Used Car Photos Discussion

[eddyshaf]

..... 80 percent stated that duringInternet searches they considered only those offerscontaining detailed information and photos of the​

vehicle.

as per this document

http://www.carfax.eu/download/carfax_research_paper.pdf

Thanks for the data, but this is a study done in Europe - I don't think it will resonate with my leadership team and GM's...

 

[eddyshaf]

Guys - all of this is really good feedback, and I think as daily practicioners of the internet craft, most of us have a sense for what is and is not successful.

What I am really hoping to find are industry studies, like the one by CarFax above...real data that either supports the notion that nothing should be online without photos or the case for posting ASAP to generate interest. Does that research exist?

Ed

 

[eddyshaf]

From my experience - get it out there.

I can't personally stand looking at my dealers websites with no images of vehicles, it drives me crazy. And I have been back and forth with this - not feeding vehicles until there was a photo to sending as soon as they hit the DMS.

Sending without photos muddys up the reports a little and isn't as eye appealing (to me) but too often I see leads, I hear call and I wittiness people coming in on a vehicle that has little data and no photos.

Note: 2001 Audi Quattro Wagon - no photos = phone calls (no matter the price)
2009 Honda Civic - no photos - no likely

Point is - depends on the market supply to demand.

Something you could test, I thought about doing this but not sure if there would be a reason to it other than my own personal reasons... exclude vehicles with no photo from your dealer website but allow these vehicles to feed to the listing sites.

OR take advantage of the No Photo slot and have something like the following.

"Photos coming soon - Call XXXX or email XXXX to expedite vehicle photos"

I really think you hit the nail on the head with this one Jeff - if I post a run of the mill car without photos, then it detracts from the user experience with my inventory, but if I post something which has great demand and low supply, I might be able to get away with it since the uniqueness of the inventory will suffice...just too hard to manage at a store level, and since most of our inventory is "core" or "common" it seems like restricting the listings to only those with photos is actually an option...

Ugh -

 

[ddavis]

If I had been a Honda or Toyota dealer trying to sell cars off an empty shelf, I would have been posting vehicles off a shipping notice "coming soon".
I worked for a group with a central accounting office in another city. I couldn't wait a week to ten days for a car to hit the DMS. I put them in on a spreadsheet and zipped them up to my website. I don't want to explain to the owner, that I didn't want to put his inventory up because it wouldn't look good. Inventory cost money and cars sell over the internet without pictures.

 

[ddavis]

I had actual pictures of my new vehicles. I had a library of those pictures. If we went through a period where there was bad weather or holidays when the picture guy wasn't available, I used the pictures out of my library.