Few Are Using Web Sites Effectively

[Autopub]

Generally speaking, very few companies are using their Web sites to market, sell, or increase sales. The sites go up and that's it. Rarely is the content new and fresh. Few companies actual put the names, phone numbers, and emails of the staff or executives. It is like they are afraid some body is going to call or email them to ask a question, sell em somthing, or complain.

[dkpagan]

What are some good companies dealers can use as their website provider which gives them the ability to easily and quickly update content themselves?

[Lhansen]

There are a lot of good website developers out there. It just depends on how much you are willing to spend. If you are a franchised dealer, take a look at the to 20 or so performing dealers of your like franchise type. In all of the seminars I attend and all of the research I do, the most hits and more important, the most deals , come for dealers individual websites, not the manufacturers site (i.e. Five Star, etc.)
A few of the DMS/DSP providers provide services.
Good Luck!

Linda Hansen

[dkpagan]

My company has a web content management system focused on the automotive industry. I know this is not the right place to market a product so I'll leave out the details. It has all the goodies (vehicle search, get a quote, dynamic forms, revolving specials, etc.)

My question is, does anyone have any suggestions on the best ways to market such a product to dealers? We currently have approx. 35 dealers in the D.C. and Pittsburgh areas through a reseller program but has kind of hit it's limit with that approach. We're looking at better, more productive ways of getting our product in front of dealers.

I'm happy to say that we've had zero cancellations and have been told from several clients that it's the best they've seen.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!!

[jeff_kershner]

Actually speaking...most dealers are stuck with templated dealership websites like Cobalt. There are a few more options out there like DealerSkins, DealerOn, PureDealer just to name a few. Unfortunately not too many of these providers have a true understanding of CONVERSION. Many of the dealership websites look the same and it's obvious that they watch what each other is doing and try to mimic. Look at BZResults.com, DealerSkins.com and TKCarsites.com. All turn out a decent product though they resemble thither and use a lot of flash.

This leads me to the next isssue...90% of these providers have no clue when it comes to SE (Search Engine Optimization). Their platforms or template designs are not esthetically built for proper indexing in the search engines.

To the defense of the website providers...Dealerships would rather continue paying THOUSANDS per week or month towards traditional newspaper advertising rather then a more effective website where they can fully track their ROI. So in order to make any real money building dealer websites...they have to be able to make up with volume. In return you get template sites or companies that can build a webpages but do not have an true understanding for online marketing.

My 2 cents.

-Jeff Kershner
Automotive Internet Sales and Marketing Director
www.dealerrefresh.com (http://www.dealerrefresh.com/)

[AutoJini_Farooq]

I would have to agree with Jeff. I mean we have dealers that will spends thousands of dollars in TV and Radio but can't seem to find the budget of $100 for our SEO link building program. Or pay $700-$3500 for AutoTrader but can't find the extra $200 for Pay Per Click program... that actually allows you to track every penny spent. Errr...

As far as flash related sites goes... it just what the dealers want... they want the site to WOW them.. what ever that is... and not deliver to the bottom line reminds me of that flaming logo commercial couple years back on TV...

[bhoecht]

Isn't the real problem that dealers treat the internet as an advertising source not a selling medium?

Why spend money to get internet leads that lead to sales with low grosses (they use price to compete online in the absense of a great online sales experience)? What are F&I penetrations on online sales? Why spend money online to only have to staff have to follow it up (and done well there is a lot of it to follow up, yet conversion efficiency is poor vs. traditional channels)? Add in some fancy CRM/BDC technology + the extra management effort to supervise, report + monitor.

I'll bet at least part of the answer as to why dealer's haven't embraced spending on their websites is how much they feel they've earned in return... which they must feel traditional advertising answers much better.

Aren't those the right questions?

My company has a solution to all that. Although I'm not here to market it like that, just address the posting.

Maybe it is the dealer in me speaking, but to me: technology and process is not an answer in and by itself. If it makes me money when a fully inclusive assessment is done, is honest and ethical, then I am all for it.

Websites, vehicle photos, SEO, CRM, BDC... it is all bunk without net profits to show for all that effort. Moving metal keeps the factories happy. It is the dealer's job to do it profitably.

Love to hear other's opinions.

[AutoJini_Farooq]

As Jakob Nielsen usability expert said "I think the basic point about the web is that it is not an advertising medium, the web is not a selling medium, it is a buying medium. It is user controlled, so the user controls, the user experiences. My hand is on the mouse, I decide where I want to go. If I don't like it here, I will go a lot of other places instead."

This goes back to point by jeff about template based sites. You got to help your customer find the right information and have the right tools on the site. Once you have a right tools and strategy you do see the ROI.

No matter how you cut it, a sell from online source is much cheaper then tradition media. I do agree there is more to follow up but the key is to follow up with the right lead and have the tools and process in place to follow up. Don't drop the lead when customer did not reply to your email. Plus a good worker does not need that much supervision...

I do agree with you that process and technology is not the answer by in it self and moving inventory profitably keeps everyone happy.

