Now personnel at dealerships using AutoManager can say they’re not wasting time if a manager spots someone on Facebook.
The dealer management software company recently announced that WebManager, its comprehensive vehicle marketing system, has integrated with Facebook Marketplace. This integration is accessible within the WebManager application and can allow a dealer to export the store’s entire used-vehicle inventory to Facebook Marketplace.
AutoManager mentioned that also built in to this integration is real-time communication between dealers and shoppers via Facebook Messenger.
Facebook Marketplace offers a dedicated discovery and search experience designed to help people find their next vehicle.
“Making Facebook Marketplace available to all our WebManager dealers means we are able to increase the scope of our dealers’ reach, and as a result, our dealers could see more customer opportunities and enjoy more potential customer engagement,” said AutoManager president and chief executive officer Kami Tafreshi.
The company acknowledged that dealers have wanted to list their inventory on Facebook Marketplace. AutoManager dealers can now:
• List pre-owned vehicle inventory to Marketplace
• Receive notifications from interested shoppers and engage in real-time chat through Messenger
• Acquire high-quality leads through Marketplace
To learn more about WebManager’s Facebook Marketplace integration, visit www.automanager.com/facebook-marketplace. To learn more about starting a free trial of WebManager visit www.automanager.com/demo.
Now any parking lot — or wherever a vehicle might be located that catches a consumer’s attention — could be the opening place where a potential buyer begins down a road toward possible delivery at your dealership.
On Wednesday, artificial intelligence platform CarStory announced the launch of CarStory Vision, a dedicated automotive visual search product for consumers. CarStory Vision uses machine learning to identify vehicles and a patented recommendation engine to help consumers discover their next vehicle.
“One of the biggest problems in the automotive industry is vehicle discovery,” said Chad Bockius, president and chief product officer of CarStory. “With CarStory Vision, we’ve tapped into the power of machine learning to enable faster, easier and a more enjoyable way to discover vehicles.
“Visual search also removes significant hurdles in automotive shopping by enabling consumers to experience parts of the shopping journey that previously could only be done on the lot,” Bockius continued.
“Starting today, consumers just have to see a car, scan it and start to shop. There is no easier way to discover your next car,” he went on to say.
Early leaders in the visual search field include Pinterest, Google, Amazon and Microsoft as well as a host of retailers that understand the huge opportunity visual search presents.
In 2017, a report by Joz and Moz confirmed that visual search is on the rise with 27 percent of all searches being for images. With CarStory Vision, users have a dedicated visual search product in automotive aimed at completely transforming vehicle search and shopping.
Trained on more than 5.5 billion automotive images, CarStory Vision can tap into CarStory’s patented recommendation engine and integrates with CarStory.com for quick search capabilities.
Key features of CarStory Vision include:
— Vehicle discovery: Combines computer vision and machine learning to visually identify a vehicle, making the street or any parking lot a virtual shopping lot
— Smart suggestions: Recommendations based on scanned or favorited vehicles
— Virtual garage: See every discovered car in one place
— Simple shopping: Quickly find the best deals nearby
“CarStory Vision enables consumers to discover their perfect car matches just by walking around,” the company said.
The app is available now for download in the Apple App Store.
Whether the music your potential vehicle buyer likes most is by Bruno Mars, Johnny Cash or Adele, Vboost says it has dealers covered.
The viral marketing company focused on the auto industry announced this week that it can now customize viral marketing for its dealer clients down to the musical taste of the customer. As a result, Vboost said the dealer videos have seen a dramatic increase in shares and views.
Vboost developed quick and easy process to capture photos at the time of vehicle delivery and quickly gets those “branded” photos out to the customer. Now the customer becomes the dealer’s advocate by posting/sharing the photos. The captured photos are stitched into a slideshow set to music and sent to the customer. New updates to the platform further improve the customization as the salesperson can input the customer’s music and song preference from classic rock, to Latin, country, oldies and more.
Vboost pays the publishing rights so dealers can use nearly any song they choose. Customers share these videos via Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and other social platforms, and additionally email them to their friends and family.
“With over seven million video views, the concept has truly caught fire,” said Paul Moran, Vboost president and chief executive officer. “Music makes the viral world go around. When messages go out, the more they mirror the customer and their individual tastes, the more likely they are to get shared. Popular license music adds entertainment value and raises the bar to a higher standard, setting the dealership apart from the competition. As customers are not used to hearing their favorite song associated with a local car dealership, imagine the difference that makes in marketing.”
The Vboost Viral Marketing Platform can deliver and track thousands of viral messages monthly — all designed to create referral business for dealers and their individual salespeople. With just a few clicks on a mobile app, hundreds of Vboost dealer clients can send thousands of viral messages every month, reaching new customers through the customers’ friends and family.
