Tag: sell more with digital retailing

DIY Digital Sales, sell more cars

AEO vs SEO vs GEO: What Car Dealers Actually Need to Know in 2026

Jun 21, 2026 by DIY Digital Sales 0 Comments #sell more with digital retailing

AEO / GEO for Dealers

AEO vs SEO vs GEO: What Car Dealers Actually Need to Know in 2026

By , General Manager & Founder  | 

Quick Answer

In the AEO vs SEO vs GEO comparison, SEO ranks your dealership on a results page, AEO gets your store named inside Google AI Overviews and answer boxes, and GEO gets you cited and recommended inside ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude. SEO is the foundation; AEO and GEO are the 2026 growth lanes.

If you run a dealership, you have probably been told you need SEO, then AEO, then GEO, usually by three different vendors charging three different invoices. Here is the thesis, stated plainly: the AEO vs SEO vs GEO debate is not a turf war, it is a sequence. SEO gets you indexed and ranked, AEO gets you named in the answer, and GEO gets you recommended in the chat. They feed each other, and a dealer who treats them as competing line items is wasting money on all three.

This matters now because shopper behavior already moved. Roughly 30 percent of vehicle buyers now use generative AI to research vehicles, and among those buyers, 68.4 percent use ChatGPT. Meanwhile about 65 percent of Google searches end without a click. Your future customer is asking an answer engine “what is the best Honda dealer near me,” and your store is either named in that answer or it is invisible. This post breaks down each discipline in dealer terms, then tells you exactly which one to fund first.

Before You Read Further

You cannot fix what you cannot see. Most GMs have never actually watched ChatGPT describe their store to a shopper. Run your free AI Visibility Check → and see how AI describes your dealership today.

30% of buyers use generative AI to research vehicles Source: Ekho 2026
65% of Google searches end without a click Source: Search Engine Land
~7% of local searches show an AI Overview Source: Search Engine Land

Three Disciplines, One Shopper

Think about one shopper, three moments. In moment one, she types “Toyota dealer near me” into Google and scans the results page; that is SEO territory. In moment two, she searches “which dealer has the best service reviews in my area” and Google drops an AI Overview that summarizes an answer above the links; that is AEO territory. In moment three, she opens ChatGPT and asks “I want a reliable used SUV under $30K, who should I buy from near Bridgewater?”; that is GEO territory. Same buyer, same purchase, three completely different surfaces.

The mistake I see dealers make is assuming these are interchangeable buzzwords for “show up online.” They are not. Each surface decides who appears using different signals, displays results in a different format, and rewards a different kind of content. The good news for a dealer: you control most of the raw material that all three pull from, which is your website, your schema, your reviews, and your Google Business Profile.

SEO vs AEO vs GEO at a Glance

Here is the side-by-side that I wish someone had handed me three years ago. Read the rows top to bottom and notice how the job, the surface, and the scoreboard all change as you move from SEO to AEO to GEO.

Dimension SEO AEO GEO
Goal Rank a page so the shopper clicks through to your site Get your store named inside the direct answer Get your store cited and recommended inside a generative reply
Where it shows up Google & Bing results pages (the blue links and the map pack) Google AI Overviews, featured snippets, answer boxes, voice answers ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, and AI shopping assistants
What you optimize Keywords, page speed, backlinks, title tags, local listings Structured answers, schema markup, reviews, Q&A content, entity clarity Citable proof, consistent facts across the web, authority signals AI trusts
Who the “search engine” is Google’s ranking algorithm Google’s answer-generation layer (Gemini behind AI Overviews) A large language model deciding which dealers to mention and praise
How you measure success Rankings, organic clicks, sessions, form fills from search Answer-box appearances, AI Overview citations, zero-click visibility Mention rate, accuracy of the description, whether the AI recommends you
From the GM’s Desk

“On my floor, I started asking walk-in shoppers a simple question this spring: how did you decide to come see us? More of them than I expected said some version of ‘I asked ChatGPT and it mentioned you.’ Two years ago nobody said that. Nobody. We did not change our ad budget to make that happen, so something on the answer side is doing work our paid search never did.”

