The UK’s automotive industry is in the middle of its biggest shift in decades.

Under the government’s updated plans (April 2025), the sale of new petrol and diesel cars will end in 2030. Full and plug-in hybrids can be sold until 2035, but from 2035 every new car sold in the UK must be zero emission.

Producing better cars and varied offerings shouldn’t be the sole focus of a marketing campaign. Dealerships also need visibility that matches how buyers now research EVs, hybrids, and aftersales – not just showroom stock.

Automotive businesses must keep up with new competitors and technologies without losing sight of what customers want today. Investing in automotive SEO is a crucial part of that, helping car dealerships get found in Google’s organic search results.

What is automotive SEO?

Car buying used to happen almost entirely on the forecourt, but more and more of the journey now happens online. There’s little point investing heavily in a website unless you also follow automotive SEO best practices that support how people actually buy cars.

For many buyers, the route to your showroom starts with an online search, so your site needs to be built and optimised to meet search engines’ high (and ever-changing) expectations.

Car buyers do a lot of research before they settle on the right vehicle and dealer, so your on-site and off-site SEO should reflect what they’re looking for.

Your website can do much more than help customers find a vehicle to buy. It can showcase your dealership’s expertise and meet other needs, from repairs and servicing to finding the right tyres.

Getting those customers to your website relies on SEO that covers the whole journey, from model research to finance, servicing, and parts.

How to improve your automotive SEO

Finding out what your potential customers search for is essential, but good SEO for car dealers covers much more than keywords. You won’t rank well without a well-designed, user-friendly website.

Remember, a car buyer’s journey usually involves a wealth of digital interactions, from watching test drives on YouTube to comparing reviews of local dealerships. Treat the five areas below as an ongoing operating system for your dealership, not a one-off checklist. Two jobs in particular never stop: aftersales content and redirects for models that are discontinued each year.

How to use keyword research to pick the right keywords

Choosing the right keywords is crucial for automotive SEO (and SEO in general). Broadly, you have a choice of short-tail and long-tail keywords.

Short-tail keywords are the most popular, generic automotive searches – “electric cars”, “Volkswagen cars for sale”, and so on.

They have high search volumes, but they’re highly competitive and less likely to bring in the buyers you want. Tools like Ahrefs give each keyword a difficulty score, which shows how hard it will be to rank for.

In such a competitive industry, long-tail keywords (more specific phrases, usually three words or more) are often a better bet, and they tend to convert well.

They have lower search volumes, but less competition gives you a better chance of ranking and earning the click.

Think of phrases like “used Ford cars for sale” or “hybrid cars with panoramic sunroof” that match exactly what a customer needs.

Keyword research will uncover plenty of terms to target, but it also pays to keep a close eye on your competitors.

Competitors’ keywords

Your competitors are writing for a similar audience, so look at which keywords they target and whether they rank for them.

You can use this to find gaps in your own content, such as categories or subcategories you haven’t covered yet. It also saves time, as you’re learning from pages that already rank well.

User intent

Think about what your users are trying to do. For most dealerships, the first audience is local, and local factors such as weather and traffic shape what people look for. A buyer in London is likely to want a very different car from someone in rural Lincolnshire.

Many customers will want to visit a nearby dealership to inspect the vehicle and test drive it, so make sure local keywords are part of your strategy.

Searches like “car dealerships near me” and model-plus-location queries such as “used Kia Sportage Leeds” are core demand for dealerships. A consistent Google Business Profile and localised landing pages should sit alongside your national model keywords.

Getting these right is how local buyers find you. For multi-location dealer groups, enterprise local SEO keeps every branch’s listing and landing page consistent.

Localised content helps too, such as a page for each branch, local events you’re involved in, or suggested test-drive routes nearby.

It’s also worth tracking searches about common problems, then publishing content that answers them and positions your dealership as the expert.

For example, someone searching “car making a rattling noise when driving” probably needs a repair. A page explaining the likely causes can bring them to your website, and then to your service centre.

Ultimately, search engines want to send people to the most helpful result, so your keywords and content need to match what customers need at each stage of their journey.

A parent looking for a new car probably won’t start by searching for their nearest dealership. They’re more likely to search for something like “best family cars”, so create content that answers those early questions and links through to the relevant models you sell.

Unique and relevant content

Once your keyword research brings visitors to your site, you need to give them a reason to stay.

That means content that’s informative, engaging, and relevant, whether it’s blogs with tips on buying a used car, videos showing a vehicle’s performance, or a finance calculator.

Many car dealerships don’t publish regularly, often limiting updates to new offers and promotions. Varied content that targets different types of search intent (informational, navigational, commercial, and transactional) is more likely to outrank your competitors.

One effective way to do this is to build a content hub around your ranges, ownership costs, EV charging, and aftersales FAQs, so informational pieces support your commercial vehicle pages. Pair your editorial plan with a technical content audit so templates stay crawlable as stock changes.

A news section covering the brands you sell, business updates, technical information, and other topics your customers care about can also help.

