Web marketing advised for automotive firms

Automotive firms should consider investing in internet marketing to reach young, web-savvy consumers.

This is one of the suggestions put forward by Microsoft following a survey it commissioned from KRC Research.

The poll asked 400 young US adults born in the 1980s and 1990s - the so-called millennial generation - about their online preferences when it came to communications from and with automotive manufacturers and dealers.

Nine in ten said they wanted to see websites offer details on car purchase options and service history, with other respondents expressing preferences for communicating with companies via instant messaging, social networks and blogs.

"For automakers to court these tech-savvy consumers, they need to embrace newer technologies as a way to communicate and sell more effectively to them," said Microsoft's Dave Graff.

About 71 per cent of millennial consumers read or watch user-generated content online, according to a study conducted by Deloitte last year.