The Best SEO Keywords For Car Dealerships

If you’re wondering what the best SEO keywords for car dealerships are, here’s the answer:

There is no universal set of “best” SEO keywords for car dealers.

If there was a set of “best” SEO keywords, search engine optimization would be much easier than it currently is for car dealers.

However, even though there’s no universal set of best SEO keywords to use for a car dealership – I’ll share some of how I go about finding the best keywords for car dealerships using my 10+ years of experience as a digital marketer.

Recommended Reading: Car Dealership SEO: Best Practices For Results

Start With Your Goals

The first thing you should do is identify your goals and what you’d like SEO to accomplish for you.

Saying things like “more leads” and “more organic traffic” might sound like suitable answers but since they’re broad statements – more leads or organic traffic may not help you.

For example, If I bring in more traffic and leads for vehicles you don’t have inventory for – would you be satisfied? Or, would you prefer more leads and traffic for the inventory you have on the lot? Odds are, you’ll prefer more traffic and leads for vehicles you can sell right now.

So start with your goals and make them as specific as you can

Make A List Of Your Important Pages

Once you have your goals, make a list of the pages on your website that are important for achieving one of your goals.

For example, if you want to increase leads to your service department, your service center page would be important.

You could also go more specific and add individual service pages to your list of important pages as well. This might include pages such as:

• brake service
• oil change service
• car battery

Regardless, this list of pages that you put together will be important for a later step and allow us to figure out the best SEO keywords for your car dealership.

Find Your Competitors Equivalent Page

Once you have a list of your important pages, go to your competitor’s website and find their equivalent pages. However, sometimes your competitors won’t have equivalent pages.

So, if your competitors don’t have a page that’s equivalent to yours – find a similar page or the “main” page for that department.

For example, if you’re trying to run a keyword gap report on your brake service page and your competitors don’t have a brake service page or something similar – use your competitor’s main service page.

In situations like this, you’re not chasing perfection. Sometimes opportunities are found when comparing pages that are very different than each other.

Generate A Keyword Gap Report

A “keyword gap report” is basically a list of keywords that your competition ranks for that you don’t. This “report” (basically a list) will become your list of “best” SEO keywords for your car dealership.

I recommend using paid SEO software (such as Semrush) to generate this keyword gap report. While it’s possible to create a keyword gap report without using paid tools, it’s much faster to use a paid tool – especially if you don’t do SEO regularly.

The process for generating a keyword gap report will involve finding the keywords your page ranks for, the keywords your competitor’s page ranks for, and then comparing that list to find the unique keywords your competitor’s page ranks for that you don’t.

Final Thoughts

That’s the process I start with when trying to find the “best” SEO keywords for the car dealerships I do SEO for.

This process isn’t foolproof by any means and can sometimes yield very few results (especially if you’re doing a much better job than your competition). However, it’s a simple and effective method in most cases.

So, if you’re trying to find the best keywords to improve SEO for your car dealership, I highly recommend trying the above process.

Recommended Reading: Automotive SEO Guide For Car Dealerships