Boat Marketing for Dealership: Why Selling Boats Requires a Different Marketing Approach No ratings yet.

The marine or boat industry is a high-consideration industry. This means that the products that are being sold (or rented) are extremely expensive. This also means that boat dealerships have hundreds of thousands or even millions invested without ever making a single dollar.

This article will focus on why the boat industry requires a robust digital marketing strategy. So, if you’re a marina, a boat dealer, a rent-a-boat business, a yacht broker, or anything similar – then this article is for you.

Let’s dive in!

Marketing has never been more difficult. Sure, you’ve got so many channels available, you’ve got so many tools to choose from, but everyone’s using marketing to gain a competitive edge. Everyone. Sure, some businesses don’t market themselves, which gives you a glimpse of hope, until you realize that you aren’t competing against them at all. This means that you’re up against giants from the get-go.

And the scary part is that if you don’t make it (or you don’t do well enough) in the highly competitive marine industry, you’ll be highly in debt. You’re incentivized to make a profit from the start and as soon as possible. That’s why you’ll see boat dealerships spend a considerable amount of resources on online marketing.

But for the marketing to be successful, you’ll need a specific approach.

Think about the difference between selling a scented candle and a cybersecurity system for a bank. They’re not even in the same universe, right? The candle is easy; mood, color, price – that’s what you focus on.

But how do you make a cybersecurity system look pretty on a website? Or safe? Or worth the crazy amount of money it costs?

Based on this example, the boat industry is closer to a cybersecurity system.

What Makes the Marine Business More Difficult to Market Than Others

Why are industries such as the boat, farm equipment, construction equipment, solar installation, and any other industry that works with complex and very expensive items so difficult to market?

We’re focusing on the boat market in this article, but the general challenges this industry faces from a marketing perspective are similar to other such industries.

If your marketing strategy isn’t really doing that great, the easiest thing to do is to blame the competition. But let’s be honest – competition is almost never the culprit here.

What you need to focus on is how a customer makes the decision because that’s the real difference in this case.

Let’s say you’re buying a small consumer purchase (e.g., a Kayak accessory).

That’s not a hard decision to make, is it? You’ve done it so many times before; it’s affordable, you know what to expect from such an accessory, and even if you buy the wrong one, no biggie. Someone doing the marketing for said notebook doesn’t have to try very hard. They just have to make it visible and easy to get. These types of items pretty much sell themselves.

Now compare that Kayak accessory to a boat.

This isn’t a decision anyone makes on a whim because it’s a huge purchase. It’s expensive. For most people, it’s luxury. The product itself is very complicated, and the buyer usually isn’t an expert in this field, so they’re terrified of making a mistake. They’ll research, ask around, check references, and think of the risks in the long run.

Now think about someone buying a $120,000 fishing boat from a dealership. They won’t go to the shop and just buy the first one they see. What they’ll do is extensive research. They’ll compare boat dealerships, inventory, financing options, insurance, warranties, parts availability, mechanics, customer reviews, as well as customer service should the need ever arise.

But even after they buy the boat, they’ll also need to park it somewhere: a marina. They want a slip that’s safe, in a marina that has good service, and where they’ll have peace of mind. Any marketer that specializes in the marine/boat industry, such as the Marine Marketing Agency experts, is fully aware of all that, which is why their marketing efforts are focused on the worries boat owners have (or might have).

Overall, the hard part when it comes to marketing isn’t how many competitors you have but whether the purchase of that product is an easy decision or not.

But don’t fall into the trap of looking at competitors and thinking that you can’t get there. You’ve just started; you’re not supposed to be there yet.

Travis Bliffen, the owner of one of the top-rated SEO agencies, Stellar SEO, said something wise that every business should implement into their strategy: “Don’t compare your chapter one to somebody else’s chapter seventeen.” With the right strategy, with effort, and with time, you’ll get there. You might even surpass them.

But back to it, if the product is cheap and low-risk, then marketing is all about convenience. But the higher the risk, the harder the marketing for the product because in that case, you have to build trust and make a complicated product simple; both key performance indicators for this type of business.

And that’s anything but easy.

Factors That Make Boat Dealers Harder To Market

Some businesses market themselves with hardly any effort, and then there are those where that approach will give you… Well, crickets.

Here’s why (spoiler alert: it’s neither luck nor budget).

Boat Dealerships Require More Information For Their Customers

If the product is too technical or too unfamiliar, a simple ad won’t do a thing because customers want proof.

Let’s picture someone buying a boat. They’ll want the full specifications, demo videos, comparison charts, certifications, the works. Nobody’s giving you a pile of cash because they saw a boat in a pretty photo, and that makes perfect sense.

Marketing in this aspect isn’t about grabbing anyone’s attention but about reducing uncertainty. You want to educate the buyer so the purchase feels safe.

Marine Dealerships Will Have Fewer Purchase Opportunities

You’ll sell a cup of coffee every day, but a boat? Probably not.