Mike Yates, General Manager & Founder of DIY Digital Sales

SEO for Dealers: The Foundation You Cannot Skip

Quick Answer

SEO for a car dealership means optimizing your website, local listings, and content so Google ranks your pages and shows your store in the map pack. In 2026 it is no longer a growth lever on its own. It is the indexed, structured foundation that answer engines and AI models pull from before they can ever cite or recommend you.

Here is the contrarian claim that some SEO vendors will not like: for a franchise or large independent dealer, SEO is now table stakes, not a growth strategy. That does not mean it is optional, it means it is the price of being in the game. A store with slow pages, missing schema, thin model content, and an inaccurate Google Business Profile will lose at SEO and then lose at AEO and GEO, because the answer layer is reading the same broken signals.

What SEO still buys you in 2026 is qualified clicks on the searches that stay click-heavy, especially local and branded queries. AI Overviews appear in only about 7 percent of local searches, so when someone searches your store name or “Honda service near me,” there is usually still a real results page with a real click waiting. That click converts. So you fund SEO to protect the bottom-of-funnel traffic that already pays your bills, not to chase rankings on broad informational terms that AI now answers without sending anyone anywhere.

The practical SEO checklist for a dealer has not changed much: fast mobile pages, accurate NAP data, complete schema, real model and service content, and a clean Google Business Profile with current photos and hours. The difference is the reason you do it. You are no longer optimizing only for ten blue links; you are building the clean, machine-readable foundation that AEO and GEO require.

AEO for Dealers: Owning the Answer Box

Quick Answer

AEO, or Answer Engine Optimization, gets your dealership named inside the direct answer a shopper sees on Google AI Overviews, featured snippets, and voice results. For dealers it means structuring content as clear questions and answers, marking it up with schema, and building review and entity signals so the answer engine trusts your store enough to cite it.

AEO is where the growth is for most dealers right now, and here is why. AI Overviews already appear on more than 20 percent of searches, and when they appear they cut click-through by roughly 60 percent. That sounds like a threat, and it is, if you are not in the answer. But flip it around: the dealer who gets named inside that Overview captures attention that the other forty links on the page no longer get. AEO turns the zero-click problem into a zero-click advantage for the store that wins it.

For a dealership, AEO is built from things you already own. It is your FAQ-style content answering the real questions shoppers ask (“Does this dealer offer loaner cars during service?”), your structured schema markup telling Google exactly what your store is, and your review volume and rating signaling that you are a trustworthy answer to recommend. None of that requires a new ad budget. It requires you to write and structure your content the way an answer engine reads it.

The reason AEO beats GEO as a starting point is measurability and control. AEO targets Google’s surface, which is still where the largest volume of dealer-intent searches happens, and it leans on schema, reviews, and local data you can directly improve this quarter. You can watch your answer-box appearances move. That fast, trackable feedback loop is exactly what a dealer needs to justify the spend to ownership.

See How AI Describes Your Store

AEO starts with knowing what the answer engines already say about you. Get a plain-English readout in minutes.

Run your free AI Visibility Check →

GEO for Dealers: Getting Recommended by the Machine

Quick Answer

GEO, or Generative Engine Optimization, gets your dealership cited and recommended inside generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude when a shopper asks for buying help. For dealers it means making your store’s facts consistent and citable across the web so the model has accurate, trustworthy information to repeat when it answers a buyer.

GEO is the newest discipline and the one dealers underestimate the most. When 30 percent of vehicle buyers already research with generative AI and most of them use ChatGPT, the question the model answers about your store is happening whether you optimize for it or not. The model will describe your dealership using whatever it found on the open web. GEO is the work of making sure what it found is accurate, complete, and flattering rather than stale or wrong.

