Automotive News - September 23, 2019 - Best Practices Supplement - A39

SEPTEMBER 23, 2019 | 39
PRIME MOTOR CARS MERCEDES-BENZ, SCARBOROUGH, MAINE

REACHING OUT VIA YOUTUBE

Mercedes-Benz store
uses videos to follow up
with specific customers
Published in Automotive News July 1, 2019

Laurence Iliff
liliff@crain.com

pencer Roe isn't quite a YouTube
sensation, but several times a week
he shows off high-end German luxury vehicles on the media platform
- along with an occasional mainstream sedan or a Sprinter passenger van. The videos
generate dozens, or hundreds, or thousands
of views based on the model, but they start out
for an audience of one.
Roe is a salesman at Prime Motor Cars Mercedes-Benz, and one of his recent video tours
began like this: "Hi Todd. Spencer from Prime
Mercedes in Scarborough, Maine. We spoke
on the phone this morning regarding the vehicle you inquired about. And it's beside me
here. It's our 2016 Mercedes GLA 250."
Also getting a personal video recently were
Dante from Arizona, who was interested in
the redesigned 2020 Mercedes GLE 350, and
Sharon, who test drove a GLC 300 Coupe but
remained on the fence. In the video to Sharon,
Roe reminded her of the vehicle's strengths:
"This will look familiar, but I wanted to give
you just another look at it."
Several other salespeople join Roe on the
Prime Motor YouTube page, including colleagues Sandy Tholl and Robert Holzhacker,
projecting the reach of the dealership beyond
central Maine and into the homes of potential
buyers across the U.S.

Going all-in
Despite some skepticism in the YouTube
comments, Todd and the other potential buyers are indeed real people. Their Internet inquiries generate leads for the sales department
and are the impetus to create a professional
video tour of the vehicle to move the sale
along, said Daniel Doucette, who has been
general manager of Prime Motor for a decade
and recently took on the same role at Mercedes-Benz of Manchester in New Hampshire.
"It helps to put a deal together," said Doucette. "We sell cars in Seattle, in Denver, in
California. We have people fly in from all over
the country. We ship all over the country, and
it's the videos that close the deal."

Spencer Roe appears
in sales videos to
showcase vehicles.

Prime Motor Cars creates video tours
of vehicles conducted by sales staff
for individual customers and places
them on YouTube. The videos
generate sales leads from across the
country.

Some recent examples: A woman drove from
the Hamptons to pick up a new, uniquely optioned Mercedes, passing perhaps 10 rival dealerships in the process; and a 2014 Chevrolet
Corvette went to a client in Ohio after he saw a
YouTube video featuring the sports car in Jetstream Blue with just 9,200 miles on the clock.
While the use of videos to sell cars is not new to
auto retailers, Prime Motor Cars has gone all-in.
Doucette employs two full-time videographers,
one for each store. All videos are shot with a professional camera. The presenters use a wireless
mic for better sound quality, and the footage is
carefully edited before being uploaded to YouTube. The interested party is sent a link.
The dealership also does generic videos on a
hot new model, or one it wants to feature.
Since the start of the Prime Motor channel in
February 2014, its YouTube page has more than
2.1 million views, with an average view time of
two minutes and 12 seconds, Doucette said. In a
recent 28-day period, the page generated
633,000 impressions with a 6.7 percent clickthrough rate, and 50,500 unique views.
The videos create emotional attachment by
personalizing the vehicle, open up the sales

possibilities to the entire country and create
obligation, Doucette said. On that last point,
he added, the dealership is less likely to get
beat up on price because it is earning the sale
by offering a high level of service, in part by
making a personalized video.

'Not for everyone'
"In summary, they are not for everyone. It requires making the investment in a full-time
videographer and the proper equipment,
making it part of your daily process, sharing
success stories in your daily save-a-deal meeting and to stay with it as there is a learning
curve as your salespeople get used to being in
front of a camera," the executive said.
Indeed, some sales representatives were apprehensive about becoming YouTube presenters. But when they saw the sales gains and
earnings by colleagues who embraced the
medium, most of them came around.
Doucette said he first heard about the video
concept at a Mercedes-Benz meeting in 2009.
At the time, they recommended using a
small video camera and sending the entire file
to the client to download. That cumbersome
process resulted in low view rates compared
with sending a YouTube link, he said.
With four Mercedes dealerships in the Prime
Motor Group, video is helping Doucette's two
stores ramp up sales by reaching potential buyers far beyond their primary market.
"Scarborough historically has the highest
new-car gross because we earn it," he said.
"Manchester is following suit." a

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