major decrease in email leads

[Alex.Lemoing]

Since January, it seems like our dealership is experiencing a major decrease in email leads (especially through our Subaru site). We haven't changed the way we do our online marketing, if anything we do more than ever.

I've recently changed our E-price button to a (let's talk!) button with a bright green color in order to get people's attention but it's not changing anything. We use to average about 100 email leads from our Subaru website but this month for example we only have about 25... It doesn't make any sense to me. Phone leads are steady with a slight increase however.

Is anybody else experiencing the same issue or is it just us ? I am running out of ideas as far as getting people to the website. any suggestions ?

 

[amirxl]

How are your analytics?
Have you recently cut off a third party source that may have been driving traffic to your website?

 

[Alex.Lemoing]

@amirxl analytics are good. we are getting a decent amount of traffic to the website, especially through Organic search and Direct traffic.
We haven't cut off anything or changed anything from the way we market online. Dealer.com has been handling our PPC and display campaign and even them have no clue of what's going on.

Here's our traffic summary :

 

[Lee_Kincaid]

Have you recently added a live chat feature?

 

[skutchhenks]

Since January, it seems like our dealership is experiencing a major decrease in email leads (especially through our Subaru site). We haven't changed the way we do our online marketing, if anything we do more than ever.

I've recently changed our E-price button to a (let's talk!) button with a bright green color in order to get people's attention but it's not changing anything. We use to average about 100 email leads from our Subaru website but this month for example we only have about 25... It doesn't make any sense to me. Phone leads are steady with a slight increase however.

Is anybody else experiencing the same issue or is it just us ? I am running out of ideas as far as getting people to the website. any suggestions ?

Anytime I have changed a DDC ePrice button the email leads fall way off too. If you change it back you'll see them come back.

 

[Alex.Lemoing]

@Lee E Kincaid we've always had a live chat through Active Engage so no changes here.
@skutchhenks I may revert back to the original E-price button. but the change is only a few months old not back to January.
I will revert back for sure, just to be safe on that side.

 

[Jeff Kershner]

My first question, out of curiosity would be, has floor traffic and sales dropped or suffered?

You've witnessed a drop in lead count, but what about your contact and show ratio on the leads you have acquired since changing the call to action? I believe this could be something to really look into.

However, knowing how most dealer operate and if you're the traditional lead form hungry dealership, then I would recommend changing your CTA button back to "get sale price or get ePrice" (does the average consumer even know what an ePrice is? Hummm).

"Lets Talk" - who wants to "talk" to the dealership? That the whole initial reason for being online. This is why your lead forms fills have dropped. As much as I HATE to say it - "Get some type of price" typically outperforms all other forms of CTA.

 

[Alex.Lemoing]

@Jeff Kershner Floor traffic has decreased a little bit but it's not out of the ordinary. Last month thanks to our BDC we were able to achieve a Contact ratio of 68% and a close ratio of 19% on our internet leads, so the leads we are getting are strong leads.
I will change the E-price button back to "get your E-price" and keep you guys posted, I'm interested to see if it goes back up.
thanks for the input guys .

 

[JessicaRuth]

@Jeff Kershner is totally right on this. "Let's Talk" isn't why a consumer is on your site. You already covered that with having chat AND having your phone number there.

The CTA on your VDP should always create a sense of urgency. Even E-Price seems old school and not transparent. Check out what your competition is doing. I bet you're going to find, "Check Availability", "VIP Price", "You Save"....and the like...

 

[Alex.Lemoing]

Thanks @JessicaRuth I will make the changes and report back in a month or so.