Chicago--The Internet has made it easy for small companies to act big and big ones to act small. That has created a David vs. Goliath battle played out online as a variety of companies compete for parts business. Aftermarket IT professionals discussed this and other topics during series of seminars at the Aftermarket eForum on July 16-18.
Product suggestions made at the parts counter are being rapidly replaced with online discussions in forums, blogs, and enthusiast Web sites, many presenters said. If parts retailers want a piece of that action, they must know what parts to sell and how to attract buyers.
Increase search results
"Ninety percent of traffic building is knowing what your keywords are," said Dan Jondron, president of Advanced Digital Strategies. "Every company has a handful of critical phrases."
If a company sells sparkplugs, Jondron said its Web site's key search words, commonly known as folksonomy vocabulary or tagging, can be sparkplug spelled as one word or two words, and every brand of sparkplug that a distributor sells should be listed.
When keyed into a search engine, such as Google, companies with an extensive folksonomy vocabulary will result in a higher result ranking, he said, calling it a no-cost way to make an immediate impact on traffic.
Rankings of organic search results are based on popularity, he said, adding that the higher your company is positioned, the better chance a buyer has to make it to your site.
Niche products sell well
"They're looking for a way to get the parts they can't find down the street," said Ken Stromberg of Autohaus Arizona Inc., who operates autohausAZ.com.
"They're looking for a way to get the parts they can't find down the street," said Ken Stromberg of Autohaus Arizona Inc., who operates autohausAZ.com.
There's a big opportunity in specialty parts, said John Wyly of Arrow Speed Warehouse, a brick-and-motor specialty parts and accessories warehouse distributor (WD) with five branches in the Midwest and western United States. "There is an inordinate demand for slow movers," he said. "I never believed we'd be selling as many Ferrari brake pads as we do."
Rick Green of 1A Automotive, a virtual parts retailer, echoed Wyly's statement. "You have to do something besides price to set yourself apart," he said.
The power of Web 2.0 Wikipedia, an online free encyclopedia created by users, definesthe commonly used term Web 2.0 as the "perceived second generation of Web-based communities and hosted services--such as social-networking sites, wikis (collaboratively-edited Web sites), and folksonomies- -- which facilitate collaboration and sharing between users." In fact, Wikipedia, is a byproduct of Web 2.0, said Luanne Brown of eTool Developers.
Many online retailers incorporate Web 2.0 features into their Web sites, including Amazon, whose retail offerings also include automotive parts and accessories.
Steve Fraiser of Amazon said Amazon is beta-testing several Web 2.0 enhancements that include askville.com, a blog created by its users, and unspun.com, a community for users to offer "best and worst" opinions on a variety of topics and cities.
The group of presenters said those features create a sense of community, causing users to spend more time on the sites.
"Start with the customers and work backwards," Fraiser suggested to attendees when they design and enhance their Web sites. Innovations on the Web should be done on behalf of the customers, he said.
Viral marketing
Viral marketing opportunities for companies exist in Web 2.0, Brown said, pointing out, for example, that Toyota has a myspace.com page for Scion, which doesn't cost the company any money--a classic example of the big company acting small. Several alternatives to myspace.com have are now available, which include facebook.com and gofish.com, she said.
Companies can use "widgets," or portable chunks of code, on their Web sites to link users to third-party content and functionality, Brown said. That can help keep visitors on your site, she said, adding that those could include links to streaming videos from youtube.com or facebook.com and blogs that include information specific to your product.
