How to Get More Website Trade-in Leads - Copy the "Disruptors" like Carvana!

[Ryan Everson]

Getting used inventory is extremely difficult right now, so here's a quick, easy tip to get more trade-in leads on your website.

Have you noticed that Carvana, Vroom, Carmax, etc all have a "Sell/Trade" link in their menu?

We noticed and added it to all of our websites and saw a significant increase in trade leads! I'm not going to say the increase was entirely attributable to adding this link as there are market factors in play, but I’m sure it helped contribute.

What are some other creative ways your dealership is acquiring inventory?

 

[Jeff Kershner]

Something so simple yet overlooked. Great advise @Ryan Everson. I'll be making this change while tracking what kind of response we get from it. It would be great for some others to make this change for a few months and then report back their results.

 

[Marc Lavoie]

Great share Ryan, the game is going to be played after this button is clicked! I have seen disastrous results and winning strategies in the past.

If available, a multi-step questionnaire is one key for sure.

 

[Brad Burlingham]

i'm going to give it a try at our 12 dealerships as well

 

[BillKVMotorCo]

Added it. Let's see how she goes.

 

[ryan.leslie]

Great share Ryan, the game is going to be played after this button is clicked! I have seen disastrous results and winning strategies in the past.

If available, a multi-step questionnaire is one key for sure.

I haven't posted in a while, but this topic hit close to home. I wanted to say that @Marc Lavoie hit it out of the park! The game starts after the click and the critical innings are after the form submission.

Full disclosure: My company is responsible for the ICO tool on 50% of the sites that Ryan referenced and I have some strong opinions. There are several other consumer-facing brands that we whitelabel as well that have adopted top-level nav as a best practice. Here is an example of that on a non-dealer site.


Top-level nav is a best practice and a must, but here are some observations and opinions in no particular order that I hope are helpful thought-starters for the Refresh community. YMMV

• Give an actionable number, not a range. (I admit to a strong bias here)
  • A number is an offer I can take action on; a range is an invitation for a negotiation. No offense, but negotiating with a dealer isn't historically very high on anyone's wish list. Many of these "disruptors" found footing in the perception of avoiding that.
    • If you show a customer a range, which end of the spectrum are you expecting them to gravitate towards? You're starting the conversation with a tough obstacle.
  • Give a real number, follow-up, and be prepared to come up or down based on the consumer's description of the condition.
  • A number is memorable; a range is forgettable.
    • More on this in follow-up, but a customer that shops you may remember your offer even if they don't find a unit that fits them on your lot. If the dealer down the road's trade-in value is lower than your offer they will take notice and may sell to you rather than trading with your competitor. You win an acquisition. That competitor's trade-in value is very likely to be within any range you gave the customer and there is no cause for action at that point on their part.
  • Purely from a tech standpoint, a range isn't all that impressive. I'd argue that you don't need to pay a 3rd party for a range. You can pick two numbers that are $3000- $5000 apart all by yourself.
• Consider using "We'll buy yours even if you don't buy ours" messaging. There are several good reasons for this:
  • If you lead with "trade value" all you will get are trade opportunities. Don't expect the customer to intrinsically know that you'll buy their car outright.
  • Inventory light in this weird market? Don't pigeonhole your customer into a trade-only mindset. Give them an option to sell their car to you even when they are locked on another dealer's unit.
    • We're still playing the long game with customers, right? What a great relationship starter that may net future service and future sales opportunities.
    • Even if you lose today's sale to a competitor, you've given yourself a chance to win tomorrow's sale by acquisition.
• Carefully consider your plan for follow-up. (THIS is a big one.)
  • Who works these leads?
    • My opinion only, but this is not a job for the BDC agent whose comp plan favors sales appointments.
    • A buyer really needs to review these as they come in to find the needles in the haystack and pursue them aggressively.
  • Check your workflows in your CRM.
    • You lose me completely when I fill out a form to sell YOU my car and immediately get my inbox full of "when can you come in to take a test drive?", "Check out our amazing specials", and "Here is why you should buy from us."
      • Don't let your CRM make you the guy trying to turn Match.com into Ashley Madison.
        • (Edit: Neither of these are my jam, I hope that I referenced them correctly. )
  • It's a two-for-one lead.
    • Yes, this is absolutely a two-for-one lead. You have an acquisition opportunity AND THEN a sales opportunity. Don't put someone on these that may get tempted, or worse is financially motivated, to reverse the order of operations.
    • "Mr or Ms customer, here is our offer. We are happy to shake your hand and put a check in your other one to buy your car today, but may I ask, are you considering replacing this car with another one? No pressure, but there are some strong tax savings advantages you may want to consider"

Last Thought: Good Luck out there everyone! This market is crazy at best, but it too will return to some sense of normalcy in time. I don't think it is a bad thing to act in the now while planning for the future.

Cheers!
Ryan

 

[Jeff Kershner]

@ryan.leslie great info!

 

[Matthew Davis]

We (TradePending) recently held a customer training webinar on this topic. It covers universal best practices from optimizing placements, campaign channels, messaging, etc. Anyone is welcome to take a look below.

We find our customers like both ranges and single price offers for inventory sourcing. Having two approaches allows them to appeal to different types of consumers at different stages of the buying cycle.

We've seen improved lead conversion by changing the messaging to "10 Second Trade Value", tested out on a small handful of dealers.

 

[BillKVMotorCo]

If you have not done this already then you need to do it. Submissions have doubled and views tripled. Next step is to simplify our form.

 

[Jeff Kershner]

If you have not done this already then you need to do it. Submissions have doubled and views tripled. Next step is to simplify our form.

That's great to hear. Do you have a process for dealing with your trade leads vs price/contact leads?