In a down market, Morrie’s Brooklyn Park Subaru experienced a considerable decline in lead volume from April to June of 2017. In addition to a large drop off in leads, their lost sales and defection rates were significantly higher than the national sales trends. They needed a solution to identify the source of all lost sales and a strategy to reduce the rate of defection to other dealers, while growing their market share in surrounding zip codes.
AutoHook Integrates with Top Dealer Website Providers to Give Dealers Advanced Vehicle Targeting Capabilities
AutoHook has announced they have completed the integration process with the industry’s top leading website providers. Mutual clients of AutoHook and the affiliate companies listed below are now set up to successfully target and incentivize customers to visit dealer showrooms based on any specific vehicle of interest - down to the year, make, and model.
- Dealer.com
- CDK Global
- DealerOn
- DealerSocket/DealerFire
- Dealer eProcess
- Dealer Inspire
- fusionZONE
- Naked Lime Marketing
- Fox Dealer
- AutoFusion
- Driving Force
- RnD Interactive
For Dealer.com, CDK Global, DealerOn, DealerSocket/DealerFire, Dealer eProcess, Dealer Inspire and fusionZONE clients, AutoHook has set up additional targeting functionality that triggers based on a vehicle’s number of days on the lot - a valuable feature that will eventually be available to all providers.
All website companies participating in this shared technology solution can now ensure their dealer clients have the ability to target individual vehicles with custom test drive and private purchase offers using AutoHook’s Web2Show solution. AutoHook executes tailored campaigns both at the dealer and OEM-levels to increase incremental showroom traffic, new to brand buyers, and sales based on their unique sales goals and areas of opportunity.
Prior to combining efforts with the industry’s largest traffic drivers, AutoHook’s incentives were limited to search results pages (SRPs) and vehicle details pages (VDPs). The ability to increase offers on specific model pages was in the works, and after successfully integrating with each of these website platforms, AutoHook can now execute higher dollar test drive offers on any new or used VDP and help dealers move aged inventory in a faster, more efficient manner.
Whether you need to boost underperforming models or simply give customers a reason to visit your showroom, AutoHook is scientifically proven to deliver incremental showroom visits that purchase cars. Powered by Urban Science’s near real-time sales match database, AutoHook can attribute all sales to a specific campaign – instantly validating ROI at an industry-low cost per sale.
AutoHook is both honored and excited to work with in tangent with these automotive technology frontrunners to offer complimentary targeting enhancements for all mutual clients.
The Uncut Story Your CRM Can’t Tell You
You Can’t Win Without Knowing What You’re Losing
by David Metter
It’s hard to solve a problem you don’t know exists. Solutions become unreachable if you don’t know the root of the issue or the source it stemmed from in the first place. The same concept applies to the sales and BDC operations inside every existing dealership. Too often, we get caught up in the day-to-day routine and can only see what’s directly in front of our eyes. We lose sight of the big picture. We look to our CRM and DMS data to identify areas of success and failure. We then use that data to attempt to make decisions and changes to the way we operate. The problem, is that this data is one-sided, one-dimensional, and only one piece of a much larger picture.
It’s a lot like attempting to run a race with your eyes closed. Without the power of sight, you won’t know if your opponents are in front of you or gaining speed behind you. You won’t be able to see the finish line. What’s the point of running towards a goal you can’t see? In order to solve the problems within your sales operations, you need the power of sight, metaphorically. You need to be able to look at your entire market from a 360-degree vantage point so that you can identify sales trends along with the sources of your greatest opportunities and losses.
Sales and service data, believe it or not is the key to being able to see your market from an omnipotent perspective. It’s just a matter of where you get the data and how you use it. Ninety-day old sales metrics can be helpful, but in order to truly see what’s going on within your PMA, dealers need to know what sold and didn’t sell as of yesterday – not 90-days ago given the infinite variables that affect this industry on a daily basis. To most of us, data is just a collection of numbers, charts, and graphs that lack meaning. But what if you had the ability to detonate and mobilize data to make it work for you? That’s when data becomes valuable – when you can turn it into actions that result in more sold cars and less lost opportunities.
