Performance Part And Accessory Marketing Idea – Dyno Testing

Does your company manufacturer performance products? Or maybe retail performance products? Either way, dyno testing is a relatively cheap and easy way to give your company a marketing boost. Consumers who are in the market for performance products are genuinely interested in seeing a dyno chart, dyno testing lends credibility to performance products, and dyno data is frequently shared by enthusiasts.

In this article, we’ll explain some of the marketing benefits of dyno testing, as well as highlight some ways manufacturers and retailers can leverage dyno testing to get more business.

First, What The Heck Is Dyno Testing?

If you’re a parts retailer, you might not know what dyno testing is. Here’s a quick primer:

• Vehicle horsepower and torque can be measured either at the engine flywheel or at the wheels with a dynamometer (aka “dyno”)
• Typically, dyno testing is done at the wheels, as it is often the best representation of performance you can “feel”
• Many performance parts manufacturers dyno test a vehicle before and after their part is installed, so that they can show consumers how much power their part “adds” to a specific vehicle

Dyno testing is available in most medium and large cities in the US, and costs about $100/hr. Here’s an image of a dyno test chart, courtesy of CJPonyParts.com:

Why Dyno Testing Is Important

While dyno testing isn’t always as accurate as we’d like it to be (for a variety of reasons, dyno results can vary widely), it’s a decent tool for expressing a product’s performance benefits. Many performance products companies – such as K&N Air Filters – publish dyno charts showing how their products improve the performance of specific vehicles.

If, for example, you’re interested in a K&N air intake for your 2007 RAM diesel (part number 57-1557, as of this writing), you might view this PDF dyno chart to see how much the air intake improves performance. The dyno chart shows that the K&N intake adds about 20 horsepower to an otherwise stock vehicle. Compared to other air intakes, this 20 hp gain might be pretty good.

Dyno charts like these give consumers confidence in performance products, and serve as a kind of proof of their value.

Dyno Data Is Good Marketing

Whether you’re a manufacturer of performance parts or merely a retailer of performance parts, dyno data is good for marketing:

1. Enthusiasts value dyno data, and look for it. Dyno charts give enthusiasts data they value. If you’re a performance enthusiast, you love to see where power is added, how an upgrade influences torque, and so on.
2. Performance enthusiasts love to “bench race,” and dyno charts help them do that. Figuring out how much power your vehicle will produce when you add various parts can be pretty fun. Dyno data gives “bench racers” the info they want to map out what they’re going to buy.
3. Dyno charts generate links and shares. Dyno data is generally considered valuable, and is frequently shared by enthusiasts on social media, forums, etc.

If you’re a manufacturer of performance parts, dyno data is a no-brainer.

If you’re a retailer, dyno test data is something you want to make available to customers whenever possible (assuming the manufacturer provides it). But retailers can also use dyno data to generate “buzz.”

Leveraging Dyno Data To Grow

It’s easy to create some buzz with dyno testing:

1. Consumers are always arguing about which vehicles are fastest, most powerful, etc.
2. Consumers are always arguing about which parts/add-ons benefit vehicle performance the most
3. Consumers don’t typically spend the money to dyno test their vehicles themselves

If you’re a retailer of Mustang parts (for example), your customers might love to see just how much impact the most popular air intakes have on a brand new Mustang. For the cost of some parts and a handful of dyno runs, you can:

• Dyno test a new, bone-stock vehicle
• Bolt on a popular intake
• Do another dyno test of the vehicle
• Swap out the popular intake for another option
• Do another test

and so on. Publish the results on your site (including the charts), share/promote the data on social media, and issue a press release about your “air intake dyno data round-up.” Worst case, it will raise your brand’s equity with consumers. Best case, it will generate a bucketful of links, thousands of website visitors, and sales.

And if the round-up included links to all the relevant product pages on your site? That would be good for SEO. And if people had to subscribe to your newsletter to see the next set of round-up data? You get the idea.

Summing up, dyno testing is a relatively cheap and easy way to build value in performance products. Dyno data can also generate links, social shares, and website traffic from real enthusiasts.

For more parts marketing ideas, see our capstone post here.