Thinking of dropping Dealer.com

[DaveReed]

Long thread but I wanted to chime in. Many good points so far.

A few points to consider when making a dealership website from scratch:

When it comes to design & programming projects it always takes longer than you hope or expect, so start early.

A few hidden costs if you roll your own inventory modules, you'll need to make sure your current data provider (homenet, vinsolutions, etc) also exports NEW vehicle information. Some vendors only manage preowned. You'll want this because otherwise you'll be paying a vendor to grab the data for you or setting up a PC with some automated exports from your DMS. The next piece of the puzzle is vin decoding, a service like autodata or chome can run upwards of $150/mo for a single rooftop depending on the features you want (build a car, image packages, video, etc). If you want a TON of stock photos you're looking at another $100 / mo for an eVox type solution (stock photos only). They also offer a number of other products like video and 360 spins. Web hosting, you'll want at least a VPS solution to handle the traffic and allow root access to the server - probably $100 a month for a decent package.

Another small roadblock can be XML ADF formatting. Your programmer will need to brush up on this in order to send leads directly to most DMS/CRM systems.

I also would recommend Drupal. I saw you mentioned it earlier. It's plenty capable of hosting dealership websites and it's extremely flexible. It has a lot of community developed and maintained modules that can enhance your site with little to no programming effort by you. The block system can also allow you to customize page content individually or with wildcards. You will also need to set up a custom content type and some scripts to import/update your vehicles on a set schedule.

If you are building the site today, I would stay away from Drupal 7. It's going to be an awesome platform but many of the modules are in flux and can wreak havoc on a production website like the one you would be building. In a years time, D7 would probably be the right choice.

Credit Apps will need SSL and should be encrypted in your database so expect to spend some time there as well.

I don't like many cloud hosting solutions but it can offer you levels of redundancy at cheaper costs than building a solution out yourself.

With the right developer and designer you will have a completely custom website and reduce your future monthly costs. Keep in mind that you may need support from them after the initial build so you should set aside a budget to pay hourly for upgrades and updates.

If you have questions as you start to spec this out feel free to ask.
-Dave

 

[MullerToyota]

Dave - great insight. Thanks for providing some good info!

 

[AWW_Spencerport]

I'm not actually sure who else will allow me to be as flexible as I want to be.

For example, I am more than capable of setting up a subdirectoy and installing a wordpress blog. Dealer.com charges me $299 to set up their crappy blog that can't do nearly what I want it to do.

Are there any vendors that will give me total access to my site and provide me something with quality? I can't think of one off the top of my head.

I just don't understand why I pay dealer.com close to $3k a month to expect, for the most part, pretty crappy results and little ability for me to customize or change anything.

I mean, I still need to make all the changes to our website as it is. I understand it would be a massive undertaking, but for a few months worth of work, I would have something that I have complete control over. I really think it would be worth it for me to do that.

My only real concern is to get our feeds to work correctly - but I am sure that I can find someone to help me with that.

3 THOUSAND a month? Are you kidding me? I've seen Dealer.com websites all over and I am not the least bit impressed.

That is INSANE. I am the marketing manager at a Used Car dealership, and I also own a Web Design company. My brother-in-law also owns one of the largest web design firms in Upstate NY. Just to give you a little background on my knowledge. For a web firm to create for you a fully customized, inventory enabled, CRM, editable website with blog, chat, and every feature you could possibly want you're looking at $15,000 to $25,000 and then $200 a month in hosting (photos included). Whatever VinDecoder service you use on top of that.

So basically, 8 months of paying Dealer.com would pay for your own customized website. $3k a month? Unbelievable. I can't believe their still in business.

 

[Chris Cachor]

So basically, 8 months of paying Dealer.com would pay for your own customized website. $3k a month? Unbelievable. I can't believe their still in business.

