How to create successful listings that generate sales
By Nicole Schantz
With summer in full swing, many anglers and boat enthusiasts are shopping for their next boat. It’s important that your dealership creates appealing listings that capture the attention of potential buyers and turn them into promising connections and leads that will ultimately generate sales. Boatline, an online marketplace for buying and selling boats, recently analyzed over 189,000 boat listings and the competitive features that contributed to their success over the past 12 months. Here are four listing features that will benefit your dealership this summer.
1. Add High-Quality Photos
Photos are an extremely important element of successful listings. The more photos you include, the better. Compared to listings with zero photos, those with 1-4 images generate 179% more daily connections. That number skyrockets when you add additional photos. Compared to listings with zero photos, those with 5 or more photos generate 484% more daily connections. This is a clear indicator that buyers prioritize photos when browsing through listings. It’s critical to make a positive first impression as quickly as possible, so make sure the photos you include are high-quality, high-resolution, and well-lit. Some important areas to photograph include the dinette, galley, cabin, head, cockpit, and flybridge.
2. Incorporate Video
If you want to increase the overall appeal of your inventory listings, video is a great strategy. Only 10% of all listings contain video. However, those listings generate 22% more daily connections than those without video. This tells us that potential buyers enjoy consuming video that illuminates a boat’s specifications in a way that helps aid their purchase decision. Full boat tours and shorter clips that highlight special features are both wise to consider.
3. Always Include Price
The price of a boat should always be clearly stated in its listing. If you intentionally leave out the price, you’re creating more work for potential buyers. Compared to listings that fail to provide pricing information, listings with price generate 313% more daily connections. This number illustrates the importance of price transparency. Some dealerships falsely believe that buyers will call over for more information if they’re interested enough, especially if the price isn’t provided. However, this is an incorrect assumption. Most shoppers believe a boat without a price is out of their budget.
4. Add Sufficient Detail
Compared to listings with shorter descriptions, listings that have at least 250 characters in their description box generate 10% more daily connections. What this tells us is that listing descriptions are important to shoppers and should highlight all relevant information about each boat. Make sure to include the boat’s history, features, strong selling points, and any noteworthy technology onboard. This information will help shoppers find the exact boat they want.
At the end of the day, as a dealer, it’s important to adopt a consumer’s mindset and build your listings accordingly. Including key components, such as high-quality photos, video, price, and sufficient detail will drive more interest to your listings and make it easier for consumers to make an informed purchase decision.
Nicole Schantz is the Vice President of OEM and Strategic Partnerships at Trader Interactive, parent company of Boatline. She has been a valuable member of Trader Interactive for 18 years and played a vital role in the launch of Boatline.com in 2021. Nicole and her team are continually optimizing the online marketplace experience for both dealers and OEM partners. Much of Boatline’s success can be attributed to Nicole’s leadership and determination.