Someone buying a boat will spend months researching and taking test drives before they finally buy a vessel they’ll probably keep for years. Repeat business is always a good thing, but in this business? You can’t really count on them alone.

That’s why newsletters are so important, as are industry events and helpful content. You have to keep showing up.

Boat Dealerships Spend A Lot On Digital Marketing To Boost Their Online Reputation

You need advertising, no doubt about that.

But you need a good reputation even more. A guy looking for a dealership will ask around before they make a single call, and you want people to recommend you. Reviews, certifications, and years of being reliable will build trust, and trust is everything when you’re selling something big and expensive.

Industry memberships, such as businesses that are part of the Marine Retailers Association, can also help increase trust as well as credibility.

Which Marine Marketing Strategy Works In Marine Marketing?

Social media platforms, targeted ads, PPC (e.g., Google Ads), customer relationship management (CRM), Dealer Management Systems, content marketing, mobile optimization, and just generally increasing digital visibility and web traffic. All these work in almost every market; they aren’t specific to the boat industry.

So, what makes the boat industry different? Which marketing solutions are specific to this market?

Well, there are a couple of marketing campaigns you should look out for:

Local SEO

Local SEO is the highest ROI long-term investment for any boat dealership.

Boat buyers tend to look to buy within driving distance, so that they can inspect the product in person (or even bring a mechanic with them to inspect it), and they’ll also likely want to haul the boat back. But to even get to the point of buying, they’ll compare your dealership with nearby ones (e.g., boat dealership near me).

Using ‘near me’ in the search query or using a location carries a very strong purchase intent, meaning the searcher is very interested and is already further along the sales funnel (a.k.a. hot lead).

This is why every boat dealership should heavily invest in their Google Business Profile (GBP). This means proper setup (first getting verified) and fully optimizing the profile, setting it up exactly for the product and/or service your boat business specializes in. Pictures and local keywords are very important, but so are customer reviews. Local SEO ensures that not only local buyers come to your business, but also nearby ones.

Motivating customers to leave reviews will help get more authentic ones. A great approach is sending a review link to the customers because it’s a one-click option instead of the customer having to look it up. A scannable QR code that leads to the review page is also a great approach.

Reviews signal to search engines (mainly Google) that your business is worthy. All this will help your GBP rank among featured businesses (the top 3) for your target keyword. And if your GBP is not among the top 3, it’s as if it doesn’t exist. So you need to do it properly.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is one of the most underrated marketing channels. It brings one of the highest ROIs to pretty much any business; email marketing (on avg.) yields an ROI of $42 (USD) for every $1 spent.

With that being said, typical open rates for marketing emails hover around the 20% mark, meaning that approx. 80% of marketing emails go unread. This is why boat marketers should use segmented email lists to improve both relevance and engagement rates.

Also, 89% of customers prefer communication via text over phone calls. And email, even though it’s very flexible, falls under the text category.

But high-value businesses such as the boat industry especially benefit from this channel since the buying cycle for boats is long and marine dealers know this. Plus, if you add to this the fact that buyers rarely buy after just one visit, you get how email marketing helps keep your specific dealership on top of the (almost-to-be) buyer’s mind.

Email is also a great way to interact with past buyers in terms of service, upgrades, new technology/accessories, trade-ins, etc. And it’s also great for lead generation.

Professional Photography & Video

Photography might seem like a no-brainer. But in the age of AI and stock photos, it’s rare to find high-quality professional photography AND video. And video (especially short-form) is extremely important. Search engines and social media love it, especially if it’s taken with your phone.

Most modern phones have amazing cameras enabling them to deliver professional-level material for your website, listing, and social.

Buyers and interested parties can inspect every detail of the boat before committing, especially if you can take this a step further and add sea-trial videos. This shows people what they’d be getting for their money without them having to see the product in person.

Psychological studies show that lifestyle-driven photo carousels that feature real families enjoying boat activities speak to buyers on an emotional level and help with conversion rates.

Online Listings / Boat Marketplaces

Again, a no-brainer, but this is probably the most marine-specific strategy out there.

86% of marine buyers shop digitally. Also, online boat listings saw approx. a 106% increase in leads each year.

Think about it: boats are more emotional purchases than anything else. A car can be emotional, but a car you need (it can be a work car that takes you from point A to point B. But boats? Pure emotion.

A good boat trader will make sure they have the most up-to-date and the most attractive online boat listings showing potential boat buyers their entire inventory. The listings also need to have a filter of sorts to enable browsers to compare boats, compare prices, look up specific models, etc.

A boat dealership without listings or without at least being connected to a boat marketplace has poor visibility and weak inventory management, which makes it doomed to fail.

Conclusion

Marketing isn’t hard because you’re bad at it. It’s hard because it simply is. And if a customer has to swallow a high price and question marks, it’s even worse.

There’s no single answer that will explain how marketing works because it needs to be tweaked according to the industry and the product you’re selling.

So, step back and look at things honestly.

How do your customers decide to buy? What kind of questions do they need answered?

Once you know that, everything else gets easier.