I don't know the exact details but the 3K can be deceiving if there's more services added onto that (PPC management, inventory hosting fees, live chat, inventory exports, etc). Not sure, though. What you'll find is that a lot of these prices are across the board as the services can be kind of across the board. Dealer A might be at $899 while Dealer B might be at $1299. Why? One reason is because the sites are sold by salespeople who can mark up the deal to whatever they want. One other important reason is that Dealer A can demand a lot more attention from the vendors staff, and also could get so much traffic they need to be put on their own VPS (passing the cost of that down to the invoice). Or they could have 150 email accts. vs ~25. It can really vary, but I would guess that in this scenario, the sales person could have sweetened the deal and the buyer had no established price to go off.

 

[yagoparamo]

Long thread but I wanted to chime in. Many good points so far.

A few points to consider when making a dealership website from scratch:

When it comes to design & programming projects it always takes longer than you hope or expect, so start early.

A few hidden costs if you roll your own inventory modules, you'll need to make sure your current data provider (homenet, vinsolutions, etc) also exports NEW vehicle information. Some vendors only manage preowned. You'll want this because otherwise you'll be paying a vendor to grab the data for you or setting up a PC with some automated exports from your DMS. The next piece of the puzzle is vin decoding, a service like autodata or chome can run upwards of $150/mo for a single rooftop depending on the features you want (build a car, image packages, video, etc). If you want a TON of stock photos you're looking at another $100 / mo for an eVox type solution (stock photos only). They also offer a number of other products like video and 360 spins. Web hosting, you'll want at least a VPS solution to handle the traffic and allow root access to the server - probably $100 a month for a decent package.

Another small roadblock can be XML ADF formatting. Your programmer will need to brush up on this in order to send leads directly to most DMS/CRM systems.

I also would recommend Drupal. I saw you mentioned it earlier. It's plenty capable of hosting dealership websites and it's extremely flexible. It has a lot of community developed and maintained modules that can enhance your site with little to no programming effort by you. The block system can also allow you to customize page content individually or with wildcards. You will also need to set up a custom content type and some scripts to import/update your vehicles on a set schedule.

If you are building the site today, I would stay away from Drupal 7. It's going to be an awesome platform but many of the modules are in flux and can wreak havoc on a production website like the one you would be building. In a years time, D7 would probably be the right choice.

Credit Apps will need SSL and should be encrypted in your database so expect to spend some time there as well.

I don't like many cloud hosting solutions but it can offer you levels of redundancy at cheaper costs than building a solution out yourself.

With the right developer and designer you will have a completely custom website and reduce your future monthly costs. Keep in mind that you may need support from them after the initial build so you should set aside a budget to pay hourly for upgrades and updates.

If you have questions as you start to spec this out feel free to ask.
-Dave

So it is a full time job for a pretty well qualified person.

 

[joe.pistell]

Ol' Uncle Joe is now Senior Director of Product Innovation at Dealer.com. After reading Clay's frustrations, I have an idea that may help me help me while helping you.

We all know I have a giant basket of cool ideas, but you may have ideas that i've never considered. I'd like to extend an open invite to Clay and any Dealer.com clients to private message me. I'd like to collect a list of your TOP10 issues that you'd like fixed or improved. I'd also be interested in hearing what new ideas that you'd think would help you sell more cars and or make your work life faster/smarter/better. I'll pool them, rank them and let's see what happens.

Additionally, I am looking for a few bright minds to bounce ideas off of and conduct beta trails in the hopes of getting some quality feedback.

In the Uncle Joe tradition, you'll get some straight talk and in return I'd like your honest opinions. Together, we could make some magic happen.

 

[ddavis]

Ol' Uncle Joe is now Senior Director of Product Innovation at Dealer.com. After reading Clay's frustrations, I have an idea that may help me help me while helping you.

We all know I have a giant basket of cool ideas, but you may have ideas that i've never considered. I'd like to extend an open invite to Clay and any Dealer.com clients to private message me. I'd like to collect a list of your TOP10 issues that you'd like fixed or improved. I'd also be interested in hearing what new ideas that you'd think would help you sell more cars and or make your work life faster/smarter/better. I'll pool them, rank them and let's see what happens.

