Stephanie , I re-read your post and I am going to assume that your "sphere of influence" is greater than buying leads. if so, then your entire future is based on educating yourself and all around you just how important the Internet is to the ENTIRE operation, not just the "Internet Department".
1st, establish just how important the Internet is to the
entire operation.
The million dollar question:
How much potential is there? You need to establish a base line to measure from.
2 simple yet critical reports need to be made. Don't let simplicity fool you, these 2 reports have more power to move mountains than any other report I have come across.
Number One Report.
Create post-sale survey (example below). This report will show you (and management) that 80-95% of your buyers were on your home site before they bought. So? Management doesn't see the site as a "gateway" to the show room. This report makes this an undeniable fact. The quality of the info and tools at this showroom gateway either makes the phone ring or they move on.
How much potential is at this "gateway to the showroom"?
Number Two Report.
Using End of Month numbers, divide number of unique visitors to your website by number of sales. This report will show you that you only sell .5% to 1.5% of your dealership's website audience. In other wods, 99 walk and only one buy. Where did the other 99 visitors go?
These two reports will give you an idea on how much upside there is to "working your crowd". You'll need this to help justifying increasing the budget. It will also help you give you a focus on what stats can help you sell more cars.
Post Sale Survey:
A very short and simple one page survey, Multiple Choice answers, made mandatory at delivery. A few on my survey are:
- Have you bought from us before?
- If yes, How many vehicles?
- As best as you can recall, how long have you been looking for a new vehicle?
- While you were car shopping, where did you get most of your ideas? (check all that apply)
- How did you hear about us? (check all that apply)
- Do you consider yourself a frequent internet user?
- Did you visit internet automobile shopping sites? (please check all that apply)
- Did you visit our website, ________.com?
- How did you locate our website, ________.com?
- Did you find ________.com helpful?
- How can we make ________.com better?
http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f43/how-much-change-will-i-see-190.html
http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f43/what-most-important-site-analytics-430.html