AI raises dealerships’ internet lead responsiveness

[Jeff Kershner]

Study finds AI raises dealerships’ internet lead responsiveness, but creates added risks

​

A study by Impel and Cresta reveals that AI has significantly improved dealership internet lead responsiveness, increasing top-tier response rates by 90% within 10 minutes. However, this automation introduces risks regarding AI "hallucinations" and a loss of personalization, necessitating a "human-in-the-loop" approach to ensure accuracy and customer trust.

26 of the brands improved their scores from the 2025 study, three of them gaining more than 10 points, while just six declined. Chevrolet was the most improved, rising 14 points to 74 and lifting its ranking from 25th to seventh.

The study found, 51% of dealers provided what Pied Piper calls a “perfect response” — an answer to a customer’s question through multiple paths, including emails, texts and phone within 15 minutes — twice the rate of five years ago.

"while AI lifts the averages it can also hide failures, with overreliance on AI automation introducing two types of “digital handoff risk.”

For the full analysis, visit Auto Remarketing.

 

[Richie K]

Interesting information there, @Jeff Kershner. Thank you for the post.

We're in the process of adding Impel to our "team". There are some grumbles from at least one person here. His concern isn't unjust.
We are a family owned & operated small Chevy dealership, and have been doing business on a more personal level since the beginning. Where our larger competitors treat customers like cattle with dollar bills stuck to them, we treat them with respect and dignity. Ok, not to step on any toes out there, but it's true. We are slow paced where it matters, and face paced where it matters. We value time and do a great job of not holding customers hostage for hours.

Our reason for adding Impel is to pick up the slack of our very small sales team (2 main salesmen). One would assume that two salesmen could answer leads in a timely manner and stay engaged with customers....one should not assume. We do a terrible job of lead handling, and the sales team and used car manager don't like to hear that. The truth hurts though.

What's my point? I said all that to say this: I understand most of the pros & cons to adding Ai, but I like to think that it will not completely change the way we take care of our customers. However, I do know that it will become more of a crutch for sales. I just hope that it ultimately helps us sell more cars.

We're at least going to give it a try.

To be continued...

 

[tylernobi]

The 51% "perfect response" stat is impressive, but the digital handoff risk piece is what I keep thinking about. Speed without accuracy is just fast failure. We've all seen AI responses that technically "answered" a customer but missed the actual intent of the question.

What I find interesting is that most of this AI investment is focused on what happens after the lead comes in. There's a massive opportunity upstream: helping the customer get their question answered while they're still on the website, before they ever fill out a form. If the site experience itself is more responsive and conversational, you reduce the volume of low-intent leads and increase the quality of the ones that do come through.

The human-in-the-loop piece is key. AI should be making the team faster and more informed, not replacing the relationship.

 

[kchristine1744]

I was just diving into this recently with my team!

Everyone’s debating whether AI is taking over the auto industry.
Wrong conversation.

The real question isn’t “Will AI replace people?” It’s “Are we disciplined enough to use it correctly?”

In dealerships right now, AI is answering leads in seconds.
24/7 responses.
Instant follow-up.
No missed opportunities after hours.

That’s a competitive advantage.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth:
Most stores aren’t training the AI properly. And they’re definitely not training their people to pick up where it leaves off. AI is only as good as the strategy behind it. If the messaging is generic, passive, or doesn’t drive toward an appointment, it’s just automated noise.

And when a human finally steps in?
Too often they restart the conversation instead of advancing it. That handoff is where momentum dies.

AI should create speed.
Humans should create connection and commitment. If both sides aren’t trained, aligned in tone, process, and appointment strategy, you’re not leveraging technology. You’re just adding another tool.

The future isn’t AI replacing sales teams. It’s disciplined stores using AI to initiate and highly trained teams to convert.

Big difference.

 

[tylernobi]

I was just diving into this recently with my team!

Everyone’s debating whether AI is taking over the auto industry.
Wrong conversation.

The real question isn’t “Will AI replace people?” It’s “Are we disciplined enough to use it correctly?”

