they walk through the door.

ZanderGrey brings strategy, creative thinking, storytelling and production together under one roof, giving your marketing a clear voice instead of a collection of unrelated vendor accents.

It also means fewer people for your team to chase. You’re welcome.

Dealerships are surrounded by companies selling platforms, packages, products and “proprietary solutions.” Some are valuable. Some are remarkably effective at producing invoices.

We start with what the dealership actually needs: a stronger position, a clearer message, better creative and a practical plan for reaching the right people.

Sometimes that means a major campaign. Sometimes it means a disciplined adjustment. Expertise is knowing the difference.

No automatic packages. No strategy copied from the dealer in the next market. No tactics included simply because they were included last year. Everything should earn its place.

BUILT FOR A SINGLE DEALERSHIP. READY FOR THE WHOLE GROUP.

For dealer groups, consistency matters—but consistency should not erase the character of every rooftop.

We can help establish a strong group identity while respecting the individual brands, markets and customers within it. That creates more efficient marketing, clearer standards and stronger creative without making every store sound as though it was assembled from the same corporate PowerPoint.

Organized? Yes. Generic? Never.

ONE EMPLOYEE’S BUDGET. AN ENTIRE AGENCY’S BENCH.

Hiring an experienced marketing manager is only the beginning. Add payroll taxes, benefits, paid time off, recruiting, training, software, equipment and the outside specialists they’ll inevitably need—and suddenly one salary is considerably more than one salary.

For roughly the monthly cost of a single management-level employee, a ZanderGrey retainer gives your dealership access to an experienced team of strategists, writers, designers, media specialists, videographers, editors and production professionals.

One person can be exceptionally talented. One person is still one person.

Our retainer model gives you a deeper bench, broader expertise and dependable production capacity without the expense of building an entire department in-house. It also gives us the continuity to know your dealership, anticipate what’s coming and respond quickly when something changes.

And in the car business, something always changes.

GOOGLE ADS REQUIRE MANAGEMENT. FUNNY HOW THE NAME GIVES IT AWAY.

Google Ads is not something you configure once, switch on and admire from a safe distance.

Search behavior changes. Competitors change. Inventory changes. Google changes the platform, introduces new features and makes recommendations that may—or may not—be in your dealership’s best interest.

ZanderGrey brings extensive experience to the daily work of managing paid search: monitoring account health, refining keywords and negative keywords, adjusting budgets, reviewing geographic targeting, improving ad creative and watching for opportunities, waste and technical problems.

We can provide Google Ads management as part of a complete agency retainer or as a focused monthly service for dealerships that already have other marketing resources in place.

Either way, someone knowledgeable is paying attention. Which is considerably better than discovering three months later that your budget has been enthusiastically promoting something you no longer have.

A CLICK ISN’T A CUSTOMER. IT’S A HANDOFF.

The ad is only the beginning.

A successful advertising funnel connects the customer’s search or initial interest to the right vehicle, the right message and a clear next step. If any part of that journey breaks down, even a perfectly good ad can produce perfectly disappointing results.

We look at the complete path: The audience. The message. The creative. The offer. The landing experience. The response. The follow-up.

Depending on the dealership and the objective, that may include paid search, video, display, retargeting, social advertising or a coordinated combination of channels.

We don’t begin with a preferred platform or a prepackaged funnel. We begin with the customer and work backward.

Because the objective isn’t to generate the greatest possible number of clicks. It’s to create more real opportunities for the dealership.

VIDEO THAT MOVES AT DEALERSHIP SPEED.

Automotive marketing does not enjoy the luxury of standing still.

Inventory moves. Offers change. Weather changes. Manufacturer priorities change. Occasionally, everything changes before lunch.

ZanderGrey is built for that pace.

We have an experienced production crew, professional cinema equipment, fully outfitted production trailers and complete post-production capabilities. Strategy, writing, directing, cinematography, editing, color and sound can all be handled by one coordinated team.

That means fewer handoffs, fewer scheduling delays and remarkably fast turnaround without sacrificing the quality of the finished work.

We create broadcast commercials, brand films, dealership anthems, customer stories, campaign content and social video—with the ability to develop multiple lengths, formats and platform-specific versions from a coordinated production.

A single shoot can become a complete family of content for television, streaming, digital advertising, social media and the dealership’s own channels.

Fast does not have to mean disposable.

And professional does not have to mean six weeks from now.

AUTOMOTIVE ISN’T JUST ANOTHER INDUSTRY ON OUR CLIENT LIST.

ZanderGrey works across a diverse range of industries. That breadth keeps our thinking fresh and our creative from becoming trapped inside the usual automotive conventions.

But the car business is home turf.

We understand the pace. We understand the pressure. We understand the people. And we know how to turn that knowledge into marketing customers will notice, remember and act on.

No learning curve.

Just a better way forward.

NEXT STEP

LET’S TALK SHOP. YOU BRING THE QUESTIONS.

Give us an hour. We’ll bring forty-plus years of automotive experience - and considerably fewer buzzwords than you may be accustomed to.
Tell us what’s working, what isn’t, what needs to move and where you want your dealership to go next. We’ll take it from there.