The mechanics differ from SEO. There is no ranking position to climb and no single page to optimize. Instead, the model assembles its answer from patterns across many sources, so GEO rewards consistency and authority. If your reviews, your hours, your inventory mix, and your reputation all say the same true things across Google, your site, and third-party listings, the model has a clean story to tell. If your facts conflict across the web, the model hedges, gets it wrong, or skips you for a competitor it understands better.

GEO matters and it is growing fast, but it is downstream of the same structured, citable content you build for AEO. That is the honest reason it comes after AEO in the sequence, not because it is unimportant, but because the foundation that feeds it is the same foundation. Build for the answer engine and you have already done most of the GEO work; then you layer on the consistency and authority signals that the chat models specifically reward.

Which Should a Dealer Invest in First?

Quick Answer

For most franchise and large independent dealers, the order is fix the SEO foundation first, then invest in AEO, then GEO. SEO makes your store readable to machines, AEO captures the high-volume Google answer surface with signals you control today, and GEO follows because it draws on the same citable content you already built for AEO.

Let me be direct, because hedging helps nobody. You do not get to pick one and ignore the others, but you absolutely should sequence your money. A dealer who pours the first dollar into GEO before fixing a broken site is building the roof before the foundation. The model cannot cite content it cannot find, and it cannot trust facts that conflict across your web presence.

So the sequence is foundation, then growth. Spend the first phase making sure your SEO house is in order: fast pages, complete schema, accurate listings, real content. That is a few weeks of disciplined cleanup for most stores. Then shift budget to AEO, because that is where the largest pool of dealer-intent searches now resolves into answers, and because you can measure progress quickly. GEO comes online almost as a byproduct, then gets its own dedicated push once your answer-box presence is solid.

Our Verdict: Foundation First, Then AEO

For most franchise and large independent dealers, we recommend the fix-the-foundation-then-AEO order: spend phase one on technical SEO, schema, and listing accuracy, then put your growth budget into AEO. The reason is leverage. AEO targets Google’s answer surface where the most dealer-intent searches happen, it runs on signals you already control, and the same structured content seeds your GEO results, so a single investment pays off on two of the three surfaces at once.

The Bottom Line

SEO is no longer your growth engine; it is your foundation. AEO is the growth lane that captures the high-volume Google answer surface with signals you already control, and GEO is the recommendation layer that the same content quietly feeds. Sequence the spend, do not split it three ways and hope. A dealer who builds the foundation and then wins the answer wins the recommendation almost for free.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between AEO, SEO, and GEO?

SEO gets your dealership ranked on a results page so a shopper clicks through. AEO gets your dealership named inside a direct answer from an answer engine like Google AI Overviews. GEO gets your dealership cited and recommended inside generative chats like ChatGPT and Gemini. They overlap, but each one optimizes for a different surface and a different way of measuring success.

Does SEO still matter for car dealers in 2026?

Yes, but its role changed. SEO is now table stakes, not a growth lever. Clean technical SEO, fast pages, and accurate local listings are the foundation that AEO and GEO are built on, because answer engines pull from indexed, structured pages. A dealer with broken SEO will not get cited by AI either, so you fix the foundation first and treat AEO and GEO as the growth lane.

Which should a dealership invest in first, AEO or GEO?

Fix your SEO foundation, then invest in AEO before GEO. AEO targets Google AI Overviews and answer boxes, which already touch a large share of searches and lean on the same schema, reviews, and local data you control today. GEO inside ChatGPT and Gemini matters and is growing fast, but it is downstream of the same structured, citable content you build for AEO, so AEO gives you faster, more measurable returns.

How do I measure success in AEO and GEO if there is no click?

You stop measuring only clicks and start measuring mentions. For AEO, track how often your store appears in AI Overviews and answer boxes for your local and model queries. For GEO, track whether ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude name your store, describe it accurately, and recommend it when a shopper asks for a dealer in your market. An AI visibility tool that runs these prompts on a schedule turns presence into a trackable number.

