DealerOn fell off. Who are the good website providers these days?

[Mid-Grade Ford]

We’re looking to switch to a new provider. DealerOn used to be great but they have turned to crap.

We’re a ford store so we might have limited options.

Why DealerOn Sucks

Every month we find a new thing on our site that they’ve broken.

For example, today we found all our cta’s were broken. They just reloaded the page when you click them.

We make no changes to the site. We want no changes to the site. But every month we find they have made some changes they made (without notifying us), and invariably, they’ve just broken something new on our website.

You call into support and they play it like it’s a “you problem”. It is never our problem. Always something they broke due to incompetence/carelessness.

It is something they broke for no reason. They don’t deserve $2500/mo. That is an outrageous price to pay for someone to do nothing but break your website once a month.

 

[levin233]

Love that premium $2,500 “monthly sabotage” package… do they throw in a broken VDP as a bonus too?

 

[craigh]

@Mid-Grade Ford do you know if you have to use a vendor from FordDirect program or is that optional?

 

[Zack_AF]

@Mid-Grade Ford do you know if you have to use a vendor from FordDirect program or is that optional?

Yeah just like most OEMs, they're beholden to their digital program. The only work around is running duel sites. My understanding is that those dealers typically find the cheapest package with Dealer.com (unless things have changed and someone else is cheaper) and bury it in favor of their non-certified site.

 

[craigh]

Yeah just like most OEMs, they're beholden to their digital program. The only work around is running duel sites. My understanding is that those dealers typically find the cheapest package with Dealer.com (unless things have changed and someone else is cheaper) and bury it in favor of their non-certified site.

That makes sense - most of the solutions I have or would suggest would not be on that list.

 

[Zack_AF]

That makes sense - most of the solutions I have or would suggest would not be on that list.

I'm right there with ya. It's unfortunate for dealers most of the good stuff is outside those lists.
But don't look over there! Your co-op money is right here!

 

[Ryan Everson]

I believe this is the current list of approved FordDirect website providers:

1. DealerOn
2. Dealer Inspire
3. Dealer.com
4. Jazel
5. Team Velocity

If you're looking for proven and reliable, Dealer.com is probably your best bet of the approved solutions.

 

[Mid-Grade Ford]

Love that premium $2,500 “monthly sabotage” package… do they throw in a broken VDP as a bonus too?

lmao. yes that is exactly how it is. Monthly Sabotage.

Worst part is, it usually takes a week or two before we notice the sabotage.

My understanding is our options for website providers are limited to what FordDirect offers us. We could pick a diff provider, but ford would refuse to send rebate data to the website, and Ford would keep a second website for our dealership (thereby confusing the algos).

We're gonna shop around and see what we see.

 

[artur_ez]

@Mid-Grade Ford do you know if you have to use a vendor from FordDirect program or is that optional?

It seems like it is possible. We are building and supporting a custom website platform for a dealership group. Not sure about details, but we have the Ford website for one of the locations, and we use our custom platform for it.

 

[artur_ez]

We’re looking to switch to a new provider. DealerOn used to be great but they have turned to crap.

We’re a ford store so we might have limited options.

Why DealerOn Sucks

Every month we find a new thing on our site that they’ve broken.

For example, today we found all our cta’s were broken. They just reloaded the page when you click them.

We make no changes to the site. We want no changes to the site. But every month we find they have made some changes they made (without notifying us), and invariably, they’ve just broken something new on our website.

You call into support and they play it like it’s a “you problem”. It is never our problem. Always something they broke due to incompetence/carelessness.

It is something they broke for no reason. They don’t deserve $2500/mo. That is an outrageous price to pay for someone to do nothing but break your website once a month.

lmao. yes that is exactly how it is. Monthly Sabotage.

Worst part is, it usually takes a week or two before we notice the sabotage.

My understanding is our options for website providers are limited to what FordDirect offers us. We could pick a diff provider, but ford would refuse to send rebate data to the website, and Ford would keep a second website for our dealership (thereby confusing the algos).

We're gonna shop around and see what we see.

I believe you can use other website providers as well. We’ve developed a custom website platform for a dealership group, and one of the locations is a Ford dealership. For rebates, we integrated the RIS system, which can be toggled on or off in the admin area. Please note that the API is not free, so it may only be cost-effective for larger dealership groups. Ex. Loom | Free Screen & Video Recording Software