Online Appointment Conversion KPI - XTime

[Dan Sayer]

Quick question. We have five stores using XTime and they have been pleased with the service drive functionality. My question is the online scheduler metrics. As a group we saw a 24% conversion rate from Appointments Started to Appointments Booked on desktop and 14% on mobile. Is this good, bad?

Show rate on all Booked is 84% which I thought was pretty good. Other interesting item is that data above was hard to come by as well as XTime doesn't have any suggestions or path to improve upon those numbers within their own system (like A/B testing etc). Has anyone worked with XTime to actively improve Booking performance? Thanks!

 

[Ryan Everson]

Quick question. We have five stores using XTime and they have been pleased with the service drive functionality. My question is the online scheduler metrics. As a group we saw a 24% conversion rate from Appointments Started to Appointments Booked on desktop and 14% on mobile. Is this good, bad?

Show rate on all Booked is 84% which I thought was pretty good. Other interesting item is that data above was hard to come by as well as XTime doesn't have any suggestions or path to improve upon those numbers within their own system (like A/B testing etc). Has anyone worked with XTime to actively improve Booking performance? Thanks!

I was really hoping when CDK launched Fortellis at NADA that some innovative companies would come out with new service schedulers because the industry's current selection is pretty bad.

It's like they've all made their UI / UX purposely confusing and difficult for consumers to use. I provided PSD mockups to CDK a couple years ago showing how they could easily redesign their scheduler to make it convert better but of course they never acted on it. Not sure if XTime would be any more responsive, just look how many years it took them to finally send events into Google Analytics.

 

[C Dorman]

I was really hoping when CDK launched Fortellis at NADA that some innovative companies would come out with new service schedulers because the industry's current selection is pretty bad.

It's like they've all made their UI / UX purposely confusing and difficult for consumers to use. I provided PSD mockups to CDK a couple years ago showing how they could easily redesign their scheduler to make it convert better but of course they never acted on it. Not sure if XTime would be any more responsive, just look how many years it took them to finally send events into Google Analytics.

I know of one company that has/is working on this now. And in the interest of full disclosure, I am about to have a vested financial interest. The problem with XTime, and every other website service that uses iFrames, is how to properly track their behavior. XTime will install your GA code and report events in GA, but they are not tied to sources/behaviors like other GA conversions. Note, you may have to talk to several layers of support at XTime until you finally reach the right person. Don't give up, they will do it no problem.

The technical issue is to have these companies install your additional tracking script as part of their service. If I understand it correctly, you need to pass the GA data to the tracking script so it can associate it with the events it tracks and then write it all back to GA via the data layer. It's not easy and each service provider has to cooperate to make it happen.

It gets even more complicated if there are nested iFrames/scripts involved, which can vary depending on whether or not your website is an OEM approved website, the OEM involved and how the OEM is taking this data.

This product is still in beta and under development, but if you want to contact me I'll be more than happy to hook you up if you'd like to participate.

[email protected] or 949.910.0421.

 

[Dan Sayer]

XTime did let us know they'll be able to give us the specific "bail" points within their tool in mid-December...AND we are running our own GA within starting recently. From there though the real question will be if we can then offer a solution to correct an exit point within XTime's tool. We shall see. Did you have any data for conversion to an appointment within tools iframed in like XTime to compare my numbers?

 

[C Dorman]

XTime did let us know they'll be able to give us the specific "bail" points within their tool in mid-December... From there though the real question will be if we can then offer a solution to correct an exit point within XTime's tool. We shall see. Did you have any data for conversion to an appointment within tools iframed in like XTime to compare my numbers?

I've seen 24%-25% of all service appointments booked online as an upper range metric a couple of times now but can't personally attest to its accuracy.

 

[Alex Snyder]

In 2014/2015 I was involved with the due diligence on a service scheduler acquisition with Dealertrack. It was the most comprehensive exercise I had ever been involved in around service scheduling technology. Obviously it didn't go anywhere once Cox acquired us because Xtime was already in the stable.

What I can share from that research (based on 2014/2015 numbers and technology):

• The average dealer gets around a 7% online bookings of total appointments percentage.
• The better dealers book more than 12% of their appointments through online schedulers.
• Three of the larger schedulers were VERY EXCITED about some of their Toyota dealers seeing higher than 20% bookings. At that time Toyota was putting a big focus on helping dealers do more with service online.
• BMW stores are higher on average.

 

[Cheri James]

Quick question. We have five stores using XTime and they have been pleased with the service drive functionality. My question is the online scheduler metrics. As a group we saw a 24% conversion rate from Appointments Started to Appointments Booked on desktop and 14% on mobile. Is this good, bad?

Show rate on all Booked is 84% which I thought was pretty good. Other interesting item is that data above was hard to come by as well as XTime doesn't have any suggestions or path to improve upon those numbers within their own system (like A/B testing etc). Has anyone worked with XTime to actively improve Booking performance? Thanks!