Will AI search hurt my dealership’s website traffic?

It already is shifting it. Roughly 65 percent of Google searches now end without a click, and AI Overviews appear on more than 20 percent of searches and cut click-through by about 60 percent when they show up. The upside for dealers is that local intent stays click-heavy, with AI Overviews appearing in only about 7 percent of local searches, so a store that wins local AEO keeps the clicks that actually convert.

Common Questions, Quick Answers

Is AEO just SEO with a new name?
No, SEO optimizes for ranked links while AEO optimizes for being named inside the direct answer above those links.
Can a small dealer compete in GEO against a big group?
Yes, because GEO rewards accurate, consistent, citable facts more than ad budget, and a tightly run single store can keep its facts cleaner than a sprawling group.
Do I need separate vendors for SEO, AEO, and GEO?
No, the same foundational work feeds all three, so one coordinated effort beats three siloed invoices.
How long until AEO work shows results?
Schema and content fixes can surface in answer boxes within weeks, faster than most traditional SEO ranking gains. [VERIFY timeframe against your own data]
Does GEO require me to advertise inside ChatGPT?
No, GEO is about being accurately represented in the model’s training and retrieval, not about paying for placement.
Will good reviews help my AI visibility?
Yes, review volume, rating, and recency are strong trust signals that both answer engines and generative models lean on when deciding who to recommend.
Is schema markup really necessary for dealers?
Yes, schema is how you tell the answer engine exactly what your store is, which makes you far easier to cite correctly.
What happens if I ignore AEO and GEO entirely?
The answer engines still describe your store using whatever stale or wrong data they find, and a competitor who did the work gets recommended instead of you.
Does this apply to my service and fixed-ops business too?
Yes, “best dealer for service near me” is exactly the kind of query answer engines now resolve, so fixed ops benefits from the same AEO work.
Take This With You

The SEO vs AEO vs GEO Dealer Cheat-Sheet

One page you can hand to your marketing director or your vendor. It defines each discipline in dealer terms, lists what to optimize for each, and gives you the exact sequence to fund them in.

  • A plain-English definition of SEO, AEO, and GEO for dealers
  • The five-row comparison table from this post, formatted to print
  • A “fix the foundation first” SEO readiness checklist
  • The AEO signals you control this quarter (schema, reviews, Q&A content)
  • The GEO consistency checklist for your facts across the web
  • A simple scoreboard for tracking mentions instead of only clicks

Explore More

Ready to See Where Your Store Actually Stands?

SEO, AEO, and GEO all start with one honest readout: what do the answer engines say about your dealership right now? Find out in minutes, no sales call required.

Run your free AI Visibility Check → See how AI describes your store

About the Author

Mike Yates

General Manager & Founder of DIY Digital Sales

Mike has spent 25+ years in automotive retail, moving from the sales floor through fixed ops to the GM’s chair. He founded DIY Digital Sales to help dealers get found, described, and recommended by AI search instead of losing those shoppers to competitors. He writes from the floor, dealer to dealer, about what actually moves the needle.

Sources

  1. 2026 AI Vehicle Research Study: How Buyers Are Using ChatGPT and Other AI Tools — Ekho
  2. Car Buyer Journey Study: Efficiency, Digital Tools, and AI Drive Record Satisfaction — Cox Automotive
  3. AI’s Influence on Car Shopping Skyrockets, New Survey Reveals — Digital Dealer (Cars.com data)
  4. Google Zero-Click Searches 2026 Study — Search Engine Land
DIY Digital Sales, building a personal brand, DIY Digital Marketing, DIY Personal Branding, DIY Social Media, sell more cars

Building a Personal Brand Part 3 – Promote Yourself and Win

Mar 14, 2021 by diyautogalaxy 0 Comments #building a personal brand, #diy digital sales, #diy sales, #how to brand, #how to build a brand, #how to build a personal brand, #personal brand building, #salesperson, #sell more cars, #sell more with a personal brand, #sell more with digital retailing, #sell yourself, #socail media brand, #social media, #social media brand, #social media branding

Building a Personal Brand Part 3 is all about promoting yourself with digital marketing.

