A Message from AutoTrader to Dealers

[Alex Snyder (blog)]

I have taken my time on posting about this even though I watched the video when it was originally posted.

First off I have to agree with Brian Pasch 100%, and would like to add that I'd prefer to go to a funeral over watching this thing. Whoever orchestrated this production has no business in marketing or Public Relations. I feel sorry for Alan and Chip - this is a reflection on them and I'm sure it isn't something they put together themselves. If you guys came up with this, keep it a secret. If you did, it shows that you know very little about Internet marketing and that would speak volumes toward ATC.

Second...lower your prices. Charge for the level of service you provide. This has been my only beef with Autotrader.com. Yes, I have written about other things, but at the end of the day the argument is so strong because you charge more than what you're worth. You're taking advantage of a good name you didn't start and the mentality of old-school car guys who don't know any better. Maybe you don't know any better either. But at the end of the day, your pricing is the issue.

Third...I applaud you for finally making some sort of move to squelch the things being said about your organization. You still have a very long way to go (lower prices), but I think you'll find we all want to see you get better. Do more!

Fourth...on lowering prices (in case I forgot to mention that), here are some hard numbers from the Checkered Flag and Drivers World Automotive Group that I'm about to show to some of our GM's who continue to flirt with ATC. My cost per sale (Internet and phone) with ATC is $416.18 ...without ATC it is $243.14. Please don't respond with "but the majority of the ATC customers walk through the door."

 

[lightnup]

Alex@ Imagine how low you could get your cost per sale if you didn't advertise or market your inventory at all. You'd really impress those GM's then.

And if you are still holding to the antiquated concept that only an email or a phone call counts when judging your online marketing, you're doing your GM's a disservice. When you go online to research a purchase at Best Buy and you find what you want, do you call or email the store or do you hop in the car and drive over there? I just drive over there. (I'll bet if you ask your neighbors and friends, most of them do too.) Does that mean I'm not an Internet customer, even though I found what I was searching for on the Internet? With the vast amount of information provided in online listings, why would a shopper other than one from far away even need to call or email before coming to your lot to look at a car? Some will, many won't. Yet they are both brought to you via the same advertising venue. If you truly want to figure your cost per sale, your objective should be to determine what venue brought them, not to automatically rule out the Internet as the source just because they haven't called or emailed first. That's true whether it's ATC, cars.com, your website or any other place your inventory appears.

Former ATC Manager@ A record 16.1 million unique visitors to ATC in June - that's hardly a description of the mighty falling.

 

[Alex Snyder (blog)]

Please don’t respond with “but the majority of the ATC customers walk through the door.” ...thank you very much.

I will agree with the assumption that some people walk in, but the same could be said for Cars.com can it not? Why is it that we consistently sell more cars through Cars.com for less than half the cost?

I think I will disservice my GM's another time, and will continue to disservice them everytime the numbers don't add up. I am definitely getting sick of this argument internally and externally.

Why is it Autotrader.com every friggin' time? Can you at least answer that?

 

[interesting]

So, ATC is crying the Economy blues? Well they just checked in about 75 reps/managers into a Ritz Carlton in Michigan for a meeting......They are so full of %#*&.

 

[Cargurrl]

Why does anyone really care about what ATC employees do? You all should spend more time chasing your 20% email traffic and a little less time being on this blog during work hours. Don't you have cigarettes to smoke in the parking lot while telling your vendors your too busy to market your cars? Oh, that's right, no one hear makes decisions so none of this matters.

 

[Cargurrl]

sorry here not hear before everyone blasts me. Now, back to growing my business.....

 

[mikesayre]

Hi DR blog!
First time poster, long time reader.

I've heard about these ATC postings here from sooo many people recently I just had to check it out.
I missed the last ATC blog-festival here and didn't want to re-live saying "no I didn't read it yet" in conversations.

I glanced at the thread history for this topic too; my gawd JK you must be lovin' this ATC controversy (and traffic!

Anyway, I'm an agnostic party here in the digital trenches of automotive lead generation drama, I could truly care less. I'm also officially off-duty too, so screw that no blog posting corp mandate. I'm going rogue here.

First to ATC: I understand wanting to deliver an important message to your core biz ~ the dealers.
Excellent idea, I'm all for it, but why a video?
And why a video about tough times, changes, and blahhhh?!
And then why so dreary and canned?
Who approved that?

Please pump that video up next time!! Seriously, you're still a very crucial part of alot of dealers business!
I talk to dealers everyday that absolutely love ATC, and sell a bunch of units daily from it. Focus on the positive, read some Ziglar or something. There's still a bunch of light at the end of the tunnel, maybe go do some dealer testimonial videos, and put them on Youtube (btw i can help with that.

Next to the ATC haters:
Bottom line is you've either been offended by ATC in a variety of ways as a customer or employee, or you don't believe the money invested in ATC is worth the return, right?

The positive I get out of this is; the former customers looking for ROI just want to see it first hand, prove it to them, be their friend, partner, work with them, and they'll buy again. (maybe not Tim, but hey ya can't win them all)

As for the former employees being offended; I have no answer, no thought, no comment, and I ain't touching that topic. I'm truly sorry to see job loss happen too anyone, it sucks.

On a final note, I won a national video parody contest with Automart.com back in the good ol' days with legendary "real" guitar hero Johnny Fink.

We submitted 2 videos out of 3 overall nationally, and took 1st and 3rd place... Now that's total domination!!
So next time ATC needs to deliver a message, someone might want to look towards captain video and Johnny Fink too get that done for ya, huh??


