Cargurus, Please tell me how this benefits your customer (aka... The Dealer)????

[Jeremy Sacco]

Hi all --

Jeremy from CarGurus here. Yes, we're listening.

Without getting into a detailed discussion, I wanted to correct a key misconception that's been repeated in this thread:

CarGurus does not scrape your dealer websites for inventory. If your inventory is appearing on CarGurus and you'd like it removed, use this form or call (800) 227-4878.

In response to recent questions, we've created a new Dealer FAQ page. Hope that helps clarify some things.

As always, if you have specific questions about your dealership, reaching out to your dealer rep is the best way to get detailed answers. Thanks!

 

[joe.pistell]

I’m not sure I understand, how is CarGurus to blame for a poor website experience?

Never said CG was to blame, I simply spoke to your observation of how cars.com has lower lead counts. I have dozens of posts here speaking about lead quality vs lead volume and what causes this.

 

[Chris Leslie]

Jeremy, thanks for popping in here. I read your FAQ and it basically says nothing. There is zero clarification on pricing, products and ROI. The verbiage you guys have chosen to use is just as hollow as it was yesterday.

 

[joe.pistell]

I rather liked CG's FAQ.

• They dont scrape.
• Their subscription is based on what THEY believe is their performance to the dealership.
• Deal Rating attributes are: make, model, year, trim, options, mileage, vehicle history and geography, and...
  • This information comes to us via your inventory feed. (& its "rarely wrong") and...
  • The dealerships rating, as determined by consumer reviews on CarGurus, (slightly) impacts the deal rating.

Tearing it down, I have a problem with:

• The system by which CG scores itself is how they'll build & optimize the platform.
  • IOW, if CG values leads highly, the CG UI team will be working on ways to increase lead gen.
• They state "Inventory feed is rarely wrong", yet, I have vAuto dealers that are manually fixing the options SNAFU and evidence here.

 

[Dan Sayer]

Of course.. they allow Carvana to market “out of market” inventory into your market.. they cater to them because they are a delivery service and their inventory is applied differently.

I started noticing out of area inventory of theirs suppressing our inventory, when I asked my rep about it he knew this is happening and has been having trouble convincing dealers of their stance on “delivery service” which they claim accommodates consumers therefore it’s not a big deal.

To me this is a big deal, low lead generation and an uneven playing field.

Thanks. I had no idea that Carvana listings were on Cars.com. Carvana isn't in our market/s yet....

 

[A Kappler]

Never said CG was to blame, I simply spoke to your observation of how cars.com has lower lead counts. I have dozens of posts here speaking about lead quality vs lead volume and what causes this.

oh, I see. Thanks.

 

[A Kappler]

Hi all --

Jeremy from CarGurus here. Yes, we're listening.

Without getting into a detailed discussion, I wanted to correct a key misconception that's been repeated in this thread:

CarGurus does not scrape your dealer websites for inventory. If your inventory is appearing on CarGurus and you'd like it removed, use this form or call (800) 227-4878.

In response to recent questions, we've created a new Dealer FAQ page. Hope that helps clarify some things.

As always, if you have specific questions about your dealership, reaching out to your dealer rep is the best way to get detailed answers. Thanks!

Hi Jeremy.. I must be the only naive person on this thread to believe that Cagurus is a legit contender

Hi all --

Jeremy from CarGurus here. Yes, we're listening.

Without getting into a detailed discussion, I wanted to correct a key misconception that's been repeated in this thread:

CarGurus does not scrape your dealer websites for inventory. If your inventory is appearing on CarGurus and you'd like it removed, use this form or call (800) 227-4878.

In response to recent questions, we've created a new Dealer FAQ page. Hope that helps clarify some things.

As always, if you have specific questions about your dealership, reaching out to your dealer rep is the best way to get detailed answers. Thanks!

Thanks for speaking up, I fail to have any issues with you guys here in Western Pa, things must be different elsewhere.

 

[Jeremy Sacco]

Thanks for the positive responses, Joe and Andy.

Jeremy, thanks for popping in here. I read your FAQ and it basically says nothing. There is zero clarification on pricing, products and ROI. The verbiage you guys have chosen to use is just as hollow as it was yesterday.

Sorry you're not getting the answer you want. The answer on scraping is clear, right?

On pricing – the gist of it is, every dealer's price is set individually according to multiple factors, particularly on the number of connections they're receiving. As a result, the price should always be reflective of the expected ROI of the program: if we're driving more connections, you should be selling more cars and seeing more ROI, so it's appropriate for the subscription price to be higher. If that's not the case, you should talk to your rep about why.

On products and ROI — I'm not sure what the question is, but let me know and we'll try to get it sorted out.

 

[Chris Leslie]

Sorry you're not getting the answer you want. The answer on scraping is clear, right?

I personally dont care if you scrape or not. Its an unsolvable problem in my opinion. But, yes you are clear that you don't "scrape"

Pricing, Here's the problem. Dealers who do a better job of acquiring vehicles that people are interested are going to pay more based on what you are saying. Because if the cars that I buy are higher in demand they are guaranteed to have more interest by consumers naturally.

You guys don't do anything to "Drive" more connections to dealers who have shitty cars compared to those who don't have shitty cars. The platform does not adjust based on those factors. We are all the same as far as look and feel go. People do a search and cars pop up. thats it.

So how are you "Driving" more connections exactly?

Could it simply be the fact that I might just buy better inventory than the guy down the street that is leading me to get more "connections"?

Your pricing model is like basically saying that the pretty girls have to pay more to get in the club because their chance of hooking up with someone is higher.

 

[Jeremy Sacco]

You guys don't do anything to "Drive" more connections to dealers who have shitty cars compared to those who don't have shitty cars.

Oh there's a disconnect: we absolutely do more to drive connections to popular cars. Just because we operate at a large scale doesn't mean we operate at unlimited scale: we need to be efficient, too. It's important to us to spend our time and money marketing cars that people want to buy - via SEO, SEM, and all the other marketing channels we use to bring shoppers in. That's the kind of thing our algorithms are good at. If you acquire more cars that are in demand, you should get the benefit of that marketing and see more connections for those cars.

Yes, once someone's on our platform, cars are generally treated the same. But our investment in getting shoppers to the site can vary.

And of course, also factoring into pricing are volume, location, and other factors that drive more connections.

I'm going to leave it at that for now - this is a dealer forum after all. Have a good weekend.