Thinking of dropping Dealer.com

[davidmoon]

Inventory and credit apps can be third-party served. Besides, the days of storing flat data files are over.

The ability to change at-will and in real-time is a great benefit to any Web publisher. Also an ability to segment, or randomly conduct A/B testing on-the-fly would be beneficial. It would be like have tiny little Uncle Joes living on your Web server, telling you what to do.

From what I understand, you tell your rep, who tells a project manger, who put the request in queue with 1,000 other requests to change font size, background color, etc. and four weeks later, it gets done.

 

[davidmoon]

Remember that 80% of the dealers out there don't want flexibility - they want automation. Set it and forget it.

Again, ya'll make little sense.

 

[davidmoon]

View attachment 329

Ok then, other than a company you are associated with. Who would you recommend for a dealer managing a website on their own?

I've stopped recommending hosts. They always let me down. But something on a scalable cloud.

 

[joe.pistell]

...I am looking at building something from the ground up. I am looking at this from a very broad view right now....

...I can't say that I have ever made a single page alone that has made a significant dent in our conversions....

I think my ultimate goal is to do three main things:

1.) Reduce my cost of my website.
2.) Increase my conversions
3.) Be able to use the control I want to be able to make changes quickly and easily and then analyze the results to make further changes or implementations.

All three of these I feel I can do better with my own site.

I know that I can't do this alone. I will want to hire someone to help me design and implement everything I need before our contract runs out in a year and half before we go live. Meaning that I should have a lot of time to make sure that things don't go drastically wrong.

Clay,
You are taking on the role of Project Manager. It concerns me that your "shooting high" for your first job. Failure is waiting for you to arrive. You've got a lot of mistakes to make and you haven't experienced the cycle of trouble-shooting, drafting a repair plan and then deciding who is going to PAY for this short fall.

In my case, its a giant task to move a concept from my head into a plan that fully communicates each and every move needed to others (who don't know what your thinking, nor dont comprehend your thought process). You are going to find that if your project is not fully and completely choreographed, then your asking the Geeks to circle back again and again to help you build your plan.

There's a lot to be gained by the "crawl, walk, run" plan. Your plan with live or die on just how well your Geeks understand you & our market. I was blessed with a great team at Homenet with Matt Scalcione at the point. He's 1/2 geek, 1/2 marketing wonk. A perfect partner for me.


You have 3 things to manage:

1. Price
2. Speed
3. Quality

You can't make all 3 better, YOU ONLY CAN OPTIMIZE TWO. You must knowingly let go of one of the three.

You want LOW PRICE.
You want HIGH QUALITY
That means...
You let go of SPEED

Dreaming up concepts is child's play. Making concepts produce MORE sales is a road few dare to travel. Conquering failure is the real test... Are you prepared for failure? It's coming.

 

[joe.pistell]

I quite like wordpress and I agree that it is very powerful with a ton of great plugins. I'm just not sure if it would be the right tool for a new and used dealer site. But, it may be the right tool, just not sold 100% yet.

I was thinking around $10,000 would be a good budget. Hell, its still less than half of what we spend with dealer.com in a year...

Agreed. Although I wonder how this would affect online credit applications...

We have a dedicated server with inMotion hosting for roughly $299 per month. It is a bit of overkill for what I use it for now. I would think this should be able to house all of my sites. I am looking at about 200-350 unique hits per day to our Toyota site and less than 1,000 for all three stores.

OMG Clay!,

I just read this thread. Sorry bro, some tough love coming your way.

WARNING! You are a NOOB. WARNING!

Your taking 2 measurement points and making assumptions.

1. Dealer.com is slow and expensive.
2. WordPress is almost free.

RESULT?
You can do it better, cheaper and faster.


That's like saying, you went to a concert, didn't like the band or the ticket cost, all you saw was a microphone and guitar and they are cheap SO... you can do it better... huh?


I get your angst, but, WTF bro, Just what do you bring to the table? You haven't even looked deeply into... anything! 95% of your mission is all wrapped around what Dealer.com is not doing for you and 5% is spent dreaming about stuff that belongs on the back of a napkin. You winged the $10,000 construction estimate. How in the world can you put a dollar sign on anything if you haven't conquered the inventory into WP problem! You can't put any estimate on the project until you have found your PARTNER... because you are totally dependent on your partner to pull this off. Pick a sh*tty partner = FAIL.


SUMMARY:
Clay, you don't need a WP site. You need a SKILLED partner to lead you. Your current partner is Dealer.com. I HIGHLY recommend you dig into Brian Pasch's AWA (Automotive Website Awards) and find a skilled partner from this group. Put together a summary list of all of your goals and Interview all these players. Get your list boiled down to finalists, then ask for references (find your own references by googleing the web vendors tag line: "this site is powered by ____")

Clay, Don't under-estimate the risk you're taking on. >80% of your buyers come to you via your website. DESIGN FREEDOM = IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT.

