All States Ag Parts Expands...Again!

National Tractor Parts Dealer Association (NTPDA) member All States Ag Parts has announced the acquisition of Hoye Tractor Parts. The company is located in Iowa Park, TX and specializes in new aftermarket and used parts for Yanmar tractors. Hoye Tractor Parts is predominantly a web-based sales company.

With this acquisition, All States Ag Parts now operates 22 locations in North America including 15 tractor, combine and construction equipment salvage yards. 

John Dyke, CEO of All States Ag Parts said in a release, “Hoye Tractor Parts will add over 200,000 Yanmar after market tractor parts to our product line along with a solid line of used Yanmar parts. This acquisition will tremendously improve our opportunity to serve that segment of our customer base as well as improving our service times in Texas.”

Dyke added that the former owner, Aaron Murray, will remain in place as the manager during the transition of ownership. All other Hoye Tractor Parts employees are being offered jobs with All States Ag Parts. The Iowa Park, TX location will continue to operate under the Hoye Tractor Parts name.

“We are very excited to be working with All States Ag Parts,” said Murray, “All States has a much broader distribution network for parts to help us gain additional market share for our product line."

Congratulations and best wishes from all of us who make up the National Tractor Parts Dealer Association!

About All States Ag Parts - All States Ag Parts is the leading supplier of agricultural parts in North America and carries used, new aftermarket and remanufactured parts for tractors, skid steers, combines and other ag equipment. Parts are stocked for virtually all brands of equipment including John Deere, Case IH, Ford, New Holland, Allis Chalmers, Massey Ferguson, Agco, Hesston and many more.

Hoye Tractor Parts can be reached at 940-592-0181 or online at HoyeTractor.com

All States Ag Parts can be reached at 877-530-4430 or on-line at TractorPartsASAP.com

 

NTPDA News Notes

Congratulations and In the News:

Every so often we catch some news about the tractor parts industry and our members. Last month the Abilene-RC from Kansas ran a story congratulating Blake Swenson the son of Kevin and Jill on his $1,000 National Tractor Parts Dealer Association college scholarship. Blake is headed to North Central Kansas Technical College for a certification in heavy equipment and his NTPDA sponsor was Abilene Machine.  Blake joins many others who were recently awarded scholarship dollars from your association.

If you've got a story about your NTPDA Member Business send it along to our staff writer Michael Libbie.

Sharing Equipment & Cutting Costs

Meanwhile lackluster commodity prices has farmers considering ways to reduce costs. This week Iowa Farmer Today carried a story about how some "Good Neighbors" have struck a deal to share equipment rather than buy new. When a combine is only used a few weeks a year these farmers figure they can improve their bottom line by sharing. Here is the story.

Driverless Tractors

It was all the rage during the Farm Progress Show as farmers and ranchers got a good look at the Case IH tractor that is missing a driver. The Autonomous Concept Vehicle, as Case IH calles it, comes equipped with cameras, radar and GPS, allowing a farmer to remotely monitor planting and harvesting via an app on a tablet computer. Here is the story from Bloomberg Technology. We assume that it will still take a human to change the oil.

Save the Date!

A reminder that we'll be in San Antonio for the 33rd Annual Conference and Trade Show from January 18 - 21, 2017. We'll soon have registration data available but, for now, put it down in ink so we make sure you're there. We've got an exciting and valuable line up for our members and ways to help your business grow.

Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

Paying Attention to your SEO?

The world, it seems, buys from the computer. If not making the direct purchase from the computer we, at least, go to the Internet to find where we can buy an item. The Total Retail Survey of 2016 looks at the buying habits of consumers and in the United States and Canada 40% and 38% respectively make decision purchases based on product and supplier reviews.

But, first they have to find you.

We just completed a quick study using five different computers that have had zero interaction with agricultural parts. In other words the words "Ag", "Tractor" and "Parts" were never used in any product search. We know because we picked people without any connection with agriculture. In each test we asked our subjects to do a search for "Ag Tractor Parts" just to see who and what popped up.

The good news is that several National Tractor Parts Dealer Association regular members showed up on the first page of the search. There were also paid advertising on the first page and that varied from computer to computer. 

The bad news is that many of our members did not make the first, second or even the third page of the search. What can you do to improve your ranking and "findability"?

