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AutoTrader.com Agrees to Buy HomeNet Automotive
- Thread starter Jeff Kershner
- Start date
Jeff is correct, the ATC and cars SRP/VDP counts can't be compared side by side, particularly when calculating cost per VDP. Here is how it was explained to me. I'll leave it up to a cars.com rep to refute it.
When a cars.com shopper who is already on a vehicle details page (thus, 1 VDP count) clicks any additional links on that details page (view dealer details, see our inventory, view our website, view map, etc.), they are counted as additional VDPs by cars.com. ATC only counts the original click to get to the vehicle details page.
Additionally, when a dealer's car is on page 3 of the search results but the shopper never gets to page 3, cars.com still counts it as an SRP. ATC only counts it as an SRP if the shopper actually viewed the page that the car is on.
When a cars.com shopper who is already on a vehicle details page (thus, 1 VDP count) clicks any additional links on that details page (view dealer details, see our inventory, view our website, view map, etc.), they are counted as additional VDPs by cars.com. ATC only counts the original click to get to the vehicle details page.
Additionally, when a dealer's car is on page 3 of the search results but the shopper never gets to page 3, cars.com still counts it as an SRP. ATC only counts it as an SRP if the shopper actually viewed the page that the car is on.
I think it is interesting how this latest purchase by AT has become the straw that broke the camel’s back. It is obvious that there is a lot of pent up frustration with AT and it didn't just appear out of the blue when they began flexing their wallet. Is it due to AT being such an expensive product and the perception is that they are expanding their reach on the backs of dealers?
The AT conundrum has been a mind game for dealers for years. You use them, you pay big! You don't, and feel like you are missing something. Are you really? AT probably has the highest cancelation and re-sign occurrence in the automotive industry.
Regardless of any of the conversations that are taking place here, dealers need to carefully evaluate where they are allocating their marketing budgets. Is AT the best place for a dealer to spend between five and twenty thousand dollars each month? There was a time when a dealer would be scared to death to pull their newspaper advertising, Is it because AT is an online service that we feel they are a necessity?
I am in the process of evaluating my AT ROI for both stores. This will involve reaching out to my company rep. I suggest that all dealers concerned do the same. Dealers shouldn’t base their decision to use or not use AT on whether or not they are becoming an evil empire, but simply whether or not they help you sell cars and make a fair profit.
The AT conundrum has been a mind game for dealers for years. You use them, you pay big! You don't, and feel like you are missing something. Are you really? AT probably has the highest cancelation and re-sign occurrence in the automotive industry.
Regardless of any of the conversations that are taking place here, dealers need to carefully evaluate where they are allocating their marketing budgets. Is AT the best place for a dealer to spend between five and twenty thousand dollars each month? There was a time when a dealer would be scared to death to pull their newspaper advertising, Is it because AT is an online service that we feel they are a necessity?
I am in the process of evaluating my AT ROI for both stores. This will involve reaching out to my company rep. I suggest that all dealers concerned do the same. Dealers shouldn’t base their decision to use or not use AT on whether or not they are becoming an evil empire, but simply whether or not they help you sell cars and make a fair profit.
Alex,
Lightnup explained it for me. ATC only counts the click into the vehicle as 1 VDP. However, it is my understanding (although the answer varies depending on which Cars.com rep you talk to), Cars.com counts not only the click into the vehicle but also every click that happens within the actual VDP as well. I have never been able to get Cars.com to give an official explanation of this. Maybe you can help Alex. It makes sense. It is my understanding that ATC has 35% more traffic, their visitors spend more time on the site, and their visitors view more pages. If all of that is true, then if when a dealer is looking strictly at the data, ATC activity should be higher if everything else is equal. Am I missing anything here? Thanks
BTW...Now that Cars.com is testing Premium Listings and their version of ALPHA, does anybody know the price?
Lightnup explained it for me. ATC only counts the click into the vehicle as 1 VDP. However, it is my understanding (although the answer varies depending on which Cars.com rep you talk to), Cars.com counts not only the click into the vehicle but also every click that happens within the actual VDP as well. I have never been able to get Cars.com to give an official explanation of this. Maybe you can help Alex. It makes sense. It is my understanding that ATC has 35% more traffic, their visitors spend more time on the site, and their visitors view more pages. If all of that is true, then if when a dealer is looking strictly at the data, ATC activity should be higher if everything else is equal. Am I missing anything here? Thanks
BTW...Now that Cars.com is testing Premium Listings and their version of ALPHA, does anybody know the price?
- Jan 12, 2011
- 13
- 3
- First Name
- Dennis
A VDP is a specific page view. That is a pretty simple metric that needs to be comparable across every listings service, from AT and Cars.com to the local newspaper with a thousand listings on their website. Combined, these companies take in over $1 billion from dealers each year under the banner of internet transparency for consumers. They need to provide the same level of value transparency to dealers.
