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Automotive Marketing

Stop renting leads from portals. Own your pipeline.

Dealerships and repair shops bleed margin to third-party lead portals that charge for the same customer twice. We build automotive marketing that brings buyers and service customers directly to you — vehicle inventory campaigns, fixed-ops advertising for the service drive, geo-fencing around competitor lots, and local SEO that puts you in the map pack when someone searches “brake repair near me.” We've run automotive campaigns since 2011, for franchise dealers, independents, repair shops, and detail studios. The economics of each are different. The discipline is the same.

Sales Floor UNIT ECONOMICS • Vehicle inventory & listing ads • Model-line search campaigns • Conquest vs cross-shopped brands • Geo-fenced competitor lots METRIC: COST PER SOLD UNIT Service Drive FIXED OPERATIONS • Tight-radius service campaigns • Map pack: brakes, tires, AC, oil • Review velocity systems • 5-mile "near me" domination METRIC: COST PER REPAIR ORDER One growth system
Most automotive budgets chase units and starve the service drive — where the profit actually lives. We engineer both engines separately, then measure each by the number that pays: sold units and repair orders, never clicks.
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By the numbers: Automotive with BeFoundly.

The principles our automotive marketing engagements are built on — before a dollar of budget moves.

2
Profit centers, one strategy
5 mi
Where most service revenue lives
Weekly
Manual campaign review
$0
Paid to lead resellers

The four leaks we plug first.

Most automotive budgets fail in predictable places. We start by finding which leak is costing you most.

01
Portal dependency
CarGurus, Autotrader, and lead resellers charge monthly fees and then charge your competitors for the same shopper. Every dollar shifted toward your own search presence is a lead nobody else can buy.
02
Service-drive neglect
Fixed operations carries most dealership profit, yet nearly all ad budget chases unit sales. Oil changes, brakes, and tires are searched daily within five miles of your store — campaigns most stores never run.
03
Wasted radius targeting
A 30-mile blanket radius pays for clicks from people who will never cross town to buy. We target by drive-time, household income bands, and in-market audiences actually shopping your segment.
04
Invisible inventory
If your VDPs aren't structured for Google's vehicle listing surfaces, shoppers find your competitor's identical unit instead. Inventory feed hygiene is unglamorous and decisive.
How we grow automotive businesses

Sales floor and service drive, both engineered.

The Compound Growth Method, applied
The same weekly cycle behind every engagement
Audit build the full list Prioritize CRITICAL MED LOW by impact, surgically Fix this week critical first, always Measure REPEATS EVERY WEEK — THE GAINS COMPOUND

Automotive has two businesses living in one building, and they need different marketing. Unit sales run on inventory: vehicle listing ads, model-specific search campaigns, conquest targeting against the brands you cross-shop with, and geo-fenced ads served to phones that walk onto competitor lots. Service runs on proximity and urgency: tight-radius search campaigns for brakes, tires, AC, and diagnostics, a Google Business Profile tuned to win the map pack, and review velocity that makes you the obvious choice.

We start with whichever side leaks more — usually identified in the first audit week — and apply the same weekly improvement cycle we run for every client: find the highest-impact problem, fix it, measure, move to the next. Cost per sold unit and cost per repair order are the numbers we report, because clicks don't pay floorplan.

Vehicle inventory & listing-feed campaigns
Fixed-ops search campaigns by service line
Geo-fencing competitor lots & service centers
Google Business Profile & map pack domination
Conquest campaigns against cross-shopped brands
Review velocity & reputation systems
Drive-time and income-band targeting
Call tracking tied to closed ROs and sold units

Automotive marketing, answered straight.

How is marketing a repair shop different from marketing a dealership?
Repair shops live on proximity and trust: tight-radius search ads, a dominant Google Business Profile, and reviews that out-signal the chain down the street. Dealerships add inventory complexity — vehicle feeds, model-line campaigns, conquest audiences — plus the sales-versus-service budget split. We run both, and the first thing we do is figure out which side of your business the next dollar should go to.
Can you really target people on a competitor's lot?
Yes. Geo-fencing draws a virtual boundary around any physical location — a competing dealership, a national service chain, an auction — and serves your ads to mobile devices that enter it, both during the visit and afterward. Precision runs to roughly 100 meters. It won't replace your search campaigns, but as a conquest layer it reaches shoppers at the exact moment they're comparing.
Do you work with franchise co-op programs and OEM compliance?
We build campaigns that pass OEM compliance review — approved imagery, disclaimers, and brand standards — so eligible spend can claim co-op reimbursement. We'll also tell you when a compliant campaign is the wrong campaign: co-op money that forces you into generic brand ads is sometimes worth less than non-reimbursed ads that actually sell cars.
What budget does automotive PPC need to work?
Service campaigns can produce measurable repair orders on $1,000 to $2,000 a month in a typical metro because the radius is tight and intent is urgent. Unit-sales campaigns need more, since vehicle shoppers compare longer and clicks cost more. Our Starter package at $799/month covers management for spend up to $1,000/month; larger dealer accounts are quoted on scope.
How fast will we see results?
Service-drive campaigns usually show booked appointments within the first two to three weeks — urgency searches convert fast. Unit-sales improvement takes 30 to 60 days as inventory campaigns gather data and we cut what isn't selling. Either way you'll see the waste we removed in week one, because that's always where we start.
Related services

What powers automotive growth.

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We will review your campaigns, your portal spend, your service-drive visibility, and your competitors — and send a prioritized fix list within 24 hours. Free.

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