In dealerships right now, AI is answering leads in seconds.
24/7 responses.
Instant follow-up.
No missed opportunities after hours.

That’s a competitive advantage.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth:
Most stores aren’t training the AI properly. And they’re definitely not training their people to pick up where it leaves off. AI is only as good as the strategy behind it. If the messaging is generic, passive, or doesn’t drive toward an appointment, it’s just automated noise.

And when a human finally steps in?
Too often they restart the conversation instead of advancing it. That handoff is where momentum dies.

AI should create speed.
Humans should create connection and commitment. If both sides aren’t trained, aligned in tone, process, and appointment strategy, you’re not leveraging technology. You’re just adding another tool.

The future isn’t AI replacing sales teams. It’s disciplined stores using AI to initiate and highly trained teams to convert.

Big difference.

Interesting, I definitely agree that the handoff is crucial but it's also not complicated. The AI has the full thread of what it talked to the user about (not to mention information on what that user did before and after engaging) and that tends to be enough context for the sales rep.

What do you mean when you say "stores aren't training the AI properly?".

I'm not seeing this be the issue. The issue is that dealers aren't activating AI responders to begin with.

 

[kchristine1744]

I completely agree that "should" be enough information for sales, but it doesn't always happen like that! Salespeople are re-starting the conversation instead of picking up where the AI left off - this is based on real calls we listen to from mystery shopping.

A lot of dealers expect AI to show up fully trained. But it doesn’t know your dealership’s policies, processes, or how your team handles customers unless you teach it. Without that training, it’s just giving generic responses. The stores winning with AI are the ones continuously training it and refining it, just like they would a salesperson.

 

[tylernobi]

I completely agree that "should" be enough information for sales, but it doesn't always happen like that! Salespeople are re-starting the conversation instead of picking up where the AI left off - this is based on real calls we listen to from mystery shopping.

A lot of dealers expect AI to show up fully trained. But it doesn’t know your dealership’s policies, processes, or how your team handles customers unless you teach it. Without that training, it’s just giving generic responses. The stores winning with AI are the ones continuously training it and refining it, just like they would a salesperson.

ah OK that's helpful. As someone building in the AI space, when you say "training" the AI that means something very different in my head than what you're talking about We have our customers upload documents and URLs to a knowledge base for Nobi to understand all those policies and procedures and then we tweak it with some detailed training instructions to match how the dealer wants the assistant to respond to certain questions.

As for the salespeople re-starting the conversation instead of reading the AI brief, that's pretty frustrating. Thankfully we haven't seen that yet but I could imagine that being an issue!

 

[Jeff Kershner]

Interesting information there, @Jeff Kershner. Thank you for the post.

We're in the process of adding Impel to our "team". There are some grumbles from at least one person here. His concern isn't unjust.
We are a family owned & operated small Chevy dealership, and have been doing business on a more personal level since the beginning. Where our larger competitors treat customers like cattle with dollar bills stuck to them, we treat them with respect and dignity. Ok, not to step on any toes out there, but it's true. We are slow paced where it matters, and face paced where it matters. We value time and do a great job of not holding customers hostage for hours.

Our reason for adding Impel is to pick up the slack of our very small sales team (2 main salesmen). One would assume that two salesmen could answer leads in a timely manner and stay engaged with customers....one should not assume. We do a terrible job of lead handling, and the sales team and used car manager don't like to hear that. The truth hurts though.

What's my point? I said all that to say this: I understand most of the pros & cons to adding Ai, but I like to think that it will not completely change the way we take care of our customers. However, I do know that it will become more of a crutch for sales. I just hope that it ultimately helps us sell more cars.

We're at least going to give it a try.

To be continued...

Nothing wrong with giving it a try. You've recognized the bottle neck and a possible solution to help out.

I too struggle with Ai, not the utilization of it but the overall morality of it. I have it plugged in to a few areas to respond to particular leads and to be honest, I'm not seeing much success. I still have some tweaking to do, so the jury is still out.

I look forward to your updates.