Competitive Strategies followed Automobile Industry

 Pricing Strategy:
1) Penetration & psychological pricing strategies

In order to gain a great market share, many companies embrace the penetration pricing
strategy. The company aims to set up a customer-based price in the market. This is
primarily achieved by providing a free to low price for their products or services to a
limited period of time. This later on, with a revised version comes into the market as a
premium product with a little raise in the price. This strategy is implied to meet the
expectation that consumers will hop on to new brands when they're priced low. On the
other hand, a psychological pricing strategy is a method that embraces a consumer's
emotional response rather than considering their rational one. Here consumer ignores the
quality of a service/ product but sticks on to the costing price.

2) Product line & economy pricing strategies

The product line pricing strategy is nothing but, providing service with an option to
upgrade upon choosing higher value packs. Consumers are pushed to compare the
packages and choose a wise plus cost-effective product or service. The other purpose of
the product line strategy is to bring a product or service to the spotlight which had low
visibility or recognition earlier. Whereas, economy pricing strategy embraces no to the
low marketing cost in product or service promotion. It's more like the budget pricing of a
product or service. A great example would be promoting only a certain range of products
or services that shall gain specific and quick attention among people. 

3) Customer value-based pricing strategy

This is the most effective method that is followed by many successful automobile
companies. Value-based pricing is a nothing but, price setting strategy that exclusively
focuses on consumer perceived value of a service or product. This is entirely based on
how consumers value the product and how they find it worth buying. Many companies
that offer unique and high-value products choose this strategy in setting the price. The
value-based pricing embraces customer's abilities to buy a product by considering the
unparalleled experience upon buying a particular service or a product. Many luxury
automakers find customer-value based pricing strategy an effective method of approach.
A value-based strategy will enable manufacturing companies to extend the life-cycle of
existing products and will help to establish a great bond with value-added suppliers.
  Non – Pricing Strategy (Advertising Strategy)
1) Video marketing

Video content is king in the auto industry. For many car shoppers, seeing is believing, so they
need to understand the complete look and feel of a vehicle before they can envision
themselves in a new car. Whether you’re adding video to your website, sharing it on social
media, or uploading it on YouTube, online video can offer your potential customers an
experience that persuades them to buy before they leave the house.

The effectiveness of video in encouraging consumers to take action is proven. Research from
Google shows that over 40% of auto shoppers who watched a video about cars or trucks
ended up visiting a dealership as a direct result. With your video doing much of the work,
your on-site sales pros will simply need to give a final push to persuade visitors to buy.

Online videos that produce the most results for car dealerships typically showcase a vehicle’s
build and major features. These may include video test drives, accessory demos, and even
360 virtual reality videos that fully immerse viewers inside the car setting.

Overall, this automotive marketing strategy is all about creating proof that your cars function
as claimed and showing, rather than telling, viewers why the given vehicle provides the
experience they want and need.

2) Online review management

As trust in car dealerships continues its steady decline, keeping up with your online

reputation management is a great opportunity to get more car buyers to your dealership. A big
part of this is responding to your online reviews (even giving professional responses to the
negative ones) and actively working to increase the amount of positive reviews you have.

In addition to general review sites like Google and Facebook, auto marketers should also be
paying close attention to feedback on auto dealership review sites, including CARFAX
reviews. These platforms are destinations for serious car buyers, who are more likely to
choose your dealership if your customers have good things to say. After all, online reviews
are just as powerful as a peer recommendation—but they also can reach thousands of
consumers at once.

When you pair your automotive marketing strategy with Podium Reviews, your customers
will automatically receive invites to review you on all the platforms that matter. As you start
getting more reviews, you can respond to all your customers on a single platform for a more
streamlined process.
 3) Creating a user-friendly web experience

Building a website designed for the consumers who need it is essential to capturing their
attention. The website would load quickly and be easy to navigate for all consumers, whether
they’re on their smartphones, tablets, or computers.

Your website should also take search engine optimization (SEO) into consideration. Inserting
keywords throughout your site and blog copy will not only help you rank higher for relevant
terms, but it will also allow you to give car shoppers the answers they need. Consider what
features they may be looking for—for example, “best gas mileage” or “best luxury cars,”
depending on your target audience.

When developing a user-focused SEO strategy, you should always take into account local
SEO. Car buyers tend to shop for dealers near them, which means a complete Google My
Business listing can make a big difference. You can get our local SEO checklist to ensure
your listing is set for attracting nearby buyers.

In addition to organic SEO, you can also add Google pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns to your
automotive marketing strategy. Google actually offers a Model Automotive ad format, which
is designed specifically to target car buyers and lead to a 30% higher engagement rate. These
search engine ads will catapult your company to the top of search results pages for the
keywords you’re targeting, helping you generate more leads faster.

4) SMS marketing

With nearly 80% of the population are owning smartphones and the majority of all online
traffic coming from mobile devices, catering to this consumer behaviour can put you ahead of
the competitors. Smartphone users spend hours each day on their phones, leading to an
average 82% open rate for all text message marketing campaigns. Using SMS marketing will
help you reach your potential customers on a platform where they’re actively looking for
messages.

In fact, 68% of car shoppers are very open to chatting online with car dealers. This means car
buyers want to interact with experts—as long as it’s convenient to them. This is an
opportunity for the representatives to have a direct influence on shoppers while they’re still
deciding where to visit.

With Podium Webchat, one can blend the best of live chat and SMS by adding a button to
your site that captures leads and allows you to continue your conversation through text. This
powerful tool enables the dealership to build relationships while helping shoppers move
further through the customer journey in real-time.
  Price Discrimination Strategy
We can find a number of price discrimination related strategies by a different player in the
automobile industry. Some of these are
Maruti Suzuki providing loyalty cards to consumers who have been long associated with the
companies. These cards provide a discount in service and parts which are to be used in due
course of time. This system of discrimination has helped Maruti to keep customers stuck to
the company even after the sales.
Hyundai had also once come up with a kind of discriminated pricing by segmenting and
targeting specific populations which also helped them to boost their growth. For example,
zero down payment financing vehicles for senior citizens and women. This helped the
particular population as well as their families.
We have also seen such strategies being followed by Hero Motor Corp as well. Benefits to
people belonging to financially weaker sections of the society have also helped the brand to
be a market leader in the budget segments of vehicles.