Supercharge Your Dealership’s 2021 Marketing Strategy With Press Releases

It is hard to believe that we are in the month of December already! The end of year wrap up and the planning for 2021 marketing and advertising is underway.

If you are just starting to follow my content, I am the Vice President of Marketing for Celebrity Motor Cars. Celebrity Motor Cars is a luxury auto group in the greater New York City market that consists of the following luxury brands: Lexus of Route 10, BMW of Springfield, Maserati of Morris County, Alfa Romeo of Morris County, and Mercedes-Benz of Goldens Bridge. In my day to day, I manage Celebrity’s internal marketing agency, an agency I created.

There are also many other areas of marketing that I oversee on a daily basis. One of those areas is writing press releases for the company. A press release is a short news story that we send to targeted members of the media. The objective of any press release is to gain the interest of a journalist or publication. Press releases can be published online, featured in articles, TV, and the news, etc.

Over the years of working in a retail-dealership environment, I have noticed that not many dealerships actually harness monthly press releases’ power. Most dealerships only savor those moments for the OEM and do so on their behalf.

So why would a dealership need to use press releases?

Here are my top 3 reasons:

Since this year took a nasty toll on virtually everything, it has also impacted media spending. 98% of your competition are not writing press releases right now. If I took a poll of 10 dealers of any brand within a 20-mile radius, maybe one of them will be writing releases. Less than one will be doing this on a regular basis. You can do press releases on any of the following topics: employee features, employee promotions, community events, new model launches, or virtual events.
There is significant SEO (search engine optimization) value in press releases. One unknown fact of writing press releases is the SEO benefits you will reap from them. Not only can you target your audience, but you can be picked up by other huge publications in or out of the automotive industry resulting in additional search results. All the targeting strategies for your releases should be an essential part of your SEO and social media efforts. Over time the releases you publish will come up in the SERP (Search engine results page) and add a new flavor to your business’s online presence.
The opportunities are virtually endless. Press releases simply generate a web of opportunities for your dealership, creating a ton of visibility for your store. The list goes on from social media moments, featured in blogs, websites, videos, television, etc. If you are looking to generate some grassroots movement on social media, in addition to sharing on your own personal social media channels, you can opt in to have your releases shared on social sites direct such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Side note: anything “in the news” related will organically populate on LinkedIn and your entire network of followers and connections will see this as well.

I love PR Newswire for publishing press releases. For a fee, PR Newswire will help you upload your press release, where you can also add in videos, relevant links, and images. They will edit your release, check for grammar, and send it to as many media outlets as you want in the geography and category of your choosing.

Adding in monthly press releases for 2021 will help separate you from the rest!

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Melanie Borden

VP of Marketing at Celebrity Motor Cars, LLC

Melanie Borden has spent the majority of her 14+ year marketing career in the automotive tech industry. Melanie has worked in various atmospheres from social media startups to a public tech company in consulting, marketing, and business development roles. She has driven marketing efficiencies for her clients along the eastern seaboard from NYC to Burlington, VT. Melanie is the driver for the marketing vision and strategy from inception to execution for the clients she has worked with. Presently, she is the Vice President of Marketing for Celebrity Motor Cars, a franchised highline auto group based out of the New York and New Jersey Metropolitan area.Melanie develops and implements every single facet of the marketing and advertising strategy, and singlehandedly built the in-house advertising agency.