• Paid Google Ad Words - You can pay for keywords and that investment will drive your search results but, frankly, it's a gamble;
• Review Your Home Page - If the wording on your home page has not changed in some time the "search bots" look at that and think, "Nothing new here, let's move on!" It's critical that you alter, at least every month the wording on your home page and your "About Us" page. It will help get you found;
• Social Media Interaction - If all you are doing is Facebook it is not enough. It helps but remember, you are limited to your "Likes". To reach out further you'll have to invest in other platforms. You could start to Instagram parts tractors, combines and people you work with. You could do SHORT YouTube videos of a delivery or a parts tractor or a burned combine it all matters and making sure you have keywords in your description helps;
• Do a Blog - What better way is there for people to learn about your "back-story"? Tell about your founding, your experience, your customers...it all adds up.
• Don't Just Broadcast - If you do Social Media don't just broadcast your message but interact with others. Ask questions, do a poll, have some fun. People don't always want to be "sold" they just want to be human and interact.

Hope this helps move your SEO and your website ranking.

 

Something New from NTPDA!

It seems like it's always something, right?  Recently we've made some significant changes in our outreach program to existing and potential new members.  The changes in this blog is part of that effort.

For those of you who have websites or blogs it's going to be critical that you alter your online presence to become mobile friendly. Here are two solid reasons to make this happen as quickly as possible:

• Over half of all website searches are now done on mobile devices. If a person searches for your website and it is not responsive to whatever device they are using (phone/tablet/desktop) the ability for them to use your site deminishes;
• We believe that on April 21st Google will roll out a new "mobile web-crawler" which will identify if your site is or is not mobile friendly.  If the site is not mobile friendly we believe Google will flag it as such.  That means, even at the search, users will know if they should or (perhaps) should not continue.

Last year, we made changes to our website to make sure it was mobile friendly. This year we've altered our blog to make sure that it too matches the way in which users are switching how they access content.

Here is an article from our member and agency of record that details the Google changes in more detail.  If you have not made contact with your web developer we suspect you may want to do that very soon.

Thanks for reading and let's go sell something!

It's...ALIVE!

This week we gave birth to the new National Tractor Parts Dealer Association (NTPDA) website!!  It's been in the works for several months and following some little "tweaks" we've birthed the baby!

What's really nice about the new site is that it is easy to navigate and you can see it on everything!  Yes, go ahead and give it a try.  If you've got a smart-phone it works there.  If you have a tablet, it works there.  And, of course it will work on your laptop and desktop. 

We know that one of our major membership drivers is the website and that is why we've spent the time and money to make sure our current members and potential members can use it. 

Along with being "responsive" (that's what the geeky people call it) we've added some features like an easier member look up, a better parts look up and this blog. 

Have a spin around the new site and let us know what you think?

We are so excited!

Here at NTPDA we're so excited!  We're just days away from launching our new website and thought we'd give you a sneak peek at what it looks like.

When we were building our marketing plan it was clear to us and our advertising agency, Insight Advertising, that we needed to create a new website that not only looked cool but was also responsive.  That means it can be seen across all platforms.  And, it's almost done!

So the image you see is a screen shot of just one page of the NTPDA site.  We're hoping it is more inviting to members and those tractor parts friends who are not yet members.

Can you tell we're...excited?

Hurry Up & Wait

Many of you know that the NTPDA office will soon be moving.  It seems like we've been sharing that information FOREVER because once we think we're set to go we get delayed. That's really not such a bad problem but trying to keep everything in order and finding things we've packed away is clearly a hastle.  Sort of like living out of a suitcase except, as you can see, we've got plenty of "suitcases"!

We can't show you just yet...but coming next week we would like to tease you a little with a peek at our new website. The Board determined that we needed to upgrade the old site (it's been live for nearly eight years) and people who might be using their smart-phones to look us up were missing so much.

Over the past month we've been working with our advertising agency, Insight Advertising, Marketing & Communications and the staff at DWebware to create a "responsive" website that can be seen and used across all platforms from desktop to smart-phone.  Right now the Board is taking a look at the (close to) finished product and they may have further suggestions.

It's a beautiful day here in Texas and there is a hint of fall in the air.  Thank you for being interested in NTPDA and our tractor and industrial members who serve their industries.  A reminder that we are also on Twitter @NTPDA is where you can find us.

Have a wonderful weekend!