CHICAGO -

We talk a lot about the power of the Internet — and how it ties in strongly with consumer car-shopping behavior. But what about after a consumer drives off your lot — either with one of your cars or without one?

These days, many of them are going home, posting reviews on sites like Yelp, tweeting about their experiences, posting on Facebook and otherwise sharing their experience with your dealership online. Way beyond their rants or raves about the actual cars, they’re talking about your salespeople, service, atmosphere, the value you offer and more.

Needless to say, this raises the stakes for you — making it even more crucial to offer transparent, trustworthy and value-added service and salesmanship. It starts with your online listings — creating ads that accurately represent the value each car offers — and continues onto the lot during the sales process. Arm your salespeople with the tools they need to show your customers what your worth — and that of your inventory.

Are You Easing the Buying Process?

The Internet has made the car-buying process worlds easier for consumers—but chances are, attitudes shift when they set foot on your lot.

Chip Perry, chief executive officer of AutoTrader.com, says in an article from Wards Auto that while most consumers are fairly pleased with the overall car-buying process, they lose patience with the on-lot process of negotiating prices, completing paperwork, applying for financing and getting a trade-in offer.

Perry believes that much of this process can be brought online — or at least started there — to help ease this portion of car-buying process for the customer. While dealers and third-party sites do offer tools that give instant tentative trade-in appraisals, credit-applications and approximate monthly payment quotes, the tools are mediocre and consumers and dealers alike don’t fully leverage them. For example, Perry says, of AutoTrader.com’s 16 million monthly visitors only 26,000 submit loan applications to dealerships—and 45 percent of them never get opened.

In the coming years, however, he expects the process to be optimized online and for dealers to get on board. Once dealerships address this customer-satisfactions shortcoming, they’ll be more successful in their business, he says.

This starts with giving customers the relevant information they need about your inventory, even before they start to think about the financing and negotiation process. By optimizing your listings and online tools for consumers, you’ll make the car-buying process easier on them — and more profitable for you.

Jacob Solotaroff is senior vice president and general manager of MAX Systems.