If you only draw conclusions based on your CRM’s sales and lead data, you can only quantify the effectiveness of your own sales. But it’s equally important to have the ability to identify defection trends to competing dealerships or brands in your market. How many of your customers purchased from somewhere else? Which dealers are you losing the most sales to? How many customers did you lose over a certain date range? Which competitors did you lose them to? How many units per day are you losing to a specific store? Can you pinpoint areas of lost sales tied to a specific salesperson or lead source?
When you have the ability to answer these types of questions, then and only then do you have what you need to take control of your marketing and sales processes. If you want to successfully grow your market share and cut your losses, you have to know exactly what you’re losing, where you’re losing, and who you’re losing to. The right data, will show you a clear snapshot of which models on your lot present the highest level of opportunity. It will show you which leads in your CRM have already purchased so you don’t waste time and money trying to reach people no longer in market for a car. The right data will determine if you are losing sales based on internal or external factors. It will show you the top 10 zip codes where you’re losing the most sales. It will show you by name which members of your sales and BDC staff have the highest closing rates, as well as who is allowing the most opportunities to fall through the cracks. It will empower you to make better decisions with staffing, training and employee responsibilities based on a more thorough analysis of your business.
From my years of experience as the General Manager of a dealership and as the CMO of a large dealer group, I am very aware of the fact that dealers are not data scientists, nor should they ever be expected to be. Your only job is to sell cars and to reduce the rate of lost sales to the competition. But you can’t stop losing sales if you don’t have the near-real time data to expose why you lost them in the first place. And it’s not only about having access to the fastest data or the best data – that’s only half the battle. It’s also about working with the people that know how to extract the most impactful, actionable pieces of that data and that possess the technology needed to execute a strategy that results in fewer losses and more incremental gains.
My session, “The Uncut Story Your CRM Can’t Tell You” at Digital Dealer 23, will provide dealers with never before seen visibility into their market conditions so that missed opportunities can be turned into closed sales.
Attend this session and learn how to:
- Define your greatest opportunities and losses tied to a specific lead or traffic source, salesperson, model, day, or zip code.
- Identify defection trends of competing stores or brands in your market to reduce lost sales.
- Continuously grow your market share by understanding what you’re losing.
- Identify defection trends even down to your individual salespeople that are in your showroom. Know more about what’s going on in your dealership and the dealerships around you.
The Digital Dealer 23 Conference & Expo will be held this Sept. 18-20th in Las Vegas, NV. Register now to start building your agenda by choosing from more than 100+ sessions!
***Article originally posted on DigitalDealer.com.
INTRODUCING: AutoHook® + ServiceSmarts® Integration for KIA
THE WAIT IS FINALLY OVER...
AUTOHOOK® + SERVICE SMARTS®
LAUNCHES AUGUST 1, 2017
What is AutoHook?
AutoHook specializes in proving sales attribution combined with their untouched ability to increase showroom and service drive traffic. Through their 100% DAS-Eligible incentive solutions, AutoHook supplies true, incremental sales, new to brand buyers, and service appointments to KIA Dealers. Powered by Urban Science, AutoHook proves ROI with the fastest, most accurate sales and service data in existence.
What is ServiceSmarts®?
ServiceSmarts® is an online tool that allows all KIA Dealers to identify and target their best Service opportunities.
What Happens When Two Superpowers Combine?
After establishing a proven track record for driving sales and new to brand buyers to KIA stores, it was only a matter of time before AutoHook brought our high-converting incentive solutions to the service drive! With the all-new AutoHook + ServiceSmarts integration, KIA dealers can improve the effectiveness of every service campaign and TAKE BACK service revenue by isolating, targeting, and incentivizing the customers with the highest level of opportunity. ServiceSmarts data identifies any potential missed opportunities and AutoHook incentives allow you to create campaigns to convert those opportunities into service appointments.
