AI is changing how drivers discover and buy aftermarket parts, and the shift is happening faster than most teams are ready for. Mike Chung joined by Jon Hedges, founder of Hedges & Company, to unpack what “digital marketing” truly means in the automotive aftermarket when the customer journey spans Google search, marketplaces like Amazon and eBay, reviews, video, email, and in-store research with a phone in hand. 

We start with the fundamentals: why being visible online is now table stakes, how the industry moved from paper catalogs to online catalogs and shopping carts, and why accurate product data and fitment details still decide whether a shopper trusts your brand. Then we get practical about measurement. Jon explains how to think about goals, which metrics actually matter, and how to avoid the attribution traps that make reports look great while sales stay flat. If conversion tracking is misconfigured, today’s algorithms will optimize for the wrong actions and send you more of the wrong traffic. 

From there, we tackle SEO versus LLM optimization (LLMO) and what it takes to show up when consumers ask AI tools for shopping answers. Jon shares why original, useful content and technical signals like schema are becoming essential, and why trust frameworks like EEAT (experience, expertise, authoritativeness, trustworthiness) will matter even more as agentic AI begins shopping on behalf of customers. The big takeaway: better data and stronger trust signals can help smaller aftermarket brands compete with much larger players. 

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