 

[Bruce Novicky]

Tom,

Thanks for the input! Just out of curiosity, how much do you spend maintaining and hosting your sites? I spend roughly $36,000 a year with dealer.com for one store. I genuinely don't know how a self maintained site can cost more than that. Any more input on costs would be greatly appreciated.

Well you would be in charge of creating, maintaining and upgrading the site right? How much do you cost a year... pro-rate a bunch of that and add it in... remember whether you like the results or not there is someone on the other end when you call dealer.com for help... you would now be the guy on the other end.

Lets say the website is 50% of what you do there... now lets say you make $75k a year... that puts the cost at $37,500 + all other costs and fees... and 50% is a low ball... it is probably higher...

 

[MullerToyota]

Joe,

I appreciate the tough love and I agree with you. I don't want to do this by hand by myself. Not at all.

I am just looking for a way to have the most flexibility to make changes to my site that I can do myself - without getting nickel and dimed every time I try to do it.

That is one of the reasons that, while I love wordpress, I don't think it is the content management system that I want to run my site on.

I also agree that I haven't done any real research. Everything is pure speculation at this point. I am basically brainstorming to see what the next move should be.

I'm actually not sure if I came off looking like I wanted to build a WP from scratch or not, but that wasn't my intention.

I am merely looking for an alternative to dealer.com that allows me to be flexible with my design and implementation of new ideas.

I really do appreciate all the insight because it is invaluable.

 

[MullerToyota]

Well you would be in charge of creating, maintaining and upgrading the site right? How much do you cost a year... pro-rate a bunch of that and add it in... remember whether you like the results or not there is someone on the other end when you call dealer.com for help... you would now be the guy on the other end.

Lets say the website is 50% of what you do there... now lets say you make $75k a year... that puts the cost at $37,500 + all other costs and fees... and 50% is a low ball... it is probably higher...

I understand this and I thank you. I actually don't find the person on the other line at dealer.com to be helpful except for the fact that I need them to accomplish something I have no access to. Typically, I understand the problems and solutions better than they do. Of course, if the shit hits the fan and there is a massive failing of the site, then yes, I might be a bit paralyzed. Which does make me think that I might look for a smaller auto design firm that can fit my needs.

Also, I understand the my salary cost argument, but I don't take that into account now and I don't think it is relevant when looking at new options. Only because it is a constant that won't change from project to project.

 

[joe.pistell]

Clay,

I really like your pioneering attitude, I got out the tough love because I smelled your frustration and I didn't want to bite off too much.

Ck out my 2007 reply to the 2008 NADA Show Review and you tell me if we're not in total lock step!
Post: NADA 2008 Review | DealerRefresh


I wrote:
"...I was amazed at how "rigid" these web providers are. Every single dealer wants to "accessorize" their site; a few (intellectual leaders) want a custom site. The current solution is to fit the dealers into their platform, rather than engineer a platform that lets the dealer walk his way up the upgrade ladder. Someone shoot me, am I an idiot?"


Ck out my Dealer.com take:
"...Dealer.com has this Vermont aura around it and I was convinced that they had it all figured out. I expected a flexible platform that would accommodate dealers of all intellects. To my amazement, Dealer.com was the most rigid (or should I say "least flexible") of my 1st tier picks. The rep saw my custom check list and broomed us! It was a nice broom! hahaha..."

 

[MullerToyota]

Clay,

I really like your pioneering attitude, I got out the tough love because I smelled your frustration and I didn't want to bite off too much.

Ck out my 2007 reply to the 2008 NADA Show Review and you tell me if we're not in total lock step!
Post: NADA 2008 Review | DealerRefresh


I wrote:
"...I was amazed at how "rigid" these web providers are. Every single dealer wants to "accessorize" their site; a few (intellectual leaders) want a custom site. The current solution is to fit the dealers into their platform, rather than engineer a platform that lets the dealer walk his way up the upgrade ladder. Someone shoot me, am I an idiot?"


Ck out my Dealer.com take:
"...Dealer.com has this Vermont aura around it and I was convinced that they had it all figured out. I expected a flexible platform that would accommodate dealers of all intellects. To my amazement, Dealer.com was the most rigid (or should I say "least flexible") of my 1st tier picks. The rep saw my custom check list and broomed us! It was a nice broom! hahaha..."

Joe, love the reviews.

I can take criticism, and I usually appreciate it - especially from someone that knows their stuff.

It was actually my owner that suggested he may not renew dealer.com's contract and that is what got me started.

I do think what I need it a firm that is small enough to care about me as a client and good enough to make sure I don't fall on my face.

I received a phone call from a guy yesterday. I'm not going to name anyone yet, but it was a good conversation. I liked that they actually took the time to call me. It is a huge pet peeve when vendors email me their crap.

I was impressed and they said they might be able to work something out where I have enough control to satisfy my needs and enough restraint to make sure that I don't make a site with their name attached to it look bad.

Plus, their pricing was very reasonable. Now, I am going to look more into it - but if they can deliver - I think it might be a good fit. Their portfolio was impressive to say the least.

But, the one thing that I do have is time. No jumping to quick decisions. Everything is going to be done for a good reason.