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9fJELZruNY


BTW I never got my flip video camera for taking 1st place, or my "shop smart @ automart.com" bumper sticker for taking 3rd??

Johnny said he got his right away, SO who's ass do I need to kiss too get my prizes??

L8r
-Sayre

 

[Jerry Morris]

Alex, in these times the term “walk-in” must be clarified. Old school a “walk-in” was just that, someone who walked into the dealership to see what the dealer had in stock. Because, there was know definitive listing easily available of the dealer’s inventory.
Enter the internet age you have dealer web sites, 3rd party web sites, and a litany of other inventory listings. When a customer walks into a show room not only do they know what the dealer has in inventory but in which vehicles they are interested.

The 2008 Dealer Brand Image Study & Dealer Walk in Study showed very clearly that 80% of dealer traffic is walk-in that has not previously contacted the dealer by phone or email. The remaining 20% breaks down 17% phone, and 3% email. This varies greatly from the dealer’s perception which is 41% Walk-in, 42% Phone, and 17% email. This study was conducted in 17 markets and 59 dealers nationwide. These were exit interviews of people who had just bought vehicles.

I don’t want to be accused of heresy, however it’s time that dealers and internet managers realized that they don’t need internet departments, they need internet dealerships. 80 plus percent of there traffic coming into the dealership is coming off the internet, and that traffic is called walk-in.

Phone calls and emails are the most convenient way for internet managers to justify their work. But as long as there is internet sales and floor sales there will always be a fight over what is walk-in traffic.

Where as a BDC that get’s the customer to visit the dealership, introduces that customer to the Sales Manager or General Manager who then introduces that customer to a sales person to compete the process will have far more accurate numbers on traffic composition.

 

[Alex Snyder (blog)]

Jerry - you're preaching to the choir. You probably wouldn't realize that if you only know me from my postings in Autotrader.com threads.

My argument is this:

Yes, most people walk-in. However a percentage of folks do pick up the phone or request information via a form. If I were to only look at Cars.com and Autotrader.com under this small percentage I find that Cars.com is double the effectiveness for more than half the money without a bunch of differing packages. On top of simply looking at non-walk-in traffic I also have this nifty tool from vAuto that they call "Merchandising" which looks at the impressions, detailed views, and form submissions for ATC and Cars.com on each car. Every single time I look at it Cars.com has double the detailed views and form submissions.

These are the tools of accountability I have at my disposal and when you simply look at the numbers it is 2:1 Cars.com to ATC in sales while it is 1:2 Cars.com to ATC on pricing. I can't make a more even playing field for both companies, so I have to assume (based on the hard numbers) that Autotrader.com is now half the product Cars.com is....Cars.com, feel free to quote me on that.

The thing that troubles me about the whole thing is Autotrader.com won't do anything for us to get the numbers more in line, so I will be campaigning to our 2 GM's that still want to be on the product to either cancel or justify the money. Thankfully it doesn't come out of my budget (it is a pure store-expense) but wasted money does bug me a lot.

I'm sure my rep will be reading this thread now, and I apologize to her. It is absolutely no reflection on her as she is someone who will put some real work in - I'd like to have her on my staff. I suggest working with Todd to help him find the deals if you want to shut me up on this one.

 

[Jerry Morris]

Alex,
My post was not met to either defend or indict ATC. I worked for ATC for 7 years starting in Metro New York and finishing in South Florida when I left them last fall. Although I had issues over the years with the company, the people I worked with and friends that I made are still very dear to me. I am not quiet sure what Chip and Allan were trying to accomplish with their video, that however I won’t go into.

My passion lies with teaching and training dealers that the internet is not a static medium like traditional media, but a wonderfully useful medium that with a little inspiration and help from knowledgeable people can open a whole new world of people and customers to dealers. Dealers must realize that the success their granddaddy and daddy enjoyed in the traditional mediums available is no longer the case. These mediums have been supplanted by the internet. Because we live in“on-line society” marketing on the internet is constantly changing.

My last job in a dealership was 9 years ago; we had a very successful BDC because their job was to get people into the dealership. Once people where in the dealership, they were turned over to sales people to complete the sale. Early in my career with ATC I saw internet departments who tried to sell cars. The problem is no one understood the internet let alone computers. So originally the person put in charge of the internet department was able to turn on a computer, answer and email, and semi-talk on the phone. What this person was not is a salesperson. Given all this; dealers wondered why the internet did not work. Of course over the years professionals like your self have entered the field with very good results.

So what has happened over the last 10 years? The internet as come 180 degrees. It is the medium that everyone looks at for information. Traditional media still has a place, but not so much. The industry cannot become complacent it must embrace and grow with new technology’s. The funny thing is the more things change the more they stay the same. I currently am marketing a line of video players for web sites. With my players a dealer can personally welcome a customer to their website. They service director can welcome a customer to the service department. New and used car managers can video weekly specials. Customers can give live testimonials. Customers can send it there own videos using there vehicles, and much, much, more. I short people can talk to people. Wow, what an OLD concept. Plus the videos become viral, and are just as effective in moving dealers up in search results as PPC. However, what’s interesting is I still hear the same thing I heard when I was with ATC who is going to do this, who has the time? As this industry shakes it self out over the next few years, the dealers that find the time to do the right things will be the ones left standing.

By the way I always enjoy our articles. Have a great one!