Nearly three-fifths of car buyers turn to their mobile devices to read up on you and your fellow dealers, be it a review or a search for your store. That’s according to the 2014 Automotive Social Media Trends Study released by Digital Air Strike at the J.D Power Marketing Roundtable on Wednesday. “The overall trend […] [Read More]

Twitter: It ain’t just for hashtagging your favorite pumpkin-spice whatever or Grumpy Cat pictures.  That’s right, perhaps one of the most important uses of Twitter this fall, at least for folks in the used-car business, is the #DealerChat from your friends at Used Car Week. After a successful debut #DealerChat hosted by Equifax last week, […] [Read More]

Propelled by the merger with CAR-Research XRM earlier this year that brought 20 years of call center experience, AutoLoop introduced Engage — a solution geared to gather customers and increase sales and service profitability for dealers. Among the five capabilities AutoLoop highlighted this week, officials explained the Engage call center solution can deliver dealers the […] [Read More]

Dealertrack Technologies announced this week that its customer relationship management tool’s interface has received certification from Reynolds and Reynolds. The system, Dealertrack CRM, received certification from the Reynolds Certified Interface Program, which applies to the ERA dealership management system. Robert Granados, senior vice president and general manager, inventory and CRM Solutions at Dealertrack, believes the […] [Read More]

Digital marketing company Search Optics has launched a new mobile-optimized website platform built to enhance mobile search engine optimization and conversions for dealerships. The new Blueprint Platform is designed to ensure customer websites are viewable across every device and screen size. “The Blueprint Platform was built from the ground up for the mobile Internet and […] [Read More]

In an effort to aid dealers’ service departments, Cox Automotive — the parent of Manheim, AutoTrader.com, vAuto and Kelley Blue Book, among others — recently joined other companies in purchasing a minority stake in AutoMD.com, previously a wholly owned subsidiary of U.S. Auto Parts Network. Joining Cox Automotive in this development were Federal-Mogul Motorparts, a division of […] [Read More]

J.D. Power released the results of its recent report on customer reactions to their interactions with automotive mobile sites on Thursday. The J.D. Power 2014 Automotive Mobile Site Study found that smartphone users are more likely to share vehicle information on social media when they are satisfied with the experience they had on either a […] [Read More]

Manheim executive vice president and chief operating officer Janet Barnard has been named by Women in Technology as a finalist for the Women of the Year in Technology Awards, presented by Infor. The awards spotlight Georgia’s leading female leaders in science, technology, engineering and math, honoring their accomplishments in these fields and their impact to […] [Read More]

Peer-to-peer used-vehicle marketplace Beepi announced Monday the closing of $60 million in Series B funding to aid in the company’s desired national expansion. The company, which began in April, originally catered its all-online buying and selling program to the San Francisco area with a more limited buying scope.  As of Sept. 5, Beepi announced customers […] [Read More]

“I would like to buy a car with bitcoin.” The majority of dealers and their sales staff likely have not heard those words from a customer. At least, not yet. The global emergence of cryptocurrencies in the last five years has brought to question one serious issue: what can be accepted as money? Is it […] [Read More]