by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, (August 17, 2017)

Think like the customer and understand their needs. It may sound simple, says Jim Brannen, VP of ecommerce at BuyAutoParts, but it works. Tailor the content and advertisements across search and title the search. Descriptions become a key element.
BuyAutoParts, an online auto parts distributor founded in 1987, began using AdWords in 2010. Since then the company took advertising offline to online and then began focusing on mobile.

An interesting yet little-known fact that has become a focus is that consumers can buy auto parts online and take them to their neighborhood professional mechanic to have the parts installed. AdWords helps to target this message to a range of potential customers. Being able to educate customers and save them money has always been a major company objective. The company believes that a strong online presence helps make this a reality.

Understanding the relationship and performance between AdWords and the overall business is also important. Measuring the impact of AdWords, in the context of other advertising channels, gives BuyAutoParts the insight needed into the channels available to influence change in the overall performance of the business.

Working with Google, Jim Brannen, VP of ecommerce at BuyAutoParts, says the company has made the mobile site faster and more user friendly. Testing also has helped to redesign the site to focus on the checkout button and other details to above the fold and has changed the checkout process from five steps to two.

Brad Paugh, marketing manager at BuyAutoParts, said the company continually tests features. “The old website was poor, the user interface was bad, and as soon as you added something to the cart it became a five-stage process,” he said.

The mobile site managed to increase the speed by 50% and mobile conversion rates by 80%.

More than half of BuyAutoParts’s customers come to the site via a mobile device — specifically a smartphone — since December 2016, Paugh said. The price and order value of the parts typically drives the consumer to search on their mobile phone for the item and make the purchase on a desktop or laptop, or even place a phone call, he said.

These days Paugh said the company is testing a new mobile home page and mobile car page, and on the desktop tests are being run on the search results bar.

The team also works with Google Shopping. Brannen said BuyAutoParts sends about 1 million product IDs, equivalent to one million ads that can be served at any time, in their feed to Google Shopping.

MediaPost.com: Search Marketing Daily

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