Additionally, I am looking for a few bright minds to bounce ideas off of and conduct beta trails in the hopes of getting some quality feedback.

In the Uncle Joe tradition, you'll get some straight talk and in return I'd like your honest opinions. Together, we could make some magic happen.

That is as close to an engraved invitation as you will see in the car business. If I was still retail, I would be all over that offer.

I call on dealers based on how bad their marketing is on their website and on third party display advertising sites. I spend a lot of time looking at dealer websites and checking out their content on Cars.com and AutoTrader. It has taught me that I can call on most anybody.

I'm talking to a dealership, Monday. Here are some notes on my observations:

• They have a Dealer.com website (I like that and am familiar with the backend tool)
• All of their new cars are priced at MSRP but many say "call for price".
• They are sitting on a bunch of left over 2012s also at MSRP.
• On Cars.com, other dealerships have their vehicles discounted and include the rebates in the price.
• They are an Alpha dealer on AutoTrader but not premium (featured) which puts their vehicles on the third page back or farther, if you sort by price.
• They are featured on AutoTrader but I couldn't find any specials or spot lighted vehicles (lazy).
• Many of the other dealerships have actual new vehicle pictures but not this store.
• They have a used car specials page with no cars.
• They have a new car specials page with 4 coupon type specials.
• All of their descriptions are about the dealership and not the vehicle.
• They must be running a high days to market because about a third of their used cars are without pictures.
• I couldn't determine how they arrived at their used car pricing. I saw a nice sedan at $2000 below anyone else. It had the lowest miles and a clean CarFax. I saw many of their other vehicles that were 4, 5 or $6,000 more that the lowest price car, of that type.
• Many of their used cars are not properly styled. I saw a Silverado that was styled as 2007 Chevrolet (I only knew it was a Silverado by the picture). They had a 2009 Corvette LT2 (it is a convertible).

This isn't some in depth analysis. I clicked around their website. I have a pretty good idea what a used vehicle is worth and verified my suspicions on Cars.com and AutoTrader. This wasn't an exhaustive study, maybe twenty minutes.
If you think this is rare or isolated, you're wrong. This is much of your competition. If this store is like the majority, they are spending the largest part of their internet budget (search) to drive customers to a poorly marketed website.

I can't imagine spending the additional time and money trying to build a custom website. I did well with the one from Dealer.com.

 

[joe.pistell]

DD,

One of my favorite challenges to decision makers is to take a print out of the top10 most expensive used vehicles and go outside and do a physical audit of the features and options, one car at a time. It amazes me how few get it right. Internet shopppers are doing this on their inventory 100's of times a day.

The smart shoppers will grind you on your well equipped unit vs the base model across town.

 

[ddavis]

DD,

One of my favorite challenges to decision makers is to take a print out of the top10 most expensive used vehicles and go outside and do a physical audit of the features and options, one car at a time. It amazes me how few get it right. Internet shoppers are doing this on their inventory 100's of times a day.

The smart shoppers will grind you on your well equipped unit vs the base model across town.

Joe, That lack of attention to detail, are costly mistakes for a dealership. Normally, these are examples of poor execution rather than random errors. You have to wonder if the GMs, at these stores, ever visit their websites or look at their vehicles on Cars or AutoTrader. These same people are the ones that will likely complain that their websites are not performing.
Do you have people that look at the same things, that I do, and point them out to GMs and Internet Directors?

 

[joe.pistell]

Joe, That lack of attention to detail, are costly mistakes for a dealership. Normally, these are examples of poor execution rather than random errors. You have to wonder if the GMs, at these stores, ever visit their websites or look at their vehicles on Cars or AutoTrader. These same people are the ones that will likely complain that their websites are not performing.
Do you have people that look at the same things, that I do, and point them out to GMs and Internet Directors?

Totally agree DD. 10+ years into the Internet Revolution and some managers...