Watch CarGurus Hijack this Lead

[AndrewAutoiPacket]

Great post Joe. I enjoy your content the most on this forum, you need your own sub forum or something.

The race to the bottom was really started with vAuto. It was always my opinion that every used vehicle stood on its own as a unique entity. I found it laughable that my one owner, never been hit peach was being compared to the guy across towns' former wreck that had a checkered out of state history. It's a disincentive to being a reputable retailer when its a price>value war.

The only way you get into that WAR is when you HIDE the stuff that you do that makes you great. Do you show your RO's upfront on your recon work? Do you tell them what warranties they get, why your dealership is the one to purchase at, etc BEFORE you try to sell them. Again, price is only the issue in the absence of value. Once the customer understands the value and the reasoning behind the price, it makes it much easier and makes you look much more credible - ESPECIALLY when they shop you at another dealer and they are hiding everything!

 

[Susan Shephard]

Hard not to agree with that Andrew. If the options are more messed up (missing) than not, how can dealers try and build more value in marketplace websites like this?

One of my biggest gripes around Fair/Good/Great deal badging is the fact that there tends to be no added value for an OEM Certified Pre-Owned program vehicle. No value add for an additional or extending the original manufacturer warranty?

This alone, depending on the manufacturer can easily add a $1000 in value to the vehicle. If I'm not mistaken, CarGurus doesn't even take CPO in to account. There's no highlighting or CPO badging added to the VDP. So unless you're mentioning this in the custom vehicle comments and/or within the images of the vehicle, the shopper has no way of knowing if that particular vehicle is a Certified Pre-Owned and includes any additional options and warranties.

CG has been a race to the bottom from the start. If you are selling units with frame damage, more miles than the space shuttle, etc and selling them way below book, they will bring you that bottom fishing traffic. Be careful what you ask for. Additionally, I understand that as they send you two additional units on their shopper response, that adds 2 extra vdp’s to your reporting. Smoke and mirrors much??

 

[joe.pistell]

Woa... these words of wisdom can only come from a highly experienced player in our space!

"Susan Shephard, post: 54018, member: 11080"]CG has been a race to the bottom from the start. If you are selling units with frame damage, more miles than the space shuttle, etc and selling them way below book, they will bring you that bottom fishing traffic. Be careful what you ask for. Additionally, I understand that as they send you two additional units on their shopper response, that adds 2 extra vdp’s to your reporting. Smoke and mirrors much??[/I]

Welcome aboard @Susan Shephard. Keep those thought bombs coming!

 

[joe.pistell]

Great post Joe. I enjoy your content the most on this forum, you need your own sub forum or something.

The race to the bottom was really started with vAuto. It was always my opinion that every used vehicle stood on its own as a unique entity. I found it laughable that my one owner, never been hit peach was being compared to the guy across towns' former wreck that had a checkered out of state history. It's a disincentive to being a reputable retailer when its a price>value war.

​

We're stuck in this unhealthy dance...

I'm Calling Out Technology Vendors... Stop Destroying Your Dealers.
Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars. Lowest price sells cars.

• Vendors, displaying a low price is not high technology. We've hit the floor on low price, we need a new direction... we need a new and improved car shopping experience.

I'm Calling Out Dealers... Stop Obsessing About Lead Gen.
Leads sells cars. Internet = Leads.
Leads sells cars. Internet = Leads.
Leads sells cars. Internet = Leads.
Leads sells cars. Internet = Leads.
Leads sells cars. Internet = Leads.
Leads sells cars. Internet = Leads.

• Dealers, stop obsessing about lead gen. No car shopper ever goes to Google and says "I can't wait to find a site to fill out a form to invite a salesman to call me".
• Leads are a small part of your total sales. Your focus for leads has taught vendors to stay in the box and focus on nothing but... leads, leads, leads.
• Vendors don't know that 80% of your sales come from 'invisible' internet shoppers... aka the silent majority.

Car Dealer Pioneers, It's time we all look for a new shopper scoring model. Our vendors would love it.

p.s. Cooper, thank you for your kind words.

 

[Brian Tucker]

The race to the bottom was really started with vAuto.

They just made the information available. The race to the bottom starts when you decide to get serious and start looking at your aged inventory - 75 days + and then decide it is time to take pictures and merchandise. The getting a car web ready and competitively priced should happen day 1 instead of day 75. Then you are in a profitable situation before you hit the panic button and drop the price through the floor at 83% of market on day 75.

 

[Viracocha]

Not disagreeing. Our main focus was always in compressing the length of time it took to process a used vehicle through service and cleanup to get it lot ready. The concern was always around the danger in blindly following a tool that encouraged you to skimp on recon and focus on price over value. My belief has always been as a Franchise store we couldn't afford to round those corners. As Andrew mentioned the key to holding gross is communication with your shoppers the VALUE you offer, and not just the commodity. vAuto is not good at the Value part of valuation. I do however appreciate the market metrics they offer.

 

[Brian Tucker]

I'm with you and we need improvement in this area as well. Simply stating that pricing and advertising has been an issue since the first newspaper ad with a price leader appeared.

 

[Viracocha]

It wasn't an issue back in the newspaper days. There were plenty of ways of having that loss leader bring em in! I'm old enough to remember it

 

[joe.pistell]

The getting a car web ready and competitively priced should happen day 1 instead of day 75.

Hi BT, LTNTT!!
Man, are you looking into the wayback machine. My very 1st UCM job was at a store that took 4 weeks to get the car front line ready. Today, a few shitty stores are about 2 weeks. The vast majority of stores that I connect to are front line ready in 7-10 days. High velocity stores are 1-3 days. So, regarding age vs pricing power, there is no big gap. The High velocity stores have their products up, photoed and priced only 4 to 9 extra days faster than avg stores.

I'm ... Simply stating that pricing and advertising has been an issue since the first newspaper ad with a price leader appeared.

Sorry Bro, newsprint ain't got no filters nor facets. You can't go to the afternoon paper and ask it "I'd like a Black or Red SUV, from Honda or Toyota, with less than 30k miles, with AWD, backup camera, 3rd row, Bluetooth for less than $22000 within 50 miles of me... oh, and BTW, send my phone an alert if one of these drops its price" Nope. Print can't do that.,, The internet is a shoppers weapon.