Program Overview
Target inactive or at-risk customers using your ServiceSmarts data.
Identify and incentivize your greatest areas of service revenue opportunity.
- Deploy AutoHook's custom email incentive campaigns to secure more service appointments without compromising your price integrity.
How Does it Work?
STEP 1: Service Manager selects a target audience within the ServiceSmarts tool (active customers, inactive customers, first service appointment, or at risk service customers).
STEP 2: After selecting a list of customers to target, select AutoHook as your Fulfillment Vendor. This will enable you to create targeted service campaigns using strategic email incentives offers. The email creative has already been done for you.
STEP 3: Select your campaign details including the name of your campaign, duration, email template, the dollar amount of incentives you'd like to offer, etc. Don’t forget to click to preview your service URL to make sure your customers can schedule an appointment online.
STEP 4: Preview and confirm your campaign and hit submit.
STEP 5: Customers visit your service department to redeem their incentive. A Service Advisor activates the customer's incentive using a unique 9 digit coupon code and AutoHook's easy 30-second redemption process. The customer instantly receives their Visa e-gift card while their vehicle is being serviced.
SIGNING UP IS 100% FREE.
YOU ONLY PAY IF A CUSTOMER SHOWS UP IN YOUR SERVICE DRIVE TO REDEEM THEIR EMAIL INCENTIVE.
SIGN UP NOW TO START TAKING ADVANTAGE OF THIS PROGRAM!
*CAUTION: Dealers using AutoHook Incentives have been known to experience outrageously high levels of ROI.
Big Data’s Biggest Accomplishments
A Timeline Of Big Data’s Big Moments In History
1965: The U.S. Government built the first federal data center to store over 742 million tax returns and 175 million sets of fingerprints, marking the beginning of the electronic data storage era.
To see what happened next click the data clock....
Winning Means Knowing What You’re Losing
3 Steps to Reduce Lost Sales
by David Metter
1. Use Data That Tells a Complete Story
The only way to know exactly where you stand in your market is to have a clear view of what you’re losing. The problem the automotive industry has faced for years now, is that both CRM and DMS data is one-sided, one-dimensional, and only shows your effectiveness against your own sales. But what about the sales of competing dealers or brands in your market? Wouldn’t it be easier to grow your market share if you knew what percentage of it you actually owned compared to your top competitors?
The other problem exists within the reporting provided by some third party vendors, as these reports only show you one side of the story – their side. In other words, what you’re winning. If you think about it, what is the most vital piece of information to have in terms of improving your dealership’s sales operations? Is it how many clicks your VDPs got or is it how many actual vehicles you sold…or didn’t sell? You be the judge.
2. Accurately Quantify Your Lost Sales Opportunities
What if you could know which dealerships you’re losing sales to? How many units per day or per month are you losing to competitors? How many of your customers purchased from competing dealers or brands in your market?
It is critical for dealers to not only look at their own data and sales and defection trends, but also the sales trends of their biggest competitors. Know where you stand. If you have a clear view of what and how much you’re losing, then you have a clear view of what you need to win back.
3. Identify the Source of Lost Sales & Adjust Accordingly
There are several factors that play into each and every lost sale. What dealers need is the ability to recognize if sales are lost due to internal or external factors. For example, is there an internal problem with your sales staff or with a specific salesperson? Are your lost opportunities tied to a certain model? Or, is it an external problem such as one of your lead providers consistently delivering leads that are no longer in consideration? Look into your website traffic and the traffic providers you work with. Are these sources driving low-funnel buyers to your showroom, and can they prove it?
If you don’t know the answer to that question, it’s because you’re not seeing the full picture. You can’t fix a problem if you don’t know the problem exists. Similarly, you can’t make smarter decisions with your marketing budget if you don’t know which sources are driving bad traffic or causing high defection rates.