Regards,
Farooq
http://www.autojini.com/blog

My shameless plug. :)

[jeff_kershner]

TV ads, News Paper ads, Radio ads, Billboards…even your showroom…it’s all bunk without net profits. So why advertise at all?

In many cases it’s up to the customer to decide if the internet is an advertising source or an actual selling medium. Example; you’re shopping for a new BluRay DVD player, you visit Circuit City’s website to view what brands they have available, if they have it in stock and what the prices are. From there you can decide if you want to purchase online or actually go into the store to make your purchase.

Don’t get me wrong. Your dealership website and other forms of online marketing media can and should funnel the customer through to the next phase of their purchase with your dealer. Having the right branding message and the right call to actions in your online marketing can result in a sale and then one could call this a selling media. (Yes, there is a very small percentage of consumers that never want to set foot in a dealership (only due to fear) and want to shop online and make the website a full on purchasing media. This is such a small % of people, and there are companies out there to cater to this small crowd.)

As for money being wasted on “internet efforts”, BDC staff and additional managers..then I would have to say that dealer is going about it all wrong if they are loosing money and not showing a profitable ROI. If a dealer has not embraced the internet, it’s simply because they do not understand it. When you don’t understand something, you typically stay away from it.

Times are changing…they really are. I know we hear that all the time but the Baby Boomer generation are retiring and fading away. We have GenX, Y and a whole new generation coming amongst us that will never read newspapers, watch traditional TV or listen to FM radio. HOW are dealers going to brand themselves if they are not up on “technology” with this generation?

I could go on but I think I will end it here.

-Jeff Kershner
www.dealerrefresh.com (http://www.dealerrefresh.com)

[bhoecht]

Car dealers today don't have websites capable of supporting an online sales presence. "Call or email for price" isn't what is meant by the term clicks and bricks.

Nearly every dealer I have spoken to laments about the Internet. No wonder - they use low prices to attract consumers (b/c they don't have a great (or any) online selling experience), low prices = low vehicle grosses, F+I is virtually non-existent on the sales they do get, relationships w customers is poor since there is little personal connection beyond the low price, staff turnover is high and they need additional technology to support, manage and run it.

At Ai-Dealer, we came up with what we feel one solution may be, but we never claim to have a lock on all the correct answers. Does anyone have an inclusive ROI study of a web strategy (site, commissions, SEO, leads, BDC, CRM, staff, training, turnover vs. incremental grosses generated) that they would like to share?

[Lau Pan]

Please if there is a CRM Player out there with an afforable system that will work for dealers let us know, we need a simple, userfriendly solution that will work.


I have used a number of LMT's (Lead Management Tools) over the past 6 years and none of them are the real answer. Maybe when Microsoft rolls out the new system in the next year or so we will see a system that is the answer.

Nettrak/BZ Results is not high on the list of the tool that would be a choice of mine. It is bloated and like all the ADP products too many steps and archaic. The sad thing is they purchase these companies so you would think they would purchase the ones that are state of the art technology wise. Maybe they are afraid of getting ahead of themselves on the technology curve and then they will find themselves further behind????.

There are more steps to the Nettrak process than the Empire State Building. The control panel is a real work of art that must have been worked on by a bunch of high school students. I feel bad for the large auto groups. Maybe because most are focused on the showroom and MSM (Main Stream Media ) ad process they think great, this system is automated and we do not have to bother with manging it, imagine all those emails we have to deal with.

Cobalt has not upgraded it's system in a long time. At one point a few years ago it was a workable process however some there needs to realize that technology needs to evolve constantly or it becomes out dated Just look at ADP for an example.

Salespoint is the most useable system for lead management until you have 5000 plus leads in the database and then it is bloated and slow, the more names the slower it becomes. Salespoint needs to address this issue. It is very simple, user friendly and easy to use.

I have 10,800 plus names in our data base that are fresh as I always do a run once a month with a newsletter and keep the database fresh. I do not delete as the client may change the email address so I call and update the lead. If the email and phone have changed I update the client and keep the name. It is amazing how often the client will show up a year or so later and I have their data in the system and I am able to merge at that point and freshen up the data.

Our Internet Department averages 28-37% of the dealerships monthly sales depending on the time of year. These are trackable sales which we are able to monitor from the time they become a lead to the POS. We have clients we have worked with for over 4 years that we were able to eventualy bring in for a sale. Some managrs feel "gee" how can you work with a client for 4 years to bring them in? Well that is part of the Internet Process, we never give up on a lead.

We also mine this data base whenever a new model or feature the client has requested information on. IE a hard top convertible? Do a query, choose the clients and send them the information. Direct marketing. Free Bluetooth offer, same thing. We can bring the client in.

We are also able to manage the whole process from one location and tailor the access and management for the group as well as individual teams. I know from experience that every dealer has turnover in sales; the management of the Nettrak is much more of a hassle than sales point in keeping up with the changes in the staff and reassigning clients. There is also more security for protecting the dealers data. Many dealers do not think about the security issues until there is a breach and they lose the data to a competitor when a sales professional leaves.

