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Here are a few sources for fake contact information:

  • OEM leads are notorious for this as they're usually giving something away at a car show.
  • Unlock the price leads are too.
  • Digital retailing leads.
  • Any dealership that can no longer show a price below a manufacturer threshold aside from a specific 1:1 conversation.




I agree!  It is a broken process that continues to get worse and worse as time goes on.  When the first internet leads were coming in we did not know what to do, so we answered the customer's questions and gave them a plethora of information.  We had closing ratios above 25%.


Then we discovered the desk was tired of giving us numbers, so we developed ways to not answer the customers' questions.  Our closing ratios fell.  So we pushed our vendors to get us more leads because our pay plans did not change.


  • Spend more on SEM
  • Spend more on SEO
  • Spend more on social
  • Turn our websites into the Vegas strip with pop-outs, pop-unders,  chat this, chat that, text us, get your ePrice, check availbility, unlock your savings. and whatever call to actions someone can come up with
  • Try anything that brings a lead in

More leads, more leads, more leads.  And our closing ratio fell further.  But we still have the same pay plans.  And we still have the same reluctance from the desk to provide the customer with answers.


We blame it on not being able to hire good people.  We blame it on the lead sources.  We blame it on the vendors.  What we are missing is a simple single truth:  we are not putting the customers first.