The German Case

January 09, 2015

Client: German Auto Center
About German Auto Center: German Auto Center of Austin focuses on repairing Audi, Mercedes, Porsche, BMW, Mini Cooper and Volkswagen models (German vehicles). The shop is led by Len Gilmore, whose passionate vision of providing quality auto repair services at prices below major German dealerships, is the driving force behind the company's growth.

URL: http://www.germanautocenter.com

The Challenge:
German Auto Center came to us with the vision of building their online ecosystem, which included expanding their reach in organic search, paid search, social media and referral sources. However, they faced big challenges as their rankings needed some major improvements, their paid search campaigns needed some revamping, their social presence needed to grow and there were advertising opportunities on industry related sites that were not yet explored. The objectives derived from these observations included the following:

  • Improving rankings in the search results for primary terms
  • Revamping their paid search campaigns to compete for targeted terms in select geographic regions
  • Build a solid following with their Facebook audience and take advantage of Facebook's targeting adverting platform
  • Advertise on relevant website for additional traffic and potential leads

What We Did:
Utilized SEO to begin improving the site's organic rankings, revamped the pay per click campaigns to make them more cost effective, enhanced their company Facebook profile and kick stared an ad campaign and partnered up with industry related sources for more referral traffic.

Why We Did What We Did:
Search engines influence commerce and traffic in many ways. In order for any site to compete in search engines, they need to follow 'The Rules of the Web.' It starts with having a site that people can trust and people behind the site who can deliver. With the help of internal support such as subject matter experts, it was easy to develop a content strategy and find partner website that would be willing to cite the company website. Leveraging internal assets can be a huge competitive advantage as these materials are often hard to replicate.

The Results:
The results below are compare June 1 2013 – December 31, 2013 vs June 1 2014 – December 31, 2014:

Organic Search:

  • 77% increase in non-branded organic traffic
  • 78% increase in new users to the website
  • 45% increase in contact form completions

Referral Sources:

  • 229% increase in traffic from referral sources

Paid Traffic

  • 153% increase in paid search traffic to the website
  • 43% increase in contact form completions

Social Media (focused on Facebook)

  • Number of 'Likes' on Facebook increased from 50 to over 500

*Non-branded organic traffic indicates visitors who reached the website who used a keyword in a search engine that did not include the name of the brand or company URL.

What We Learned:
Finding more than one traffic source is key to a site's growth. Search engines control the type of content we see each day and for any reason they can change those results. By diversifying traffic sources, you are able to sustain traffic even when major shifts in the results occur.