Audi oADD Website Discussion

[Brad Burlingham]

We just moved to the new required Audi OEM-built website. It is built on Adobe and they arent supporting Google Analytics or ASC events. Curious if anyone else is in this boat and if they have any advice on building GA4 events manually for these websites.

One of the big features is a seamless integration between tier 1 and tier 3 site, but I'm wondering how i can track that cross platform tracking in GA4.

I thought this might be a place to discuss any issues or questions Audi dealers are having with the new platform.

 

[Alex Snyder]

Adobe??? Wow. One of the analytics companies Audi uses is down the street. Let me see if I can get one of them to lend a hand.

 

[Ryan Everson]

We just moved to the new required Audi OEM-built website. It is built on Adobe and they arent supporting Google Analytics or ASC events. Curious if anyone else is in this boat and if they have any advice on building GA4 events manually for these websites.

One of the big features is a seamless integration between tier 1 and tier 3 site, but I'm wondering how i can track that cross platform tracking in GA4.

I thought this might be a place to discuss any issues or questions Audi dealers are having with the new platform.

I believe I've heard they plan to add support for ASC events in the future, but in the meantime you can recreate many of them yourself using Google Tag Manager and pulling from Adobe's data layer. However you can't track anything that happens on the tier 1 site.

Here's an example GTM script that can be used on VDP urls to make vehicle data accessible so an asc_item_pageview event can be fired:

<script>
(function(){
  // Safety net to ensure GTM's own dataLayer array exists
  window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || [];
  var maxAttempts = 30; // e.g., poll up to 30 times
  var intervalMs = 1000; // poll every 1 second
  var attempts = 0;
 
  // Set up an interval that runs repeatedly
  var checkInterval = setInterval(function(){
    attempts++;
    
    // Confirm adobeDataLayer is defined and see if there's a vehicleData object
    if (window.adobeDataLayer && window.adobeDataLayer[0] && window.adobeDataLayer[0].vehicleData) {
      var v = window.adobeDataLayer[0].vehicleData;
      
      // Push data into GTM's dataLayer
      window.dataLayer.push({
        event: 'adobeVehicleData',
        item_id: v.vin,
        item_number: v.stockNumber,
        item_price: v.price,
        item_condition: v.inventoryType,
        item_year: v.modelYear,
        item_make: v.make,
        item_model: v.modelName,
        item_variant: v.trim,
        item_color: v.exteriorColor,
        item_type: v.bodyType
      });
      
      // Once we find it, stop checking
      clearInterval(checkInterval);
      console.log('vehicleData found and pushed to dataLayer!');
    }
    else if (attempts >= maxAttempts) {
      // After 30 seconds total, stop polling
      clearInterval(checkInterval);
      console.warn('vehicleData not found after 30 attempts.');
    }
  }, intervalMs);
})();
</script>

 

[DjSec]

It’s sad to see OEMs pushing dealers onto platforms that seem to take more control away from the store and place it in the OEM’s hands.

From what I’ve seen, many of these sites are slow, bloated, full of coding errors, and not fully ADA compliant. The big concern is that it’s the dealership, not the OEM, that will be held liable in an ADA lawsuit, even if the OEM requires the platform.

The irony is that these heavy, error-prone sites often underperform in search and user experience. That could create an opening for independent dealers or agencies to build faster, cleaner sites that rank better, which means it may be a good time to start targeting Audi-related keywords.

 

[LocalWerks]

Brad I am happy to have our analytics team get you set up with GA4 tracking free of charge. Shoot me a DM.

 

[Brad Burlingham]

I believe I've heard they plan to add support for ASC events in the future, but in the meantime you can recreate many of them yourself using Google Tag Manager and pulling from Adobe's data layer. However you can't track anything that happens on the tier 1 site.

Here's an example GTM script that can be used on VDP urls to make vehicle data accessible so an asc_item_pageview event can be fired:

<script>
(function(){
  // Safety net to ensure GTM's own dataLayer array exists
  window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || [];
  var maxAttempts = 30; // e.g., poll up to 30 times
  var intervalMs = 1000; // poll every 1 second
  var attempts = 0;
 
  // Set up an interval that runs repeatedly
  var checkInterval = setInterval(function(){
    attempts++;
   
    // Confirm adobeDataLayer is defined and see if there's a vehicleData object
    if (window.adobeDataLayer && window.adobeDataLayer[0] && window.adobeDataLayer[0].vehicleData) {
      var v = window.adobeDataLayer[0].vehicleData;
     
      // Push data into GTM's dataLayer
      window.dataLayer.push({
        event: 'adobeVehicleData',
        item_id: v.vin,
        item_number: v.stockNumber,
        item_price: v.price,
        item_condition: v.inventoryType,
        item_year: v.modelYear,
        item_make: v.make,
        item_model: v.modelName,
        item_variant: v.trim,
        item_color: v.exteriorColor,
        item_type: v.bodyType
      });
     
      // Once we find it, stop checking
      clearInterval(checkInterval);
      console.log('vehicleData found and pushed to dataLayer!');
    }
    else if (attempts >= maxAttempts) {
      // After 30 seconds total, stop polling
      clearInterval(checkInterval);
      console.warn('vehicleData not found after 30 attempts.');
    }
  }, intervalMs);
})();
</script>

thanks for the response ryan! i'm pretty saavy with gtm, but when it comes to actual scripts and coding, you lose me . i have a meeting with them tomorrow to try to figure out a solution

 

[Brad Burlingham]

In talking with them i dont think they understood how much we use GA4 to optimize our campaigns. Not to mention the fact that GA4 will lose all attribution as soon as they exit our site and go to tier 1. a good visit would be classified as a bounce in that case.

 

[Brad Burlingham]

Adobe??? Wow. One of the analytics companies Audi uses is down the street. Let me see if I can get one of them to lend a hand.

axis?

 

[Ryan Everson]

Not to mention the fact that GA4 will lose all attribution as soon as they exit our site and go to tier 1. a good visit would be classified as a bounce in that case.

Yeah having two navigation menus is definitely an interesting choice...

The main hamburger menu sends your customers to the OEM site, while the lower secondary navigation is where the dealership's website links are hidden.

 

[MattCopley]

We went through the migration with one of our oldest clients. His thinking was that it couldn't be that bad since he owned both Audi points in town. 3 weeks into the new site he is pacing for his worst month in store history for both variable and fixed ops, and is reverting back to his DDC site. He then plans to move to an out of program site and let the OADD site live in obscurity on a new URL. They experienced about a 60% decline in search visibility overnight....And Google hasn't even reindexed all of the results that are now dropping to 301.

The major issue is that Audi won't migrate more than around 30 pages, and if you have serious SOE clout built up via a helpful content strategy they force a manual migration and have made Adobe Experience Manager so ridiculously painful to deal with that the process of manually migrating hundreds of pages of SEO content would drive any sane person to jump out a window.

AEM actually has an API we could have used to execute a migration of all of their content in an hour or so, but after multiple pleas to Audi we were denied access "by Germany"... Go figure.

Best of luck to all of you out there going through this nightmare. I expect you will all be running 2 sites in the not too distant future.