Hey Dan,
I sure never thought I’d be on this end of the spectrum in my automotive career but oh well- I still feel like I belong to the car biz! I am a Senior Manager with Performance Management in Xtime and was actually just looking for some printable resources I remember existing in internet land when I stumbled on this site then saw this on the first page. I have been in a dealership my entire working career (started selling cars then made my way to Fixed Ops Director) only to decide I wanted to do something broader that helped more dealers. I have recently made it my mission that anyone I work with who has a UA number with Google Analytics- I get them set up right away so they can track where customers are coming undone and then be more strategic in your attack. I am the information junkie of my group and just believe if there is a way to do something, I want it right, I want the full benefit, and the most for my money. I am not sure how this site works but I did read the rules so I want to comply and hope I’m in line here. If I can help get that started for you- please let me know . I know your group’s Performance Manager and can help him make this happen ASAP. As soon as we pull the switch you’re tracking all on your own with no influence from Xtime. I love that actually, but since this is a relatively new integration, not many have been set up. I have friends and other great users of Xtime who we are going to work together to dissect the data and game plan. I’ve even made a guide to pass to our team and any dealer who may need to understand what and how the integration works. Good luck, friend! Hope to hear from you. I’m on LinkedIn too if it’s hard to connect through here.

 

[Dan Sayer]

Hey Dan,
I sure never thought I’d be on this end of the spectrum in my automotive career but oh well- I still feel like I belong to the car biz! I am a Senior Manager with Performance Management in Xtime and was actually just looking for some printable resources I remember existing in internet land when I stumbled on this site then saw this on the first page. I have been in a dealership my entire working career (started selling cars then made my way to Fixed Ops Director) only to decide I wanted to do something broader that helped more dealers. I have recently made it my mission that anyone I work with who has a UA number with Google Analytics- I get them set up right away so they can track where customers are coming undone and then be more strategic in your attack. I am the information junkie of my group and just believe if there is a way to do something, I want it right, I want the full benefit, and the most for my money. I am not sure how this site works but I did read the rules so I want to comply and hope I’m in line here. If I can help get that started for you- please let me know . I know your group’s Performance Manager and can help him make this happen ASAP. As soon as we pull the switch you’re tracking all on your own with no influence from Xtime. I love that actually, but since this is a relatively new integration, not many have been set up. I have friends and other great users of Xtime who we are going to work together to dissect the data and game plan. I’ve even made a guide to pass to our team and any dealer who may need to understand what and how the integration works. Good luck, friend! Hope to hear from you. I’m on LinkedIn too if it’s hard to connect through here.

@Cheri James pretty sure you are using this forum exactly as intended; offering solid advice and inviting conversation. We have implemented GA and are watching where that visitor bails inside of XTime. The question was if once we find that out, is XTime flexible enough to work with the data to A/B test changes to measure other UX/CTA/etc? We also realize that our own set-up for each store with schedule availability, etc, may be a culprit as well. It would also be great to know what XTime says are average conversion rates based on desktop and mobile to compare. Thanks!

 

[Cheri James]

@Cheri James pretty sure you are using this forum exactly as intended; offering solid advice and inviting conversation. We have implemented GA and are watching where that visitor bails inside of XTime. The question was if once we find that out, is XTime flexible enough to work with the data to A/B test changes to measure other UX/CTA/etc? We also realize that our own set-up for each store with schedule availability, etc, may be a culprit as well. It would also be great to know what XTime says are average conversion rates based on desktop and mobile to compare. Thanks!

Oh, now we are talking. It was late last night and I must not have read everything in context. So not only can we provide all sorts of comparative data- we can look at OEM, Xtime-wide, Dealer group’s of similar size and we can absolutely work with you on A/B testing variations- let me make sure I am clear because we actually have a new consumer portal about to be released and is going through A/B testing but the methods are we doing this are random within certain dealer’s customers who are part of the pilot. I don’t know we would be able to help you make changes within a certain store, for instance, and have different test variables with the same customer base. But if you are proposing trying different techniques within your group- absolutely. Feel free to reach out to me later. I can also share with you via screenshare on a demo site (if it still operates) or at least with slides what the new UI is like among other nifty internal reports that we use for analysis that includes your dealers and group. 224-651-4146. Work cell. I have openings early afternoon- 1:30 EST and after. Or email me [email protected] and we can set something up to discuss. You lucked out- this is just my forte and the entire group knows I am a Data and Improvement junkie. Meant to be I stumbled on here lol

 

[Dan Sayer]

Oh, now we are talking. It was late last night and I must not have read everything in context. So not only can we provide all sorts of comparative data- we can look at OEM, Xtime-wide, Dealer group’s of similar size and we can absolutely work with you on A/B testing variations- let me make sure I am clear because we actually have a new consumer portal about to be released and is going through A/B testing but the methods are we doing this are random within certain dealer’s customers who are part of the pilot. I don’t know we would be able to help you make changes within a certain store, for instance, and have different test variables with the same customer base. But if you are proposing trying different techniques within your group- absolutely. Feel free to reach out to me later. I can also share with you via screenshare on a demo site (if it still operates) or at least with slides what the new UI is like among other nifty internal reports that we use for analysis that includes your dealers and group. 224-651-4146. Work cell. I have openings early afternoon- 1:30 EST and after. Or email me [email protected] and we can set something up to discuss. You lucked out- this is just my forte and the entire group knows I am a Data and Improvement junkie. Meant to be I stumbled on here lol

The team and I will find a time to connect with you. I have a process ninja and GA genius here working with me but I'm out all next week so we'll connect the week after. It would be good to report some of the findings and progress in this forum for the community's sake.