DealerSocket Phone Leads Integration

[craigh]

Posting here to see if anyone has any experience with integrating phone leads with DealerSocket.
We've been stuck in an endless process of trying to get approved (for months), but their ADF parser seems to only work when the stars align.

We are now at the point where they are telling me that our leads aren't showing up because there's an extra line break in the ADF.

Has anyone had their phone system integrated with DealerSocket before?
I'm starting to think it's a myth...

 

[Dan Sayer]

Posting here to see if anyone has any experience with integrating phone leads with DealerSocket.
We've been stuck in an endless process of trying to get approved (for months), but their ADF parser seems to only work when the stars align.

We are now at the point where they are telling me that our leads aren't showing up because there's an extra line break in the ADF.

Has anyone had their phone system integrated with DealerSocket before?
I'm starting to think it's a myth...

It's been a while since we had DealerSocket but if I recall, we integrated then shut it off after a month because calls from a business that showed an alias caller ID, would place the call into the wrong customer profile if we had multiple customers working at the same company. It also triggered lead events for someone calling in to schedule service. It had to be constantly monitored, merged, and corrected. It wasn't worth the hassle. We just replaced our entire phone systems group-wide and opted for license recording on all sales lines with no CRM integration. Yes, some management involvement but spot checks and real-time review for training is the goal and counts for outbound, inbound, and recordings can be accessed via dashboard. We moved away from 175 tracking phone numbers that were all over the interwebs and would cause issues with recycled 800 numbers (so many stories). We figure if we train phone skills well (which we are working on), the success of entering the lead will come. I can also see if ext 1234 took 16 phone ups this month but he only entered 5 all month, I can spot check those calls (and see the phone number to spot check which ones were entered) for training. We also tried integration with eLead and VinSolutions. All have the same issue. It is a myth in my opinion.

 

[craigh]

We just replaced our entire phone systems group-wide and opted for license recording on all sales lines with no CRM integration.

This is our current state. The phone system is up and running and we have a dashboard that shows all their calls and recordings, broken down by toll free number, employee who answered, etc. All of that is great, but then sending an ADF lead to DealerSocket so that they can register the call is taking longer than developing the entire phone dashboard product.

All have the same issue. It is a myth in my opinion.

 

[Dan Sayer]

This is our current state. The phone system is up and running and we have a dashboard that shows all their calls and recordings, broken down by toll free number, employee who answered, etc. All of that is great, but then sending an ADF lead to DealerSocket so that they can register the call is taking longer than developing the entire phone dashboard product.

Oh, so you're talking about a manual "push to CRM" within the call dashboard and that ADF/MXL email can't be read by Dealer Socket?

 

[craigh]

Oh, so you're talking about a manual "push to CRM" within the call dashboard and that ADF/MXL email can't be read by Dealer Socket?

We automatically push every call for specific departments to DealerSocket. We're in the "testing" phase right now.
Inbound leads work fine, but anytime we send them an outbound call they say it doesn't show up.
Do they have logs? No.
Error messages? No.
A console showing incoming leads? No.

 

[Dan Sayer]

We automatically push every call for specific departments to DealerSocket. We're in the "testing" phase right now.
Inbound leads work fine, but anytime we send them an outbound call they say it doesn't show up.
Do they have logs? No.
Error messages? No.
A console showing incoming leads? No.

Isn't there a "click to call" feature in DS that'll record, log, and timestamp outbound calls? That to me seems to be the answer. This works in Vin. What DOESN'T work in Vin is calls from 3rd parties, like CarGurus, all come in as an Internet Lead because I can't set a different ADF rule for a call lead vs web lead from a single vendor. Other than that, I'm no help. Sorry. I feel your frustration.

 

[craigh]

Isn't there a "click to call" feature in DS that'll record, log, and timestamp outbound calls? That to me seems to be the answer. This works in Vin. What DOESN'T work in Vin is calls from 3rd parties, like CarGurus, all come in as an Internet Lead because I can't set a different ADF rule for a call lead vs web lead from a single vendor. Other than that, I'm no help. Sorry. I feel your frustration.

We are trying to give the dealer the control.
They can take one of their 1-800 numbers, call it AutoTrader and then we will send that call to DealerSocket as an AutoTrader lead.
I don't have high hopes that this will work though - it's been a rough go trying to get the bare bones setup.

 

[Dan Sayer]

We are trying to give the dealer the control.
They can take one of their 1-800 numbers, call it AutoTrader and then we will send that call to DealerSocket as an AutoTrader lead.
I don't have high hopes that this will work though - it's been a rough go trying to get the bare bones setup.

The reason we went away from all those tracking numbers was it was playing havoc with directories that would crawl sites, see our business name and a new 800 number, and then would proceed to update directories with that number which would then muddy the accuracy of tracking. That and then people searching for the store with intention of Service, Parts, or Body would still call a Sales listing tracking number (labeling numbers Sales and Service doesn't work lol). This then would create a Sales lead that wasn't a sales lead. Plus, it was a nightmare to get rid of the double monitor/record disclaimer, one from AutoTrader, etc, and one from our system. Made for a bad CX and literally our phone wouldn't actually ring until the customer was already on the line for 15 seconds, which is an eternity.

 

[craigh]

You've given me so much to look forward to...

 

[Jeff Kershner]

Going through the process/transition with Elead and CallSource right now. I was explaining to them what the issues it's going to cause but I'm being ignored. So once again, they will have to figure it out the hard way.

I'm with @Dan Sayer - teach and train your sales team, throw in an initiative and before you know it, they are entering phone ups into the CRM, with no need for someone needing to manage all the duplicate leads, 30 phone calls a day from dealers using your Cars.com number for dealer trades.

We spend all this time working through the integration points, setting up phone up workflows for no one to ever use the Call portion of the CRM. And then the GM/Owner changes the provider ever 13 months. /rant