NADA in New Orleans

I just returned from New Orleans and the National Automobile Dealers Association’s national convention. Like most of the attendees the first thing that stuck out was the lack of people. This is usually a convention with tens of thousands of participants, vendors, and guests. Like all businesses, car dealers have been hit hard by the recession and conventions are simply not in the budget for most.

All, however, was not lost. Those who did attend were able to look through the vendor’s booths with ease and attend workshops that we all hope will help increase our business. I know that Walker Automotive sent four managers with great expense simply to give each manager an opportunity to bring one nugget of information back to the dealership that would increase the bottom line. The expense was justified if each of us attending was able to bring back a single idea that improved our business.

From my perspective, that one nugget was some perspective on advertising. Anyone who watches the car business knows that we spend considerable amounts of money on advertising. Imagine the cost of T.V., Radio, billboards and newspaper ads every week. Add on top of that the amounts we spend on yearbooks, youth basketball and soccer, stadium billboards at little league and you begin to get the picture. The traditional media has always been the way we advertised – until recently.

Sure, you still see Walker Automotive in those traditional places but you also see Walkerautomotive.com prominently displayed along with the traditional ads. And what was surprising about this year’s NADA convention was that not one single traditional media company was there vying for our business. With all of the billions of dollars car dealers, manufacturers and suppliers have paid over the years, the biggest traditional media outlets like Cox, Lamar, Gannett, Clear Channel Communications were all absent. NADA in New Orleans was the one place where they had the opportunity to re-engage the car dealers and sell us on the benefits of traditional advertising. So what did they do? As an industry they decided to boycott. Amazing and stupid all at the same time.

What it proves to me is that our decision to shift advertising dollars to the internet was the correct decision. Like most businesses, we started with a simple toe in the water approach and a basic web site. Over the years our approach is getting more sophisticated and we buy leads, optimization, and use search engine marketing. I, for one, have touted the cost benefits of online advertising over traditional media for a while. The cost is less, it is measurable, and it allows you to instantly contact the prospect. So what did NADA prove to me? That just as I have given up on traditional media, they too, have given up on me.