Now that we’ve identified all these potential problem areas, allow me to leave you with the light at the end of the tunnel. The good news is that the tools and data needed to complete the story of your market’s sales trends already exist. I know this because I’ve been on both sides of the equation. I’ve worked as the CMO of a large dealer group, and I’m currently on the vendor side of the car business. Therefore, I can say with confidence that attempting to grow your market share without a complete view of your market in today’s complex landscape is asinine. I can also say based on factual, proven stats that Urban Science has the fastest, most accurate sales match data in existence. So at the end of the day, you can go with your gut, or you can go with prescriptive science-based conviction. (I suggest the latter).
To learn more about identifying and eliminating lost sales, visit DriveAutoHook.com/TCA.
CASE STUDY: Boucher Hyundai TRIPLES Sales Efficiency With AutoHook Incentives
In order to overcome the challenges and heightened competition of a flat market, Boucher Hyundai needed a way to protect their territory by increasing their market share, improving their sales efficiency, and reducing the incidence of lost sales to other dealers in their PMA.
SEE HOW WE DID IT! CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD.
AutoHook Moves Aged Inventory...FAST!
SUBARU DEALER CASE STUDY
JIM BURKE AUTOMOTIVE GROUP
2016 SUBARU IMPREZA 2.0i LIMITED 4DR
THE DEALER RESPONSE
“We had a 2016 Impreza 2.0i Limited 4dr that was on the lot for 362 days. We needed to move the Impreza ASAP and we were able to accomplish this utilizing AutoHook’s Web2Show solution via our Dealer.com website. We did an increased, targeted offer for the Impreza’s stock number only of $100 for a test drive and sold the vehicle in just 4 days. We are thrilled with the quick turnaround of this specific vehicle targeting campaign and will definitely continue to use AutoHook’s solutions in the future.”
Gordon Gibbs, Internet Marketing Manager
Jim Burke Subaru
SAF-ELIGIBLE SUBSCRIPTION
Convert more website traffic and leads into high-intent showroom visitors through AutoHook's SAF-Eligible solutions. Dealers can sign up below with their Dealer.com User login.
DEALER.COM ENHANCED TARGETING CAPABILITIES
Custom, on-demand strategies to fit your dealership's unique needs.
- Conquesting
- Geo-Fencing
- Specific Model Targeting
INTRODUCING: THE ALL-NEW SALES MATCH REPORT
AutoHook Releases Purchase Analysis Reports for Current Clients
As of May 2017, AutoHook released an all-new dealer sales match report, further solidifying their place in the industry as the true definition of automotive attribution. Current clients will now have a 360-degree view of their dealership’s sales, conquest, and defection trends based on data only hours old, as opposed to 90-day old registration data used in previous reporting.
REPORT ENHANCEMENTS
The Closest to Real-Time Data in Existence
This is no joke. Urban Science has the only Shared Sales Database that allows our clients to see sales effectiveness across multiple car brands in near-real time. Thus, we can report back on the numbers faster than the OEMs themselves, giving dealers:
- First-time visibility into sales and defection to other dealerships and brands.
- The knowledge required to take control of your dealership’s marketing and operations.
- Names of defectors to like-brand dealers as well as competitive brands.
AutoHook’s current dealer and OEM clients will have a significantly more actionable snapshot of their market conditions. Urban Science’s new vehicle sales matching data is now being directly pulled into AutoHook’s private offer and redemption platform for the generation of weekly reports.
Your Total Lost Sales by Competitor
This is a big one! Prior to this release, dealers could only see how many total sales they lost to competitors. Now, you have complete visibility into competing dealerships in your market (by name) that you lost sales to. This is what is known as “actionable data.” If you are a Hyundai Dealer and you’re losing the most sales to Hometown Hyundai down the street, you can then work with AutoHook to deploy a targeted conquest incentive campaign to reduce pump-in sales. OEM clients receive even more in-depth reporting on the number of new to brand buyers AutoHook delivered to their stores.
Customize Your Report View
Your AutoHook Client Service Specialist (CSS) can also generate a custom Purchase Analysis Report to show sales match data from any date range of your choice.
