Lead wall on your website

[pschnell]

@Alex Snyder , thank you for sharing your thoughts at this conference. Your counter-points were awesome and thought provoking.

I couldn't agree more that we want to give guests ALL the info they want without friction. However, we have to make the best of the hand we're given. Much of what we've done for price display is in response to OEM MAAP rules. We'd love to show our pricing to customers without their contact info. When we can't though, what's the best method to deliver this crucial info to the guest?

So, although basic contact info is required (per OEM), chat/text seems to be a preferred method for delivering pricing info. I didn't feel that Joe's stats were saying "gate everything." But when contact info is necessary (pricing/payment), we've found his company's tools to be pretty good at bridging the gap between customer expectation, OEM reqs, and dealership needs.

For anything else, give people what they want and get out of the way. They will often reward us for that alone. Why does anyone think gating inventory is a good idea?

 

[Marc Lavoie]

Those are nice increases to get a price, with those conversion %'s it must be presented well to the customer as added benefit too, like: Save your information for later, get price alerts, speed up your delivery/store visit process, get configure/payments, etc.

Any shopper attribution data to go with it?

Precisely, it's a question of value. If your customer sees value behind that wall, they'll get over it. You just have to come up with a decent offer on why they should share information with you.

 

[John V.]

I have used a website vendor that "guaranteed to double my leads" and used this lead wall strategy to get there. Instant Epricing is nothing new. Getting 27 leads on different vehicles from the same customer might 4X my conversion rate but at the end of the day it is still only 1 unique lead and 1 potential car deal......not 27.

This does not pass the "say it out loud" test

I respect what the guys/gals at the attribution summit are trying to accomplish - huge fan of the help i got with their Google Analytics classes - but when they veer this far off course it makes me wonder. Cui bono??

 

[Marc Lavoie]

I have used a website vendor that "guaranteed to double my leads" and used this lead wall strategy to get there. Instant Epricing is nothing new. Getting 27 leads on different vehicles from the same customer might 4X my conversion rate but at the end of the day it is still only 1 unique lead and 1 potential car deal......not 27.

This does not pass the "say it out loud" test

I respect what the guys/gals at the attribution summit are trying to accomplish - huge fan of the help i got with their Google Analytics classes - but when they veer this far off course it makes me wonder. Cui bono??

In this case you really have to look at increasing unique leads for sure.

 

[Marc Lavoie]

I guess people aren't as opposed to submitting their contact info like everyone in the industry was preaching they were a couple years ago. Am I reading this right???

View attachment 4459

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

That made my day.

 

[Jerry Thibeau]

this is completely out of left field unless you're saying it is a "click baity" statement to get people to use your product

I anticipated a condescending comment from you Alex. Roughly eight years ago I started a thread and offered free phone training to dealers if they were willing to allow the process to be shared on Dealer Refresh. That thread was quite popular back then and very insightful for those who participated. What I am doing now is no different.

Back in July, I brought this very topic up and offered for dealers to try this method free of charge. You've since deleted your comments, but you were condescending then as well. I am simply offering for free to show this methodology works, and it works very well. As a vendor and 33 year automotive veteran, I am here to offer my expertise. When I give advice on here, I give it for free. Do I hope that dealers on here will see the value in what I offer and eventually become customers? Sure I do, otherwise I'd be stupid to spend any amount of time on here when I have three businesses to run.

You own 51% of Dealer Refresh, so I've been told, do you disclose that to people? Did you buy it to promote the company you run Fricken Monkey? I am sure you didn't buy it because you like spending time here? So as an owner of Dealer Refresh, I would think you would want to promote engagement instead of being a smart-ass to those who come here with a free offering to prove a concept works.

This site is not the same place it used to be!

 

[Alex Snyder]

I anticipated a condescending comment from you Alex. Roughly eight years ago I started a thread and offered free phone training to dealers if they were willing to allow the process to be shared on Dealer Refresh. That thread was quite popular back then and very insightful for those who participated. What I am doing now is no different.

