AM Awards 2016 citation - Best Use of Social Media

A group-wide resolve to embrace social media has rewarded Perry’s Motor Sales with a vast online following and yet another AM Award.

After securing this award in 2015, the group’s presence on Facebook, Twitter and Google+ has continued to grow, and to fulfil the aim of “building a community of next-generation car buyers” laid out when Perrys decided to take social media seriously back in 2013.

Perrys also wanted to show the human side of the group, protecting the brand’s reputation, addressing any complaints that may occur online and engaging with customers more.

The group has 31 location-based pages – run by dealerships trained and monitored by an in-house digital marketing team – and one central Perrys Motor Sales page, which provides the basis for lead-generating adverts.

All 1,850 Perrys staff have had social media training and been trained how to run their own pay-per-click adverts via Facebook, so far generating more than £1 million in incremental turnover.

Perrys Motor Sales has an average reach of 500,000 people a week across all its Facebook pages, has more than 6,000 followers on Twitter and 1,000 on Google+.

Interaction has become a key component of its online brand, with customers posting videos and photos of their experiences with their cars online.

One customer’s online posts from a European tour in a Jaguar F-Type helped to make Facebook the highest-converting referrer for the £60,000+ sports car.

The AM Awards judges said: “It has a powerful strategy across a breadth of media and is well resourced. The winner last year too, it has advanced since.”