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New Car Photos - Stats and Ideas

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DrewAment

DrewAment

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Apr 30, 2009
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Drew
#1
Thought I would share this with you all. As a few articles/studies have pointed out NEW car photos are what the consumers like and want. I had a few large metro market dealers commit to taking photos of their entire new car inventory. I will let the stats speak for themselves:

ScreenHunter_03 Feb. 19 15.52.jpg

Started taking NC Photos in late October. VDP/NCS is the stat that I looked at to validate the results. Dealer 1 has about 650 new, Dealer 2 has about 650 new, Dealer 3 has about 200 new.

Any thoughts or comments... in your opinions, was the cost worth the action on the site?
 
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#2
Stunning work Drew! (as always ;-)

--Any impact to lead counts? (my gut says lower counts)
--Any impact to return visits? (my gut says higher returns)
--Any impact to phone calls? (my gut says higher calls)

Of course, this will be a ratio against visits.

again Drew, GREAT WORK!
 
#3
Joe - your gut is a little off. Website NEW CAR phone calls, as a percent of NCS, were actually flat. (Yes, we track new/used separately -- hey I also own a call tracking company!)

However, I still have a firm belief in VDP growth. And, if you grow your VDP's (Own site, ATC, Cars -- any of them), your will grow your activity, but more importantly your floor traffic. Depending on what study you refer to, only 25-30% of customers actually will submit a lead or call the dealership prior to walking in the showroom.

I don't have exact numbers - but as an average I can tell you that floor OTDB's increased. Can we tie that directly to NC Photos? No. NC market share percent was FLAT. How is the process in store? Alot of variables....

But the numbers we do track, and the number that we wanted to make an impact to, changed positive -- but is it enough to continue?
 
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#4
If, I'm reading your numbers correctly, the far two columns shouldn't be expressed in percentages, they should be numbers.

For example, top set of numbers for far right column (VPD/NCS). The calculation is actually the number of VDP per New Car Shoppers aka the number of VDPs a new car shopper looks at. The numbers should be the same, but expressed as a number not percentage.

NCSVDPVDP/NCS
August53495008.9 VPDs per NCS
September48084165.87 VPDs per NCS
October45693784.83 VPDs per NCS
November368738271.04 VPDs per NCS
December438953401.2 VPD per NCS2
January391143861.12 VPDs per NCS
 
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#5
All our locations also photo new vehicles (at least 16 photos). As I monitored the leads coming in from form submissions on our website(s) I noticed the trend of new vehicles with photos lead submissions became "more quality" leads vs new vehicles without photos (en-route, transfers,etc).

Generally speaking by majority, a lead of a new vehicle (also used) without photos tends to be "I'm looking for a new F-150 FX4, can I get more photos of this truck".

Generally speaking, a lead of a new vehicle with photos tends to be "I'm interested in this truck, it has all the options I'm looking for. I would like to schedule a test drive for xxxxx".

Again those are general trends I've noticed on photoed vs non-photoed new vehicles.

Just on first look and impression, a shopper would be more interested in looking at a VDP or submitting a lead from which of these VLPs:
New Ford F-150 Platinum For Sale in Lincoln, Grand Island, St Joseph | Anderson Auto Group

or

Search New Ford Vehicles | Baxter Ford | Ford Dealer in Omaha, NE
 
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#9
JoePistell said:
Drew,

The REAL goal of our work is seen in engagement stats. IMO, they out rank lead counts. From your study, can you see if there is a increase in the "Time on VDP"?
Click to expand...

Interesting question --- Time on NC VDP page was a nominal increase... of only 12 secs. Something I should have checked is the fact that the website provider did not include the GA code on the DIV/iFrame overlay for the photo viewer. So I can't give you photo interaction rate increase. Next time... next time.
 
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