Weekly Updates
Each dealer’s Purchase Analysis Report will include their previous three full months of sales data in addition to their metrics through the current month to date. Reports are updated and reran each week, guaranteeing the most current metrics as well as sales lost to other brands or dealers in the market. Your CSS will review these reports with you on a one-on-one basis and offer recommendations as to how AutoHook can help you grow your market share and reclaim lost sales from competing stores.
REAL PURCHASE ANALYSIS REPORT EXAMPLE
An example of the new Purchase Analysis Report from an actual dealer is shown below. (The dealership’s name and competing dealer names have been changed to protect their privacy).
Starting Summer 2017, AutoHook Purchase Analysis Reports will be automatically sent out weekly to all dealer clients. In the mean time, please reach out to your CSS or DealerSupport@UrbanScience to access your sales report based on your AutoHook test drive incentive redemptions. Or please contact us with any questions. Enjoy!
Has the Promise of Big Data Finally Been Fulfilled?
by David Metter
Big data has been a big topic in automotive for a long time now. At this point, I think we’ve all realized there is a limitless digital warehouse of actionable data that exists. However, the struggle remains in deciphering how all the pieces fit together and translate into more sales. At the absolute core of the car business, when all the digital minutiae and politics are set aside, being able to prove sales is the only way to know if something is working. Owning the ability to prove sales in near real time is unquestionably big data’s most powerful accomplishment as far as the car business is concerned.
Perhaps the focus has simply been in the wrong place, or maybe it’s the fact that the focus has been in too many places. Dealers have been forced to adapt, master new technologies, implement new ways to operate and sell more cars all while being pushed in a million directions, attempting to distinguish between gratuitous opinions and actual science. It’s easy for dealers to lose sight of the end game when they’re stuck trying to figure out how the pieces fit together and how to create the story needed to turn data into action. This is why a lot of people view big data as nothing but a big problem.
I’m going to make this whole big data problem very small. The only data you need to start with, the only data that allows you to take immediate action is sales and service data, nothing else - and this is the reason:
We know that when customers physically walk into a showroom, closing rates jump to roughly 60-65%. Therefore, leads are important, but there’s no argument that showroom visits are more important than leads, and sales are more important than showroom visits. That’s the trajectory. If you’re using big data for anything other than proving sales or service revenue, you’re wasting your time. Sales have always been, and will always be the single most important dealership metric.
You also have to look at the history and trends of your past sales and the sales of your fiercest competitors. Too often, some of the most influential players in this industry forget that no two dealers are the same and no two markets are the same. Therefore, the data you need to own more of your market share may be much different from other stores, including each rooftop within a large or small dealer group.
In a lot of ways, big data is like a hammer. We can all go to Home Depot and buy the same hammer, but what we use it for, and what we ultimately build with that hammer is contingent upon its user. Choose to use your hammer better and smarter than the competition. Know that in order to do so, you also have to know how your rivals are using their hammer – in other words, the sales and defection trends of competing dealers in your market. It’s impossible to cut your losses if you don’t know they exist. You need to view both your opportunities and losses from a 360-degree, closed-loop vantage point. Big data exists not only to show you what you sold, but just as importantly, what you didn’t sell.
To put things into perspective, know that the power of big data transcends far beyond the car business. On a global scale, true improvement and change can only occur if a problem or a need for change is identified. Over the last decade, big data has proven its ability to influence the world’s greatest issues, including social change, government policy, and industry laws and regulations simply by its ability to demonstrate a need. When a need is identified, it then opens up the door for change.
In the TEDx Talk, “Stories are Just Data with a Soul, Chris Coates paints a very clear picture that data exposes needs by telling stories. “These stories can help people leaving prison to find work and stay out of prison and build new lives. They can save someone’s eyesight or their leg. Data can give children in the most deprived parts of the country chances in life they wouldn’t otherwise get.” What Coates is saying is that data alone has the capacity to change a life. If big data can change lives, it can absolutely change the effectiveness of your sales operations.
