Digital Retailing for Dealers - What are your results?

[Alex Snyder]

It depends I guess on how we would define it but we had 36 total people complete a credit app and upload their driver's license, Ins/reg which to me I would count as completing the whole process. Everyone else pretty much messed around with payments until they saw a number they liked with about 60% throwing in a trade.

36 people out of 738 leads = 4.8%

Do you know what the views are? It would be interesting to note the views to lead conversion and then the views to completion conversion. Some DR tools have publicly made claims about the total completion being less than 5% during COVID quarantines. I'm hearing multiple dealers state it is far less than 1% today.

As DR continues to be pushed as a "deal completion" tool for your website, these numbers show why so many dealers are less enamored with it today.

 

[John V.]

So we had 5,172 unique "shoppers" submit 1,152 "deals" through DR. My reporting above is for first contact so the difference in lead volume is most likely the customers using DR as lead #2 which my CRM would not give sale credit to or count in source reporting.

Out of 1,152 only 36 did the full shebang which I take to mean as not a shortcoming of the technology but as a customers not actually wanting to complete the whole transaction online.

Another number that boggles the mind (what seems to me anyway) relatively low lead to engagement and engagement to visit %. You as a customer just input your trade-in and calculated payments THEN filled out the contact form and you still wont return my call, text, or open the video we sent you? Could it be our delivery, strong possibility but that does not explain why only 26% of the people we actually do have conversation with even visit the store.

open to outside input on that one.

 

[Alex Snyder]

36 people out of 738 leads = 4.8%
36 people out of 1,152 deals = 3%
36 people out of 5,172 unique views = .7% <—this is what many dealers are upset about because they were sold a magic deal closing button

1,152 deals out of 5,172 unique views = 22%
738 leads out of 5,172 unique views = 14% <— this is what many dealers are happy about, but don't like the price tag

My STRONG opinion on this stems from 2014 when the idea of building digital retailing was first presented to me at Dealer.com. @john.quinn and I had the same reaction: we laughed at it. We told the person presenting it to us that very few customers will go through a digital process without the salesperson walking them through it. Were we right?

That is the .7% number above. Those are self-guided customers who will roll down the digital retailing paperworking tunnel by themselves.

100% of customers will roll down the tunnel if it is the process of the dealership and the sales agents are leading the tour. The customer will jump through any process hoop to buy a car… even if they hate it. But people buy cars from people; not websites.

And this is also where part of your issue is coming from @John V. These tools were developed by technologists who mostly don't like the car-buying process as it stands today. They built something for themselves not realizing they are .7% of the car buying public. What they missed is that one has to include the car dealers in the process because people buy cars from people. They did not set the stage for you to be as successful as you could be, as a dealer.

One has to love dealers to build a two-sided tool. If one only loves customers, they will build a one-sided tool.

 

[BillVaughnAlWestNissan]

We simply cannot get any traction with any DR tools. We have tried at least 5 different ones without success. The only people that we get leads on are people with bad credit. We are getting ready to end the most current iteration that we have used which is CDK's tool. That one was the biggest failure of them all. So currently we are not using any true DR tool. It may matter to know that we are in a rural area in Missouri too. I think that factors into things as well. Just not sure if people are ready for it yet.

All this being said, the most success we have had with something resembling a DR tool is Frikintech. I excluded it from consideration as a true DR tool since it doesn't include the option for finalizing the deal in it's system. Obviously I could care less about that part if it's producing results and I still don't think the majority of customer's are ready to dive into the full online transaction with dealers. I almost wonder if Frikintech works well because it DOESN'T include that option. I theorize that people are more apt to use the tool and complete the lead process because they don't feel the squeeze to complete an online deal.

 

[John V.]

I am not sure if you built the worlds best tool - one that puts carvanna to shame - that you would get much higher results at he bottom of the funnel. Could be wrong but I am basing that statement on: out of the 36 fully completed deals - hard credit pull, DL, Ins, reg, etc. - only 12 bought. I mean C'mon man! I just do not understand the disconnect there. You just took the time to do a full credit app, upload all your docs and you still will only come in and buy 30% of the time?

 

[Alex Snyder]

I am not sure if you built the worlds best tool - one that puts carvanna to shame - that you would get much higher results at he bottom of the funnel. Could be wrong but I am basing that statement on: out of the 36 fully completed deals - hard credit pull, DL, Ins, reg, etc. - only 12 bought. I mean C'mon man! I just do not understand the disconnect there. You just took the time to do a full credit app, upload all your docs and you still will only come in and buy 30% of the time?

Carvana and Vroom have incredible call centers that move the customer through their website. Their website is their process. And the front components of their website is built to get the customer talking to their call center. They built their website to facilitate a process that helps them.

That is the key few solutions understand. They're still selling a magic button when they need to help dealers better understand it is more about creating conversations your people can later close.

 

[John V.]

Carvana and Vroom have incredible call centers that move the customer through their website.

I think you should do the entire Refresh community a SOLID and mystery shop both Carvana and Vroom, document the process, and let us all listen to what these "incredible" call centers are telling their customers to see if that is something that we can steal or replicate.

 

[Tallcool1]

I am not sure if you built the worlds best tool - one that puts carvanna to shame - that you would get much higher results at he bottom of the funnel. Could be wrong but I am basing that statement on: out of the 36 fully completed deals - hard credit pull, DL, Ins, reg, etc. - only 12 bought. I mean C'mon man! I just do not understand the disconnect there. You just took the time to do a full credit app, upload all your docs and you still will only come in and buy 30% of the time?

This has been my frustration since the dawn on the internet. Customer will take 5 minutes to complete an online credit application INCLUDING A SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER, and then they won't answer a call, text, or email from us 3 minutes after the lead form comes in.

 

[THEINTERNETCOACH]

New to the forum, but thought I would weigh in.
I agree that the majority of customers do not want to complete the entire process online. The 2020 Cox Auto Buying Journey's data reinforces that point. They do want transparency in the process, which a DR tool can provide.

A couple things are key to maximizing them-
-These leads can't get a generic follow up process. That customer picked out a vehicle, and took the time to work payments on it. You can't just ask them "when can you come in?" There should be manager involvement on day one. Help them finish the deal they started!
-The instore experience has to match the online experience. The customer can't be forced to start over when they get in the store.

We added Roadster to a large 7 store group at the start of Covid (including the nation's busiest Kia store). Depending on the store, contact to appointment rate rates ran up to 60%. Closing rates ran up to 35%.

The lead counts from DR are never going to be that high, but the conversions should be. It's not about the tool. It's about the process behind it.

 

[DrewAment]

the most success we have had with something resembling a DR tool is Frikintech

That is because it gives what the customer wants (most anyways) upfront, with no jick/games -- "how much is it monthly"

The other DR tools have account gateways, click 3 times to exit, hard to change vehicles (without saving my info), completely separate website, and yet cost 2-3x as much.

My numbers for my dealers are similar/close to JonV - and the math just doesn't make sense. Remember that technology is supposed to SAVE time, money, effort. IMO if you really want to track results - need to look at market share (new) and turn (used). If I am an OEM store selling at 12%MS/24Turn, and I bring on a DR tool that costs $2000/month, and six months later I am still 12%MS/24Turn -- I just added $24,000 annualized expense with no real return. And the cost is more due to training, implementation, CRM headaches, separate DR CRM, AFDs (another f**king dashboard) etc, etc.