Now that you have built the foundation for your personal brand, it’s time to start promoting it with social and digital marketing. In Part 2 I mentioned how you should consider your personal brand website as the nucleus to your brand. There’s a couple of reasons for this. First, you own your website and everything on it. Second, it’s the anchor point for everything you’re going to do going forward. If you’re an automotive sales professional, you’ll want to drive both your current and future clients to this site.

When Building a Personal Brand You Need To Leverage Digital Marketing and Social Media

Your probably already on at least one social media platform. Start with the one you’re most comfortable with. Now is not the time to start learning a new social media platform. If you use FaceBook or Instagram on a regular basis, start there. Since most people have a FB page, I’m going to show you how to start building a personal brand on FaceBook. Besides…. What’s more DIY Digital Marketing than starting a page on FB? Log in to your FaceBook page and in the top right corner click the + button and select create page. Now add your page name (use your brand name 🙂 add a category and description to get started. How easy was that?

Pro Tip: Looking for an easy way to make new creative?

Try Canva.com to create great looking posts and more. Best of all it’s free! This cool quote from Mickey Rooney was on their site and I thought it was cool. Canva has plenty of premade templates, graphics, infographics and more. Best of all you can customize with your own images and text.

It’s easy to use and with a little practice you’ll be making professional looking social media posts in no time. You need to stand out from the crown while building a personal brand, try Canva for your digital marketing efforts.

Crossposting: The art of linking all your hard work together for maximum exposure.

Crossposting is basically linking all of you content, posts, websites and social media together. This is truly where the magic happens. Most people get to this point then give up when their website and social media posts don’t get any traction. It’s extremely important that you crosspost everything. Once Google sees your website linked to FaceBook and vice versa, both will start to become more relevant. Remember this graphic from page 1?

Connecting social media and building a personal brand

Your website is at the center but it’s surrounded by a number of social media sites that all connect to your site. Most importantly they all have links from your website back to your social sites. This “crossposting” of sites links them all together and creates a strong message to Google. It lends credibility to your website in Googles eyes. It also allows Google to determine what your brand is all about and helps with the ranking and relevancy.

Now that you have a FaceBook page with the purpose of building a personal brand start crossposting. Copy the URL from your website and start a post in FB using it. FB will take it from there and now your crossposting 🙂 BTW-we’re just getting started with this. It may take a while but Google is going to like what you’re doing. Give yourself a pat on the back. You’ve done well to get this far and you’ve starting building a personal brand online.

Checkout our Facebook page to see what we’re doing at DIY Digital Sales. Oh yeah, this is crossposting 🙂

Don’t like FaceBook? No problem, get started building a personal brand on your favorite platform and don’t forget to use hashtags. #diydigitalsales #buildingapersonalbrand #crossposting #automotiveretail #facebook #sellmore #freewebsite

About the Author:
Mike has 25 years of retail automotive experience and has held positions from Salesperson to General Manger in luxury brand dealerships. In addition to his extensive retail automotive experience, he loves SEO and digital marketing. Check out this great article on beginner SEO at MOZ.com

building a personal brand, DIY Digital Marketing, DIY Digital Sales, DIY Personal Branding, sell more cars

Building a Personal Brand For Automotive Sales Pros Part 2 – The Best Part

Feb 7, 2021 by diyautogalaxy 0 Comments #building a personal brand, #digital retailing, #diy digital sales, #diy sales, #how to build a personal brand, #personal brand building, #sell more cars, #sell more with a personal brand, #sell more with digital retailing

Building a Personal – Part 2

This may be the most difficult part for some of you but have no fear. We’re going to walk you through this part, step-by-step. Whether you want to sell more real estate, cars or just about anything else, this next step in building a personal brand is essential. If you didn’t get here from Part 1, we welcome you to start at the beginning.