Keyword research will inspire plenty of ideas, but competitor analysis and Google’s “People also ask” box are good sources too.

Make sure your content is planned strategically, optimised, and naturally keyword-rich. Keep Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines (experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness) in mind when you write it.

Relevant titles, H1s and URLs

Page titles (H1s) sit at the top of a page and tell users and search engines what it’s about.

A good title also sets expectations. “7 ways to improve your car’s fuel economy” tells readers they’ll get seven practical tips.

Don’t confuse a page title with an SEO title (or title tag). The title tag is what usually appears in search results, and it’s one of the signals Google uses to understand what your page is about.

It also needs to be engaging enough to earn the click, because a high ranking is worth little if nobody chooses your result.

Keep an eye on how Google displays your SEO titles in the SERPs, use Google Search Console to check for changes in your key pages’ click-through rates, and use GA4 to see how engaged visitors are once they arrive.

Clean URLs matter too. They should describe what’s on the page, which helps both users and search engines.

Keep URLs short, use hyphens between words, and include a relevant keyword or variant that matches search intent. For example, a guide to buying a used car could use /buying-a-used-car/ to match that popular search query.

Importance of URL structure

Your URL structure needs to be intuitive so search engines and users can understand the connections between different pages on your site.

Plan a hierarchical URL structure early (for example, brand → range → model → offers) so internal links and crawl paths stay stable as inventory turns over. Our guide to SEO URL structure covers patterns that hold up when models change. Once this is implemented, it’s much easier to pick the right URL keywords for each page and avoid technically duplicate URLs.

When determining the positioning of your pages within the hierarchy, remember that pages closer to your homepage in your internal linking structure tend to receive more link value, so put your most important ranges and models within a few clicks of it.

Technical SEO tips for automotive websites

Those are the main on-page elements, but there are some technical SEO elements you need to hone if you want to stay in the driving seat.

Mobile-friendly design

Mobile phones are now a crucial part of the car buying process, letting buyers research prices, models, and specs from anywhere.

Because so much of that research happens on a phone, Google uses mobile-first indexing. This means it primarily uses the mobile version of a page for indexing and ranking.

Make sure your site is fast, accessible, and easy to use on any device, especially your vehicle listings and search filters.

Site speed

Car buyers click between makes and models quickly when viewing a car online. Page experience matters for rankings and conversions, so make sure your site keeps up.

Rather than aiming for a single stopwatch target, prioritise Core Web Vitals – especially Largest Contentful Paint and responsiveness – on mobile inventory and vehicle detail page templates, and monitor field data rather than one-off lab tests.

AutoDealer schema

Schema markup helps search engines understand your website and content, so they can show more informative results.

Start with your most-visited pages, such as vehicle detail and branch pages. Schema can make you eligible for richer search results, but validate eligibility and measure click-through rather than assuming a ranking lift. Our guide to fixing common JSON-LD structured data issues shows how.

We recommend JSON-LD for its flexibility and simplicity, using the Vehicle type (or a more specific type such as Car) to mark up each vehicle in your stock.

Don’t forget to add AutoDealer schema, which Google uses in conjunction with your Google Business Profile.

It gives search engines extra detail about your business, such as your dealership’s name, address, phone number, and opening hours, which supports how you appear in local results and on Google Maps.

Clean up old links

A tidy website has a clear internal linking structure that both Google and users can follow. Every page on your site should have at least one internal link from another relevant page.

In the car industry, models come and go every year, so you need to redirect pages for discontinued models to the most relevant alternative, such as the current range page. That way, users (and any links pointing to the old page) still land somewhere useful.

Similarly, identify pages and posts without links (orphaned pages) and link to them from relevant content so they can be found and pass on authority.

Setting up Analytics and claiming your Google Business Profile

Setting up Google Analytics 4 (GA4) lets you track key metrics, conversions, and user behaviour, so you can see what’s working. It answers questions like “How long are users staying on this page?” and “What are our top events?”

You’ll quickly see what is and isn’t working, from your best-performing landing pages to your top referral sources. Linking GA4 with Google Search Console adds the search queries that bring people in, and linking it with Google Ads helps you build campaigns that create new interest in your dealership.

Configure GA4 with dealership-relevant events, such as vehicle detail page views, finance calculator starts, and booking forms, so you can judge SEO by enquiry quality, not just sessions.

Claim and fully complete your Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business). It’s a free listing that shows your dealership when people search for it by name or location. Add accurate contact details, opening hours, categories, and photos, respond to reviews, and keep it aligned with your on-site AutoDealer markup.

Keeping this information accurate is a small job that can make a real difference to how many local buyers find you.

Keep the engine running

Automotive SEO isn’t a one-off project. Stock changes, models are discontinued, and buyers’ questions shift as more of them consider EVs and hybrids. The dealerships that win in search keep revisiting these five areas as the market moves.

If your dealership group needs automotive SEO that spans inventory templates, aftersales demand, and local visibility, talk to SALT’s automotive SEO specialists.