This is an obvious example of the quality of lead generated. As I spot monitor leads this was one area of focus for me. Vehicles without pics, pricing, or lacked information often received a lower a quality of lead. Meaning once they got their information that was last contact. Sure lead volume goes up, but those leads often convert to a lower sold rate than higher quality leads.
Phone and walk-ins should also be counted towards website leads if you have a trackable phone numbers used for website only or customer mentioned finding you on your website. I've found our mobile users tend to call instead of submitting form leads. With the focus group research I've done, they felt more comfortable calling and didn't like filling out forms on phones because of time it took.
We also pay our internet managers on solds not by leads generated.
Chad, I'm sure that you are doing everything right. High "Days to Market" is an area that robs leads and gross. A vehicle is "to Market" when you have a description, price and pictures. When we kept it to three days and less, we sold more cars. When it moved out, our sales dropped. I proved this time after time. Improving the quality of pictures and descriptions and market-based pricing helps dramatically.
If mobile customers tend to call, God Bless them and figure out how to encourage it.
No matter what you do, 65% of consumers are not going to call or email you, before coming in. We should do everything in our power to influence more traffic to our showrooms, no matter who gets credit.
I never considered it an internet deal unless the customer asked for an Internet Manager. I didn't care if their first words were I saw a car on AutoTrader.