Online Shopping to Online Buying

[craigh]

And, we all know, In our industry, there's been no significant changes to Internet car shopping,

That's another Joe Pistell all-encompassing statement that really doesn't hold true.
"no significant change"?
How many millions need to be invested in Beepi/Vroom/Carvana for it to be significant?
How many dealerships have to offer it for it to be considered significant?

Just because dealers aren't all using it, certainly does not mean that there has been no significant changes.
I can buy a car online and have it shipped to me with a return policy, warranty and financing without ever visiting a dealership.

 

[craigh]

In this light, I'd say yes. ( a conditional yes, but a yes for sure!)

Let's talk about this. What are the conditions for this to work?
Great topic starter.

• Financing Available
• Photos / Video / Walkaround of the actual vehicle in question
• Accessories / Warranty / Return Policy required
• Full online or at least majority online with live chat or phone support
• Vehicle delivery to customer location
• Pricing transparency
  • One Price or online Negotiation tool (ie: MakeMyDeal)

What else do we need?

We can glass-half-empty this until everyone else already has it or we can start defining what this industry needs

 

[joe.pistell]

Let's talk about this. What are the conditions for this to work?
Great topic starter.

• Financing Available
• Photos / Video / Walkaround of the actual vehicle in question
• Accessories / Warranty / Return Policy required
• Full online or at least majority online with live chat or phone support
• Vehicle delivery to customer location
• Pricing transparency
  • One Price or online Negotiation tool (ie: MakeMyDeal)

What else do we need?
We can glass-half-empty this until everyone else already has it or we can start defining what this industry needs

Time to step up Craig, Stop asking questions and countering ideas. Stop waiting for others to solve the unsolvable, It's time to fill in the empty page... it's time for you to lead.

 

[JamieS]

Time to step up Craig, Stop asking questions and countering ideas. Stop waiting for others to solve the unsolvable, It's time to fill in the empty page... it's time for you to lead.

Agreed, although I would put it like this; at some point as a company, if you really want to know, you will simply need to 'do it' and stop waiting for somebody else to pave the road and put nice stripes on it with directional signs for you. Many dealers have done just this, so why can't anyone else? The only reason is internal. Just like you see in this very discussion, people aren't in agreement or are nervous, don't want to be an early adopter, people don't want it yet, whatever the reason. Outside of that, there is nothing stopping anyone for making it work.

 

[craigh]

solve the unsolvable

The word "unsolvable" doesn't exist in my dictionary.
Might just be a millennial thing

 

[ruggles]

That's another Joe Pistell all-encompassing statement that really doesn't hold true.
"no significant change"?
How many millions need to be invested in Beepi/Vroom/Carvana for it to be significant?
How many dealerships have to offer it for it to be considered significant?

Just because dealers aren't all using it, certainly does not mean that there has been no significant changes.
I can buy a car online and have it shipped to me with a return policy, warranty and financing without ever visiting a dealership.

To sell cars online isn't a big deal. Doing so profitably IS. Show me the money.

 

[BHavican]

To sell cars online isn't a big deal. Doing so profitably IS. Show me the money.

If the cars listed on a dealer's site show a price that's profitable, then I don't see the problem with letting someone buy the car for that price in a way that's most convenient for them.

Many dealers have done just this, so why can't anyone else?

Is there a new car dealer that you can point me to that's done true online buying?

I'd be all in if there was a tool out there that could actually accomplish it, but everything I've seen is a fancy lead generator. Normally if I post something on these boards relating to a product/service, the vendor lurkers come out of the woodwork to pitch me. I have yet to hear from anyone suggesting they have an online buying solution, which leads me to believe an online buying solution doesn't exist.

 

[BHavican]

Could this be true for our industry as well?

Would the ability to purchase online provide enough convenience to entice a sizable portion of consumers to do business with your dealership?

At our group, in our market, yes. We have a lot of business professionals that are in this area and shop our brands. Time and convenience is important to them and having this solution would help us sell a few more cars than the competitor 5 miles away that wouldn't have the solution.

Our Hyundai store advertises very competitive prices that are true prices that everyone qualifies for and that people accept and purchase on all the time. There's still other hurdles to get around like financing and trade ins, but I strongly believe it will work for that store.

However, Mazda limits our advertised price and because of that we don't show a sale price on our new cars. A purchase online solution would not work for this store unless there was a way to get around Mazda's pricing guidelines.

 

[ruggles]

RE: "If the cars listed on a dealer's site show a price that's profitable, then I don't see the problem with letting someone buy the car for that price in a way that's most convenient for them."

Certainly not. Just mark your cars to the desired profit and let consumers buy them. What could be easier? What could go wrong?

Why aren't the Carvanas and Beepi's of the world telling us about the money they are making, or are they "disrupting" at a loss? Is anyone assuming they are profitable? Is it not an absolute fact that these startups, fueled with speculative capital, do business at a loss before they run out of capital and can't raise more? Can anyone count the failed attempts? How many did Scott Painter do himself? Just one guy? I talked today to the person who ran the PriceLine initiative years ago. Imagine, if you will, a site like PriceLine with substantial built in traffic offering a "Name your own Price" on a new car? What could be more natural? Why didn't that work? What has changed between then and now to make it work? What has changed in human nature between then and now? Anything?

All you have to do is put a shopping cart on your site and deliver the car to the customer once they've paid for it. What's the problem? What could go wrong?

Why the desire to reinvent the wheel? The Internet is what it is. It isn't what it isn't.

 

[BHavican]

That's a lot of questions. I'll just try and make my point of view as easy to understand as possible. We price our used vehicles using vAuto and it's our strategy to price them aggressively to create a faster turn rather than maximize profit on each sale. We price our new Hyundais pretty close to our bottom. With that pricing strategy we often have customers come to the store to buy a car at the advertised price and it's our pleasure to let them. Amazingly enough something about this is working because we consistently rank top 5 in our region and have above average gross.

Some of these customers that pay the internet price are business professionals that don't have an extended amount of time to spend in our store. There are even certain occasions where a customer may have to make multiple trips to complete a transaction. If we had a tool that allowed those customers who are happy with the advertised price to purchase the vehicle online, I believe they would appreciate that. Furthermore, that tool could be a reason why they buy the car at our store instead of the store 10 miles away with the same price.

In addition, we are reasonably close to Chicago where I'll often speak with people that haven't had a need for a car but now want one. We are also close to a commuter train station. When we're able to do business with one of these people we often complete most of the transaction via phone/email so the customer has piece of mind knowing they'll be able to drive home. It would be great for both parties if we had an online tool that could help facilitate this.

Finally, our BDC sells at least 3-5 cars a month to people out of state. Currently these deals require a lot of correspondence. It sure would be nice if there was a tool that could help.

I'm not looking to force all our customers through this hypothetical online buying tool, not even the majority. However if I can make it easy for SOME customers to do business with us in a way they appreciate, I win and the customer wins. That's not reinventing the wheel, that's merely providing a service that some people want.