Time to make a website or blog on WordPress

There’s a number of great website builders out there and you can use whatever platform you choose. You may already have a website. Kudos to you if you do. You may not want to tackle this step and if you don’t you can find tons of people out there who will help for very little money. Just remember this is a DIY program and we just want to help as many people Do-It-Themselves for little to no money. Even if you already have a website, read on. We’re going to talk about why this is such an important step.

When building a personal brand, you need a central location. This nucleus for your brand will be your personal website or blog. This is important because you will own this digital property or URL (Uniform Resource Locator.)

Once you get your website established we’ll begin the crucial step of linking it to all the social media channels. This will improve your sites relevancy with google for organic search and raise your brands overall digital presence. You probably have some social media experience and may already have some favorite platforms you’re familiar with. Focus on the ones you know first. You get the idea, time to get back to building your personal brand website.

You have lots of choices when it comes to building a personal brand website. WordPress is by far the largest platform and for that reason we’re going to walk you through the steps necessary to setup your website or blog on WordPress. You can also use Wix, Blogger or any other free blog building site you like. Ready to start making more money? Lets get started!

building a personal brand using wordpress

You’ll need to setup a WordPress account. Use the email address you created in step 1, create a username and enter a password for your account. On the next page you will chose your websites web address or URL.

diy digital sales website building in wordpress

WordPress offers a completely free URL and this is a good place to start. You can move your blog to a better platform like WordpPress.org and buy a unique domain name once you start getting good at WordPress. If you want to purchase your domain name now, you can but we’re trying to show you the free options first. On the next page WP is going to ask you which plan you want. Look for the link at the top that says “Start with a free site.” You don’t need a plan yet. We just want you to learn how to sell more cars by building a personal brand online. Pro Tip: Domain names are cheap buy yours now if you really want to get serious about building a personal brand.

After clicking the link, WP will start building your website and you’ll see a screen like this.

Click the link that says “Get Started” and follow the prompts to set up your website. Bet you didn’t think building a website was going to be this easy. The set up is pretty easy. Making a website that people will actually visit is the hard part and by far the most important but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Name your site and write a tagline and Save settings. I named mine “Sell More Cars by Building a Personal Brand” and wrote “DIY Digital Sales For The Automotive Professional” as my tagline. I’m going to focus on how to sell more cars as this free blogs niche.

Choose a Theme in WordPress that makes sense

After clicking the link “Chose a Theme” you’ll see a number of free website themes. These are premade templates. Pick one that you like. WordPress is always adding new ones to their site. I chose a theme called Morden and clicked “Activate Theme” Once this is done you’ll see your new website. Well the framework at least. Now it’s time to start adding some content like photos, blog posts, social media links etc.

Important note about content when building a personal brand online

Time for a short break in the action to talk about content before we move on. Good content is king and quality always beats quantity. Take your time when coming up with content and remember, great digital content is evergreen. You create it once and it will keep working for you for years to come. Best of all, it will keep making you money while your doing something else like sitting on a beach. So take your time, do it right and start building a personal brand today. Check out SmartBlogger.com for great blogging tips and tricks.

Let’s take a look at my free WordPress website so far.

At this point we have a website with a title, tagline, four pages and some samples blog posts. As you can see in the top right hand corner of the page, the site has not been launched yet and that’s the way we want it for now. Don’t launch your site until it’s ready for the public. Hit the “My site” button on the top left to return to the editor menu or My Home page in WordPress. In this section you’ll notice that WP is walking you through the steps of setting up your site.

