Cars.com launches AI Chat (Conversations Starter Package)

I've been handling a client's Facebook Marketplace listing. The questions I get are pretty common and wouldn't be too hard for a bot to handle. I imagine the questions for CarsDotCom wouldn't be too different.

 

Let's try this again with thumbnails =) Me being the curious person I am, felt the need to try the Chat feature. Needless to say, after 7-8 minutes, getting passed between 2 different folks and then to be told that someone from the dealership would contact me, when all I had asked was if the truck was still available, it left a lot to be desired. My opinion is that it is not a user friendly experience, takes too long to get a response and doesn't fulfill the desire for instant gratification of a simple answer. My hope would be that maybe this frustration would drive more dealer phone calls? But my fear is that it would cause frustration and make the customer just move on....

 

Great post Suzie. These scripts are used everywhere. It only takes a couple times for the customer to catch on:

"Let me have a team member check if this vehicle that you are referring is available and ensure no deals are pending. What is the best phone number for us to reach you?"

"I am showing the 2010 Prius is still listed, however, I would like to have a member of the dealership confirm there are no pending deals on it. What's the best phone number for them to reach you?"

"It appears like this vehicle is available. However, let me have a team member to contact you and confirm that there are no pending deals. We'd also be more than happy to have you around for a test drive once this has been confirmed. Could I confirm your email address and phone number, please?"

"I do see this listed as available. Let me get with my team about our options for you. What’s the best phone number and email to follow up with you?"

 

I would guess one of the top questions is availability

After giving this a quick thought there is technical way to solve this. I would start by isolating the data stream prior to cars being removed from the dealers inventory. Look at things like open deals, shown appointments and leads on that car with a lead type of showroom. Then make a prediction based on those leading input features as to whether the car is gone. Train the data in a test environment and rinse repeat until it is correct. You can also broadcast a SMS to mgmt to quick respond y/n

This seams pretty solvable!

 

Lots of great observations here. Craig's dialed in!

Plus, I agree with Jon B, our industry is highly focused (i.e. narrow user intent) and chat automation should be very doo-able.

Here's a deep dive into classifying chat questions: https://www.dealerrefresh.com/dealership-chat-used-or-abused/

In this study, top chat classifications on a dealer's website:

1. Credit Questions
2. Trade-in Questions
3. Search Help Needed
4. Purchase Intent
5. Miscellaneous

If this was a betting game, on classified sites, I'd bet the order would look like:

1. Search Help Needed (higher in funnel & because all our websites suck)
2. Credit Questions (desire to shop by payment & Gumbys)
3. Purchase Intent (shopper wants to know availability to ensure a productive dealer visit)
4. Trade-in Questions (deeper in the funnel questions)
5. Miscellaneous (includes "what paperwork do I need to bring?)

Regardless of the order, "Purchase Intent" is a 911 chat. It has the highest ROI. If I were DI/Cars, I'd put a lot of thought into making this chat fly into the stores.

 

Just saying..
this is garbage.

From everything I can see, this is just skip logic.
But what do I know - maybe the machine is still learning

 

I'm not exactly sure of the user experience on Cars.com, but their Facebook option is pure crap. @DrewAment

https://forum.dealerrefresh.com/threads/cars-com-requesting-facebook-page-admin-access.6366/

 

If it's anything like they've done for Facebook Marketplace, I'm out! Their managed chat was awful. Terrible greetings, terrible responses. It was a mess. Then switched to Ana Bot who then jumps in during your conversation with the customer on Facebook-continues to attempt to close the conversation while you're speaking to the customer causing frustration on both ends. The relationship between Cars.com and Dealer Inspire has been frustrating to work through. We've been working through "growing pains" for a few months with the "Ana Bot". When concerns were brought to Cars.com I was directed to Dealer Inspire. The answer I got from Dealer Inspire was "we'll get to it but can't give you a time". Or "we've stopped working on that for now but we'll let you know when we start working on that problem again". Now we have to sign in through ANOTHER website Conversations to be able to speak with the Facebook customers without Ana Bot interrupting. Seems like they launched WELL before they were prepared. After working through this for months, I'd say its mediocre and a properly trained person in the dealership would do a better job. It's nice to have for after hours but you can set an auto response on Facebook itself for that.

 

That's unfortunate to hear, but not surprising.
I'm seeing this everywhere, including from some of the largest companies in the digital space.

I spent some time playing with Buzzfeed's "Zo Chat" and a few other ones that were launched publicly in the past few months.
They all seem to have the same limitations - if it's a simple question that fits their skip logic they have the answer.
If the question doesn't follow the flow chart, they have no solution and no ability to learn.
If they answer but it's the wrong answer, almost none of them have a feedback loop in which you can tell the AI bot that it was incorrect and that it's response was not what you are looking for.

I can't imagine trying to chat beside one of these things with a customer.
Like watching a train go off the rails in real time.

 

@Alex Snyder you should quote some of this for Friday, see what they say.