Cars.com clearly lists the website transfers, map views, and ad prints as separate metrics in their reports. I was a Vice President at Cars.com for three years and if what Lightnup says is true it is news to me and I'd insist the practice be stopped immediately. Cars.com does not separate used from new and AT does. I've told Cars.com they need to change to be like AT, and they assure me they are working on it. I've also heard Cars.com people say AT inflates their VDPs. I don't buy that either.
SRPs are slightly different because Cars.com has twice as many vehicles on this page as AT does. However, when I approached Cars.com on the exact claim made by Lightnup above, I was assured that this is not how SRPs are measured. A Search Results Page is a single page of search results. I can't even find anyone who knows how to attribute a page view to a vehicle that is not on that page.
My claim is that the appropriate value comparison is cost per VDP. What makes me suspicious of all these claims of difference is that there absolutely cannot be any difference between VDPs from AT Featured and AT Premium. The same people who don't want value transparency between AT and Cars.com don't seem to want it here either.
Cost per VDP will vary from dealer to dealer based on pricing strategy and the types of vehicles stocked, but when you put the same vehicles and prices on all listings sites, the comparison at the dealer level is absolute.
Here is the deal. I've enjoyed a very good relationship with both companies over the past ten years, but I am sick and tired of watching dealers spend this kind of money in a cloud of bull crap. I am willing to meet with the experts from both companies who can demonstrate how their metrics are derived. I'll pay my own way to wherever this meeting needs to take place. To me, Louisville, KY looks to be pretty close to the middle between Chicago and Atlanta. I'm laying it down here and now, cost per VDP is the best way to compare the value of any listings site that charges on a subscription basis. Anyone who thinks this is not fair can post a date for when they are willing to meet me in Louisville. Alex and other independent marketing experts are welcome as well.
Cars.com clearly lists the website transfers, map views, and ad prints as separate metrics in their reports. I was a Vice President at Cars.com for three years and if what Lightnup says is true it is news to me and I'd insist the practice be stopped immediately. Cars.com does not separate used from new and AT does. I've told Cars.com they need to change to be like AT, and they assure me they are working on it. I've also heard Cars.com people say AT inflates their VDPs. I don't buy that either.
SRPs are slightly different because Cars.com has twice as many vehicles on this page as AT does. However, when I approached Cars.com on the exact claim made by Lightnup above, I was assured that this is not how SRPs are measured. A Search Results Page is a single page of search results. I can't even find anyone who knows how to attribute a page view to a vehicle that is not on that page.
My claim is that the appropriate value comparison is cost per VDP. What makes me suspicious of all these claims of difference is that there absolutely cannot be any difference between VDPs from AT Featured and AT Premium. The same people who don't want value transparency between AT and Cars.com don't seem to want it here either.
Cost per VDP will vary from dealer to dealer based on pricing strategy and the types of vehicles stocked, but when you put the same vehicles and prices on all listings sites, the comparison at the dealer level is absolute.
Here is the deal. I've enjoyed a very good relationship with both companies over the past ten years, but I am sick and tired of watching dealers spend this kind of money in a cloud of bull crap. I am willing to meet with the experts from both companies who can demonstrate how their metrics are derived. I'll pay my own way to wherever this meeting needs to take place. To me, Louisville, KY looks to be pretty close to the middle between Chicago and Atlanta. I'm laying it down here and now, cost per VDP is the best way to compare the value of any listings site that charges on a subscription basis. Anyone who thinks this is not fair can post a date for when they are willing to meet me in Louisville. Alex and other independent marketing experts are welcome as well.
Ok you are wasting your time if you are trying to use VDP as a measurement for success or any type of value with ATC or Cars.
1. Just because someone views a vehicle page on either of these sites means absolutely nothing, because if they don't act on that view you can’t change the page to get an action anyway.
2. If ATC and Cars are like most dealerships website, and I would tend to believe they are 80% of the visitors there never leave the listings area so you are looking at the smallest portion of the traffic.
3. If you think that somehow you are branding your dealership with the VDP inside ATC or Cars look again, you are the smallest part of the branding on that page and the visitor has forgotten you in the time it takes to click the back button.
The only ways you can measure these sites that I know of are the following:
1. Referrals back to you website that result in a lead – of coarse ATC and cars make it almost impossible for the customer to get to your site as they view the customer as their customer not yours, even though they have nothing to sell them.
2. Calls or leads that come directly from the listing
3. Sales and you can directly attribute back to ATC or Cars – put an offer in the listing that the visitor can only get from that listing. Free car washes for life, 2yrs free maintenance ect. make that offer compelling, something the visitor would be crazy not to act on and ask them to print the listing to get it. This notion of the mystical customer that just shows up on the lot is CRAP, you can and should track and hold ATC and Cars accountable.
Tracking VDP is and exercise in futility, you will only succeed and pissing yourself off and not being able to do a damn thing about it.
1. Just because someone views a vehicle page on either of these sites means absolutely nothing, because if they don't act on that view you can’t change the page to get an action anyway.