Back in July, I brought this very topic up and offered for dealers to try this method free of charge. You've since deleted your comments, but you were condescending then as well. I am simply offering for free to show this methodology works, and it works very well. As a vendor and 33 year automotive veteran, I am here to offer my expertise. When I give advice on here, I give it for free. Do I hope that dealers on here will see the value in what I offer and eventually become customers? Sure I do, otherwise I'd be stupid to spend any amount of time on here when I have three businesses to run.

You own 51% of Dealer Refresh, so I've been told, do you disclose that to people? Did you buy it to promote the company you run Fricken Monkey? I am sure you didn't buy it because you like spending time here? So as an owner of Dealer Refresh, I would think you would want to promote engagement instead of being a smart-ass to those who come here with a free offering to prove a concept works.

This site is not the same place it used to be!

There was a time when DealerRefresh helped get you going if I recall. I also recall hiring your services at Checkered Flag. And even enjoying a friendship that came out of your time at iMagicLab. The Jerry I see these days is not that guy.

So, sure, people change. Maybe DealerRefresh isn't the place you remember.

And c'mon now, do you really need me to spell out how "free" isn't really free. Because both Jeff and I have so much history with you we let your breaking of the forum rules slide. This is why you get the "condescending" comment from me.

 

[Gayle Rogers]

We have used this strategy at a handful of dealers and created some pretty interesting data around it. Right wrong or indifferent, leads are a measure of success for agencies, websites, etc. and this is a way to manipulate that metric.

First, while I don't personally like this tactic, and I don't like the UX, I fully believe that you have to test everything, and then retest it. What we like or don't like is irrelevant.

That said, here is some sample data:

	Average Unique New Car Email Leads per Month	Average Unique Used Car Email Leads per Month
Before Price Lock	150	250
After Price Lock	600	800
Net Lead Increase*	360	480

*Of the leads received after locking the prices, approximately 60% included legit contact data.


Now for the important information...None of the following KPIs were positively affected by the increases in leads: Appointments, Ups or Sales. In some cases these actually suffered.

What did we learn from this?
While creating a lead wall does increase one KPI, it does not increase the bottom line, may actually hurt sales by pissing people off and tie up your resources chasing people who have no intention of engaging, they just wanted to see a price. This tactic only manipulates a stand alone metric, it will not change the number of people in the market to buy a car. It's math.

Here is what we are currently testing with a number of our dealers:
Show a price, but use a strike through and use a "Get Today's Price" type CTA. The key is the strike through, and will increase leads by 100% - 200%. The most important part, however, is the email response from the dealership. It has to clearly explain how the dealership adjusts prices daily and it has to either show a better price based on "today's market value" and/or similar vehicles good, better, best style. Our hypothesis is that this strategy provides the best balance in terms of what the dealership wants, what the customer wants and providing a quality user/buyer experience. While the email content may seem like a basic thing, it's often the break point in the process.

Hope this is helpful!

 

[ed.brooks]

We had a local dealer who used a 'Lead Wall' until they were bought out by a much larger dealer group. This dealer used a "For The People" marketing program that I believe was developed by Greg Goebell. As I understand it, for this dealership anyway, they relied on an extensive radio advertising program designed to reach people BEFORE they were 'in market' and actively shopping any other dealers.

The dealership did okay, but they were far from being a market leader for volume. I suspect that it would NOT work if your goal was to do any volume at all.

If your goal is to increase leads, I think this would help.

If your goal is to increase overall sales, I think this would hurt.

It sounds like a plan designed to help the BDC and Internet teams take more credit for sales while not increasing variable ops volume or total revenue one bit.

 

[Michael Warwick]

We have one store in our group that absolutely crushes their district for volume and gross and they only advertise MSRP. Their formula is very simple - attract and find better customers. The entire store is focused on equity mining, service drive and running campaigns that appeal to their ideal customers. Every market is different but what I've noticed is that if you offer rock-bottom online pricing, you are going to attract bottom feeding customers who have seven quotes and want you to beat the best price by $500.