- Feb 28, 2017
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- Ben
Who is innovating?
- Thread starter Alex Snyder
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- Sep 5, 2017
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- Penina
There actually are people who are bringing the "concierge experience" that shoppers receive on sites like Amazon to automotive. If you read, for example, this article by my colleague at AutoLeadStar, you'll see all of the ways dealerships can begin to provide customers with the online experience they have come to expect. Automotive AI (artificial intelligence)-powered tools that track user behavior are already here.
I'd also like to point out that these types of platforms have another benefit beyond giving shoppers what they want. Your dealership receives so much more information about each lead that comes in. For example, when someone converts on your website, you can see how many times they've visited your site, what pages they looked at, what they converted on, etc. This can be super helpful information for your sales team to know when they speak to a shopper.
- Oct 29, 2009
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- Rick
I'm familiar with the product your talking about @Penina Rothner. I don't think your understanding what I'm talking about. To do what I'm talking about you need DMS data and maybe partial CRM data. Being able to serve up a custom offer per user based on shopper behavior isn't something new. If I recall correctly, Roughly 10 years ago, TK Carsites was able to offer up custom slides when a visitor visited the website based on keywords they entered into the SE. Our dealerships were some of the very first dealerships to pilot Datium's product before it ever went public and utilize website shopper behavior patterns years ago.
What I'm talking about is a website that knows who the visitor is. If you don't have an account set up or you've never been to the site before, it can use a tool like Autolead star or something along those lines to help customize the visit. But when it kicks into high gear is when you create an account or you've done some type of business with our facilities. It doesn't matter what store or department. If you're in any of our systems, you have an account already. CRM, DMS, etc..
Examples:
If you've serviced your car at one of our stores, when you visit the website and identify yourself either by phone number or login or something, maybe have a welcome back message and ask if you want to schedule your 35k mile service on your car with a single click. Maybe ask you if you want to include the wiper blades you turned down for your xyz vehicle the last time you were in service. Or, mention the tires you turned down and that they are now on sale!! A single click and you can include them in your service appt. While your also on the site, maybe show you custom offers on new vehicles based on how much you've spent in our service dept. When you get to the SRP or VDP, instead of showing you a sale price like $35,000 on vehicles, using DMS data, why not show you, something along these lines. To upgrade to XYZ model, your payment will increase by $15 monthly and have the monthly payment difference to show on the vehicles instead of a payment thats hundred of $$$ or a sale price thats thousands of $$$$$$ and power that by using DMS data based on the current vehicle. Or, offer those special accessories at the welcome screen based on that user profile and that persons particular vehicle. I'm talking about the visitor having a true profile / user account on the website. Being able to login and see everything they've done at our store. Seeing history on every penny thats been spent. Who they worked with and what was presented to them. There's nothing like that currently. There's pieces of it. A piece here, a piece there. And each piece is separated in its own data silo because it's different vendors providing the product! Vendors systems don't talk to each other. As I said earlier, it's just getting more complicated now because there's so many freaking vendors in the game now with some type of widget or gadget on the dealers websites.
But there's nothing thats been created recently to be truly ground breaking for a dealership to completely alter their process with the innovation or tool. My definition of ground breaking is something like, Vauto or a true service appt scheduler like Timehighway or xtime. Vauto completely changed the way alot of Used Car departments look at vehicles and operate. Alot of service departments have the schedulers now at the center of their service process. These two items completely change the way dealerships operate those departments and those tools are part of the internal dealership process now.
- Feb 28, 2017
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- Ben
I'm curious, Rick, what percent of users actually have an account and would visit often enough to make such examples worthwhile?
- May 1, 2006
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I'm not Rick....duh. Nonetheless I can help answer this question with some actual stats in regards to service scheduling. Unfortunately, I cannot pass along some of the most recent stats, in this area, but things haven't changed tons.
A few years ago (pre-Cox acquisition) we toyed with the idea of buying Time Highway and a few other service scheduling products. Time Highway told us the average dealer scheduled 7% of his appointments through the online scheduling tool. For the record: Time Highway had the lowest claim. When I worked at Checkered Flag our BMW store hit well into the 30% territory on Xtime. Our volume stores were consistently in the teens.
So, Ben, in my own experiences I know that it is somewhere as little as 7% of all service customers and as much as 1/3rd. That's pretty damn significant considering the current state of online scheduling tools' user experiences. Imagine how much higher this could be with some innovation
- Oct 29, 2009
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Everyone would use it @BenAdler. I'm sure there would be a small percentage of ppl that wouldn't use it and would prob call in or just show up. But, when they would be entered into any of our systems (CRM, DMS, etc...), their account would be created for the website. It would be just like service appt schedulers are now. If you call into a dealership now and you schedule a service appt. Your appt is going into the scheduler and your account is being created for you (at least thats how it's done with in our group with schedulers). From there, your sent links via email and txt to verify and for follow up. The website account / profile would be used the exact same way and work in conjunction with the scheduling tool thats being used internally.
- Feb 11, 2015
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Plus, with Fixed-Ops it's about repeat business and retention. What better way to do it, than to create an enjoyable user experience with an account, listing how a vehicle was serviced, etc., etc.? I think Ben must have been alluding to new or used vehicle sales. Even still, why not see updates on your vehicle or the status of your warranty, etc.? Most of that info is so shittily displayed and chopped the f*ck up all over the place. Bleh!I'm not Rick....duh. Nonetheless I can help answer this question with some actual stats in regards to service scheduling. Unfortunately, I cannot pass along some of the most recent stats, in this area, but things haven't changed tons.
A few years ago (pre-Cox acquisition) we toyed with the idea of buying Time Highway and a few other service scheduling products. Time Highway told us the average dealer scheduled 7% of his appointments through the online scheduling tool. For the record: Time Highway had the lowest claim. When I worked at Checkered Flag our BMW store hit well into the 30% territory on Xtime. Our volume stores were consistently in the teens.
So, Ben, in my own experiences I know that it is somewhere as little as 7% of all service customers and as much as 1/3rd. That's pretty damn significant considering the current state of online scheduling tools' user experiences. Imagine how much higher this could be with some innovation
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- Oct 29, 2009
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This should be interesting!!!!!!!
http://www.autonews.com/article/201.../cox-sues-cdk-cites-anticompetitive-practices
http://www.autonews.com/article/201.../cox-sues-cdk-cites-anticompetitive-practices
Innovation and evolution don't always equal disruption. Way too often we are looking for the "Next Big Thing", rather constantly improving what has proven to work.
Or actually EXECUTING what we already know works. I am extremely guilty of this, and am working very hard to break this habit. If I spent as much time executing a proven method...as I do looking for the next "market advantage".......