2. If ATC and Cars are like most dealerships website, and I would tend to believe they are 80% of the visitors there never leave the listings area so you are looking at the smallest portion of the traffic.
3. If you think that somehow you are branding your dealership with the VDP inside ATC or Cars look again, you are the smallest part of the branding on that page and the visitor has forgotten you in the time it takes to click the back button.
The only ways you can measure these sites that I know of are the following:
1. Referrals back to you website that result in a lead – of coarse ATC and cars make it almost impossible for the customer to get to your site as they view the customer as their customer not yours, even though they have nothing to sell them.
2. Calls or leads that come directly from the listing
3. Sales and you can directly attribute back to ATC or Cars – put an offer in the listing that the visitor can only get from that listing. Free car washes for life, 2yrs free maintenance ect. make that offer compelling, something the visitor would be crazy not to act on and ask them to print the listing to get it. This notion of the mystical customer that just shows up on the lot is CRAP, you can and should track and hold ATC and Cars accountable.
Tracking VDP is and exercise in futility, you will only succeed and pissing yourself off and not being able to do a damn thing about it.
- Jan 12, 2011
- 13
- 3
- First Name
- Dennis
Larry,
Thank you for bringing this up. It is a common misperception.
VDP is the point of accountability separation in these participatory models. The number of contacts per VDP is almost entirely a function of the dealer's inputs (photos, seller's notes, video). Yes, a dealer needs to understand how well their VDPs convert into phone, email, chat, and walk-in contacts. In order to determine the break-even point for cost per VDP, it is also important to know the close ratio from these leads. However, those things can be dealt with in aggregate.
The discussion here is about determining the value of one listings service compared to another or the value of a basic service versus a premium package. For this it is best to hold constant as many variables as possible that are attributable to dealership activity. Professional research attempts to isolate the measurement to that which impacts the decision. If your pricing, merchandising, and lead handling are the same for all services, there will still be variances from VDP to sale due to statistical variation and small sample sizes.
Temporarily, my analysis is somewhat unfair to Cars.com because they offer chat and AutoTrader.com does not. This is a downstream variance caused by differences between the services. However, AT will soon have chat and we will be back to cost per VDP as the best metric for deciding which service or level of service provides the best value. This is the number dealers should hold their services accountable to. If a vendor is coming in to raise rates 20%, they better have raised VDPs 20% since the last agreement, fair and simple. However, if the inflated cost per VDP is still cheaper than the other listing services, then the decision is whether to pay the increase or buy none of the services at all. That decision is where your analysis comes in.
Thank you for bringing this up. It is a common misperception.
VDP is the point of accountability separation in these participatory models. The number of contacts per VDP is almost entirely a function of the dealer's inputs (photos, seller's notes, video). Yes, a dealer needs to understand how well their VDPs convert into phone, email, chat, and walk-in contacts. In order to determine the break-even point for cost per VDP, it is also important to know the close ratio from these leads. However, those things can be dealt with in aggregate.
The discussion here is about determining the value of one listings service compared to another or the value of a basic service versus a premium package. For this it is best to hold constant as many variables as possible that are attributable to dealership activity. Professional research attempts to isolate the measurement to that which impacts the decision. If your pricing, merchandising, and lead handling are the same for all services, there will still be variances from VDP to sale due to statistical variation and small sample sizes.
Temporarily, my analysis is somewhat unfair to Cars.com because they offer chat and AutoTrader.com does not. This is a downstream variance caused by differences between the services. However, AT will soon have chat and we will be back to cost per VDP as the best metric for deciding which service or level of service provides the best value. This is the number dealers should hold their services accountable to. If a vendor is coming in to raise rates 20%, they better have raised VDPs 20% since the last agreement, fair and simple. However, if the inflated cost per VDP is still cheaper than the other listing services, then the decision is whether to pay the increase or buy none of the services at all. That decision is where your analysis comes in.
- Apr 16, 2009
- 201
- 80
- Awards
- 5
- First Name
- Eric
@Dennis - Thank you for adding your logical & rational views re: comparing VDP's.
The last 3 sentences of your previous post sums it all up nicely IMO.
The last 3 sentences of your previous post sums it all up nicely IMO.
Dennis I see where you are trying to basically put an apples to apples value comparison on the two services but if even the lowest one is costing me $50+ CPA or $400+ per car sold then neither are valuable. That money can do more good elsewhere. So why bother trying to compare them?
This is right back to the newspaper model. You have to be the lowest guy in the paper or you’re wasting your money. Anyone can see that is the case here, in fact VAuto made a business out of that.
There is a reason why Southwest is one of the most profitable airlines and they are not on orbitz.com.
Just Sayin
This is right back to the newspaper model. You have to be the lowest guy in the paper or you’re wasting your money. Anyone can see that is the case here, in fact VAuto made a business out of that.
There is a reason why Southwest is one of the most profitable airlines and they are not on orbitz.com.
Just Sayin
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