Car dealer group Arnold Clark is one of the most searched for brands in the UK automotive sector and has the largest social influence of any franchised dealer.
According to research on the last 12 months by digital marketing agency Inside Online, Arnold Clark has the second highest search volume for companies in the sector per month – and is the seventh most influential company on social media.
In search volume terms the Scottish-based dealer comes behind Auto Trader for total brand searches per month.
It comes ahead of WeBuyAnyCar, Motors, Auto Express and other dealers Evans Halshaw, Stoneacre, Lookers and Sytner.
And in terms of the number of organic searches, Arnold Clark again scored highest of any franchised group, coming seventh in this measure also, with organic search volume up 40%.
“The increase in social media influence, content marketing campaigns, brand ambassadors and fierce competition within the industry means it is more important now more than ever for companies to cement their positions within the search engines,” said Inside Online.
In terms of its social appeal Arnold Clark beats the likes of RAC Cars, WeBuyAnyCar.com and CarGiant.co.uk.
The most influential automotive company on social media is Auto Trader. Below them in the top 10 are Auto Express, Parkers, Pistonheads, Exchange and Mart and Motors.
Inside Online said: “Social Influence is starting to affect the search engines more over time. We’re seeing a shift from basic ‘how many likes does a page have’ towards engagement with the user.
“Active pages that promote great content and engagement have higher performance metrics than those who build pages purely with the motivation of having a well-liked page.
“This data shows who has been the best at promoting engagement through the social channels, Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and Stumbleupon.”
Following Arnold Clark in the top 30 influential companies are franchised groups Lookers, Sytner, Evans Halshaw, Bristol Street, HR Owen, Jennings, Perrys, Jardine, Stoneacre and Marshall.
Social influence score
Jeremy has been a journalist for 30 years, 20 of which have been in business-to-business automotive. He was a writer and news editor on AM-sister brand Fleet News for three years before setting up the AM website. For the last five years he has been Bauer B2B’s head of digital helping to manage the digital assets of AM, together with Fleet News, Commercial Fleet, Rail and Smart Transport.
Peter McCullough - 27/06/2015 08:32
The big franchised groups like Arnold Clark and Pendragon and supermarkets like Car Giant invest significant sums in marketing and branding and rightly deserve to be in a strong position on the web. Their stock is the mainstay of the 'independent' portals helping those sites retain credibility and traffic at low cost.