Updating your home page

WP says this step “Updating your Home Page” will take approximately 20 minutes. To get your website online it can be done in less than 20 minutes but once you get comfortable in WP you’ll probably go back later and make it more professional looking. Click the “Edit Your Home Page” button and let’s get this step out of the way and get back to building your personal brand to sell more cars 🙂

I clicked on the background image and selected “Replace.” You can upload a new image from your computer but I selected a free image from Pexel. The image I selected was an aerial view of a car dealership and best of all it was free! I changed the verbiage on the home page to say “Welcome to DIY Digital Sales” and changed the second line to read “Helping Automotive Sales Professionals Sell More Cars by Building a Personal Brand.” Last item on the home page that I changed was the link that reads “Learn More.” Change the navigation from the default link to your blog page. Here’s a screen shot of my progress so far. I’m familiar with WP so this only took a few minutes.

Home Page Updated

Once you have your home page looking the way you like, click on the update link on the top right to save your progress. Now back to your My Home Dashboard and WP will tell you the next step is to verify your email address. If you haven’t do so already, go verify the email that WP sent you. The next step on your dashboard may be to setup a menu. You can skip this step for now, the default menu is perfectly fine for the time being. Before we move on to the next step I want to provide you with a great resource. Smart Blogger is a great place to take a deeper drive in to How To Start a Blog. My tutorial is just a primer, Smart Blogger is a complete guide.

Now your starting to get the hang of WordPress I hope, and well on your way to building a personal brand to sell more cars or anything else for that matter. Take a look at the free WordPress site I built for this tutorial at diydigitalsales.wordpress.com.

Next you’ll need to write some blog posts. If you picked a theme that is more of a website with a static home page and you feel a blog is not necessary, you can skip this step but my advice is to stick with the plan. Blog posts are easy and allow you to add fresh content to your site from anywhere, including your phone or tablet. Click on the link in your dashboard for “posts” and get to writing. I usually delete the existing posts and start from scratch but if this is your first time doing this, edit the existing posts to see how they work. Write at least three new posts and remember to click “update” when done.

Building a personal brand is hard work but it will pay off if you stick with it. Just keep at it and remember that it will take time for your website to get ranked on Google, Bing and all the other search engines out there. I’ll show you a tip to speed up the process but the most important thing is to write good content. Then tell people where they can find it using social media and other digital channels to spread the word. Here’s a peek at my free blog posts.

Last but certainly no least you’ll need to update the pages that came with your theme. Most free WP themes have Home, Blog, Contact and About pages. Make sure you update each of them with your photos, links and information. Pay very special attention to the content in your about page. This is a great place to tell people why they should buy from you. Add testimonials from previous happy customers, links to any specials you have and anything you think a potential client should know about you.

I’m working on a video tutorial of this step to put on my YouTube channel and will add the link here when it’s ready for your viewing pleasure.

Now that you have your site looking the way you want it, press the launch button! WP will now try to sell you some additional services again. If you want to keep this free, just click “no thanks, I’ll continue with a free site.” They change this part sometimes, so just avoid the pay this amount options. If you want to build a powerful blog, one with robust plug-ins and tools, you’ll want to go the wordpress.org route. So don’t pay WordPress.com anything if that’s your intention at this point.

I built this blog on Building a Personal Brand with BlueHost and WordPress.org. If you find your free site is working and you want to take it to the next level you can always migrate your free site. You will not need to start over. It’s a little more advanced but it can be done. As I’ve said before, building a personal brand is not easy but when it starts to drive new business your way for free, you’ll be glad you did it.

About the Author:
I’ve been in the automotive retail industry for 25+ years. During this time I’ve held every position from Salesperson to General Manager. I even spent three years in fixed ops and yes, my time there was on purpose. During my time working in a car dealership, I learned a few things about myself. First, I love helping people (teaching) and second, I love digital marketing (especially SEO.) Writing a blog on building a personal brand allows me to do both.

Building a Personal Brand Part 3 is up next. We’ll start looking at ways to promote yourself online now that we have a website or nucleus.

Thanks for reading part 2 of building a personal brand for automotive sales professionals. I truly hope you found it helpful. If you missed part 1, make sure you start at the beginning.