Dealership Video Strategy: Subaru Of Wichita’s Aaron Wirtz Weighs In

Aaron Wirtz recently spoke to DrivingSales News about the importance of video at a dealership. Wirtz has been the man in front of and behind the camera at Subaru of Wichita as well as Super Car Guys. Wirtz spoke to DrivingSales News about ways in which dealers can improve their video effort. He did so not from the standpoint of whether or not dealers should use video, but rather gave insight into what dealers might miss in their video ad campaigns. S

peaking to DrivingSales News Wirtz explained, “Never-ever will you hear anyone (dealers) talk about how we present ourselves on video how we perform on video. It’s almost like just having a video is as good as any other video possibly could be.”

In addition to dealers potentially thinking that one video is as good as the next, Wirtz also explained that dealers might invest a lot of time and money into commercials while all the while overlooking one of the most important aspects of the ad.

“A dealer will either develop the creative or have someone develop it for them. They’ll go to all the trouble of setting up the shoot, they’ll shoot the commercial they’ll buy tens of thousands of dollars worth of airtime. But oh there’s this seemingly insignificant detail that the person that you put on camera is ineffective.”

When Wirtz refers to the effectiveness or lack thereof of dealership video campaigns, he isn’t necessarily talking about TV commercials. Rather, some dealers put out cellphone productions that Wirtz feels could be less effective.

“All salespeople need to do these cellphone walk-arounds. They’re holding the camera like this (holds hand in selfie position above head) and they’re squinting like this and they have sunglasses on. I mean imagine if you were to receive a cellphone video with nothing but someone’s head looking at your like this (eyes squinting, head close to camera)…hey got your 93′ Accord here we’re gonna…you know? For some reason that’s something that we never talk about.”

The big question with all of the video advice Wirtz has given is what does it add up to? How did it impact your bottom line to have a lot of commercials with the right guy on camera? For SuperCarGuys and Aaron Wirtz, it has meant a lot of growth. “We went from one store selling 75 cars a month, and now we’re at three stores selling over 300 cars a month and so it’s been nothing short of phenomenal,” Wirtz said.

What is the video strategy at your dealership? Do you agree with the advice given by Aaron Wirtz? Should dealers invest in who they have on camera and avoid amateur cellphone videos?