One of the issues with Nettrak is the automated responses drive the clients to opt out and when that happens you have lost the client. When I reply to a lead I send an auto reply, personal reply answering their questions, a 3-day and 7-day reminder. After that I send a monthly newsletter.

My opt out rate is about 0.2% for the whole database. With BZ Results the rate is more like 63.3% in the 1st 7 months. These are clients that are technology lost as when you call them they just complain they have been spammed to death and do not want to deal with your dealership any longer.

The other thing is BZ states they will increase sales from the Internet leads. This has not been the case. Most of our leads are generated from the OEM Websites, which we refused to have processed through BZ as they are not generated through BZ. These leads maybe also come through from 3rd party lead providers IE: Auto trader, cars.com etc however we do not pay on these as we consider them duplicates. So by the time we filter out the leads we are able to see who generates what. Otherwise anyone can claim success and guess who pays through the nose, we the dealer.

There is an old Chinese saying if it looks and sounds to good to be true it probably is. At BZ Results going rate of $5-6000.00 a month they will have to improve a lot to convince the prudent ecommerce dealer they have the process.

LSI is a nice tool for CRM and managing a data base of prospects, service and sold however it leaves a lot to be desired as a email process, talk about slow, it takes forever. It will work nicely for snail mail and working leads, managing leads and for the sales managers to follow up on sales professionals to make sure they are working their clients. The reporting is excellent as well. However they need to address the email issue; please.

Too bad they have not merged the LSI & Salespoint programs; they have talked this to death however nothing has happened.

GM one source is another attempt to make a useable system however they are just like GM, bloated and slow to make improvements. They spent millions on this system and released it before it was ready. This system should have been in Beta Format for another year or until it was ready. The idea that GM is making it mandatory for the dealers use this and charging the dealers for using the system before it is ready is a real strong-arm tactic. Dealers should really voice their issues with this before the OEM's think they can do this all the time.

I have looked at Jeff Kershnner's site and he has seemed to have done very well with his process. The website is clean and loads very well and is client friendly. The site is not a cookie cutter site which lacks personality. IE think cookie cutter and you see magazines at the supermarket checkout stand, they all look the same. Jeff has personalized the dealers site so people will feel good about being there. Check out the newsletter he offers: http://www.dealerrefresh.com/my_weblog/ there are a lot of good ideas here. I have used many of his suggestions and also look to his site for ideas on how to be more user friendly and personal. Any dealer can compete on price, the real dealers want to compete on a higher plane.

The web is not about advertising and selling. As the wise person stated it is a buying medium it's user controlled, we as Internet sales professionals answers their questions and provide a market for them to research and make purchases if they are comfortable about it. If the client is comfortable, likes what the see and hear and believe the site is safe, they will purchase.

Many dealers say they do not sell on line, that they focus on getting the client in the store and this is ok, we do both, we sell on line, we sell as often as we can online, we want to sell on line in fact if we could sell 90% of our sales on line we would be very happy as we would have very little overhead and larger margins. People purchase automobiles on ebay all the time. The day is here where there are virtual dealers selling on line today. Dealers who do not embrace the new way of selling will be behind the curve.


So please if there is a CRM / LMT Player out there with an afforable system that will work for dealers let us know, we need a simple userfriendly solution that will work, key word here simple.

Lau Pan

[DealerEd]

Hi Lau:

There are tons of CRM companies out there that in my opinion are "over kill and over priced." I spent 20 years in the car business and used many of the CRM products. Given that, I developed my own CRM program that is Client Server based (I do not support Web Based CRM programs) that we install on a dealers existing pc network and we use their fastest pc as our server (in installations under 11 connections) and we install a simple Linux server for a few hundred dollars when we exceed 11 simultaneous connects in a big dealership. We charge our clients $300 per month, no contract, a few bucks upfront for installation, setup, training, and if they want to integrate our E-Lead software its another $99.00 per month. DMS integration is extra, as are other optional features such as D.L. Scanner, integrate with Call Bright, integrate with Call Command, etc. As a small Chicago based company slowly spreading our wings we are able to provide personal service, in dealership support and training, and also over the internet support and training. Frankly, any dealer spending over $500 a month for a CRM program is paying way too much. Finally, all the fancy "bells and whistles" and unnecessary features the dealer must pay for makes now sense. Lastly, I can't understand a dealer that would spend some of the dollars CRM companies charge....for what?

Regards,
Marc Kovitz (DealerEd)
Hoffman Estates, IL.
www.keepyourcustomer.com

[precision1marketing]

There needs to be a real commitment at a dealership to follow through on the leads...the problem is alot of the salespeople are HORRIBLE on the phone

[Autopub]

Two suggestions from someone who is not in the "trenches"
1) The General Manager of the dealership has got to be the "Web Sales Leader" and get all hands involved in selling cars every which way but at least 40% from online resources.

2) Check out what Dealer.com is doing. This and they could be your salvation and make you famous as sales becoming more challenging each day.