• Stop being a LURKER - join our dealer community and get involved. Sign up and start a conversation.

First post I am looking for information regarding inventory feeds to power an automotive retailing site (like Autotrader or Cars.com)

Oct 10, 2020
1
0
First Name
Jason
Thread title says most of it. I am interested in developing an online automotive marketing site similar to Cars.com or Autotrader and I am trying to figure out how to get a dealers inventory feed.(obviously with their permission)

I know that Homenet and Vauto and other pieces of software syndicate that data. What I dont know is what type of format the data comes in and how to get access to a few feeds so I can build out the code.

My research so far has told me that some have an ftp site where you pull down the data and some have API's where you can update in real time.

I am hoping someone can point me in the right direction.

I have access to a few dealerships, having been in variable retail for a long time, but I have no connections with any of the syndicators to my knowledge.

Any help would be appreciated.
 
From what I've seen out there and API is pretty hopeful. Most syndications are done via FTP with CSV files. This is the same way feeds are syndicated out to 3rd party vendors (Autotrader, Cars.com, CarGurus). Each syndicating service will have its own format so you will be required to map the fields to your own application. Plan on writing drivers/schemas for each syndicator. Off the top of my head to pull a dealer's inventory you'd be looking at Homenet, vAuto, DealerVault, I think even CarsForSale.com offers this.

**Depending on how far along in your application you are I do have an API available to communicate inventory with 3rd parties but this is not public for dealers at the moment. I'd be happy to connect with you about this if you're interested and would like to test the inventory API. Message me if you'd like to take a look at the documentation.
 
I'm going to be the guy that rains on the parade Jason. I promise I'm not posting to be negative, that's not my bag. I really think you need to know the answers to these questions BEFORE you start looking for inventory because I think you have a sheer cliff of an uphill battle ahead of you.
  1. What is my USP (unique selling proposition or "big idea")? What differentiates my marketplace from all of the others?
  2. Why will consumers choose to shop on my marketplace over other well-known ones?
  3. Why will consumers use my marketplace instead of a dealer's site to search for inventory?
  4. Why will dealers choose to advertise with me instead of other well-known marketplaces? What can I alone offer them?
    1. I think you really need to assume that there isn't more pie, you will be asking dealers to divert spend TO you and AWAY from something else.
  5. How will I get traffic to my marketplace? What advertising will I deploy?
  6. How will I ensure that the traffic I drive converts?
  7. Does my "big idea" need to be its own marketplace, or can I deliver it to dealers in another way?
I work for one of the largest inventory aggregators in the industry. I get requests almost weekly from folks that are looking for dealer's inventory feeds to populate their new marketplaces. It has been a while, but Refresh has seen similar threads here too.

I don't want to discourage you if you have a great idea or a fresh new concept and you've done your homework, but I honestly believe that unless you have a tight niche (3-pedal) or a loyal following and a huge platform like Doug Demuro (carsandbids), this is going to be a tough business to hop into at this time.

Just search the forums and see how many dealers have pulled all of their 3rd party lead budget and reallocated it to search/social. The folks at CARS, Gurus, CARFAX, EDMUNDS, TrueCar, Autotrader, CarsForSale, CarStory and all of the properties we whitelabel (my company has built 240+ marketplaces in our 16 year history)... that isn't anywhere close to an exhaustive list and I left out what I think is probably you're biggest competitor for dealer's mindshare, the dealer's website itself. All of these have a big headstart on UI, branding, conversion, consumer experience, lead delivery, ROI justification, dealer support, technical support, reporting, etc...

This is a highly competitive space my friend. Again, not trying to be Debbie Downer, but I'd hate to see you spend a lot of cycles building a marketplace that you could have spent on an "easier" path to market if your idea isn't marketplace dependent.

Ryan

PS. Welcome to the Forum!
 
I'm going to be the guy that rains on the parade Jason. I promise I'm not posting to be negative, that's not my bag. I really think you need to know the answers to these questions BEFORE you start looking for inventory because I think you have a sheer cliff of an uphill battle ahead of you. Cont...
I agree with everything you have to say, however I genuinely think a database and retailing site that can effectively deliver quality leads could easily find it's spot in the current market. If the intention is a partnership with many auto retailers, his main focus is easily found. Daily refreshed inventory (easily achievable through API, and quality lead submission for dealers. Ex. Text or auto call verification for submitted phone numbers and emails. Easy to implement and would offer an immense improvement over the current sites out there. Marketing for both dealers and car buyers could be tricky though. I do notice most sites place a lot of focus on a casual and laid back experience, but this also makes them hard to differentiate. An untapped niche would be the "serious car buyer" which would not only give focus to a neglected demographic, but would likely help overall lead quality. If it was pulled off correctly word of mouth within dealerships would be big. Marketing to car buyers would be an entirely different beast.
At the end of the day though it is a huge risk with low likelihood of reward. Perfect passion project, probably not a great investment of time though.