Vboost reiterated that its mission is to produce and deliver viral marketing messages that promote the dealership and the sales rep, creating referrals. The customer receives the content in a format that compels them to share on their own terms. The shares and views are then tracked and optimized.
“The key to producing high share rates and true viral marketing is different for each person. Customization and fast turnaround are key. Most of our dealerships’ customers share their experience before they even leave the dealership — that is very powerful marketing,” Moran said.
For more information, watch this Vboost overview video available here or at the top of this page.
For additional information and to schedule a demonstration, call (800) 799-3130 or visit www.vboost.com.
Auto classified industry veterans Skip Dowd and Ernie Blood — who have been with operations such as AutoMart Magazine, AutoMart.com, AutoTrader.com, Mini Merchant and Trader Publishing — are now collaborating on a new platform to help dealers move metal.
Dowd and Blood joined forces to launch MAutoSearch, an online mobile vehicle-buying solution that is geared to bring online mobile and print together to help consumers more easily comparison shop on their mobile devices.
“Currently, the mobile car-shopping experience is not always seamless for consumers. We see gaps in the tools provided by current online and offline publishers,” Dowd said. “While mobile shopping works well if you know exactly what you want, the small screens on mobile devices make it difficult to do research and comparison shop.
“So in most cases the car shopper will initiate a search on their mobile device and then go back to their laptop or desktop to complete their research,” he continued. “That’s inconvenient, especially as consumers have begun to rely on their mobile devices for almost everything. As desktop and laptop use continues to decline, we felt car shoppers and dealers would appreciate some new solutions designed to address this gap.”
With more than 3 million vehicles for sale on www.MAutoSearch.com, the company is focusing on the mobile car shopping experience and is using technology to deliver a modernized, digitized and free automotive photo guide as a companion to its online searchable website.
MAutoSearch Magazine shoppers can browse local vehicles to find a vehicle of interest, then enter a special MCode on MAutoSearch.com to get more information.
This solution can provide shoppers a more convenient way to browse vehicles and comparison shop — without ever having to go back to a laptop or computer to do research.
With MAutoSearch Magazine, shoppers can also call or text directly from one convenient number on each listing in the magazine.
Blood added, “Technology has pushed our industry forward immensely in the last 20 years, and yet much of that technology is not integrated with local marketing solutions. Most vehicles are purchased by shoppers located within 20 miles of the dealer, and dealers ultimately want best-in-class technology complimented by efficient local marketing in their hometowns.”
Whether shoppers arrive on MAutoSearch.com by way of an MCode from MAutoSearch Magazine or through the SEM and social campaigns planned by the company, Dowd and Blood insisted they will appreciate the emphasis on mobile messaging.
The founders added that shoppers will be able to connect instantly with dealers via their preferred communication method — ultimately with less clicks — as dealer chat and dealer text options are prominently displayed on both the vehicle search results pages and vehicle details pages.
For dealers, Dowd and Blood said MAutoSearch can provides a low-cost, low-risk way to get their new, pre-owned and certified vehicle inventory directly in front of motivated vehicle shoppers. MAutosearch can offer dealers affordable, online advertising options across the country and online and print packages in select markets.
MAutoSearch.com has launched its website nationally, and its local print and digital ebook will hit the streets this week in the Akron and Canton, Ohio, markets.
The company plans expansion into additional markets in January.
Dealers can make inquiries by calling (770) 634–6351 or sending a message to sdowd@mautosearch.com.
It’s been more than a month since Hurricane Florence soaked the Carolinas and other locations in the Southeast.
On Monday, Jumpstart Automotive Media uncovered more than a half dozen metrics and other trends through its post-Florence shopping analysis, pinpointing what types of vehicles are being considered and researched along the Southeastern coastal region of the U.S. following the storm.
Jumpstart experts analyzed the Florence-affected areas and compared regional shopping growth to national growth to see where certain body styles or segments showed differences.
According to Black Book, the storm may ultimately result in as many as 20,000 vehicles damaged or destroyed during the storm and ensuing flooding. Experts suspect this number may escalate higher after factoring in additional damage from Hurricane Michael, which impacted the Florida Panhandle and additional areas throughout Georgia and South Carolina.
As was the case in Texas and Florida last year, analysts determined local residents that were affected immediately began to shop for replacement vehicles in the weeks after the storm.
In the three weeks since Hurricane Florence came ashore on the East coast, Jumpstart has seen traffic grow the fastest in the Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) of:
— Wilmington, N.C. (up 219 percent)
— Greenville, N.C. (up 127 percent)
— Florence, S.C. (up 117 percent)
— Charleston, S.C. (up 66 percent)
— Raleigh, N.C. (up 19 percent)
Jumpstart noticed one major shift since recovery efforts began is the growth in shopping for used vehicles.
In each market that was affected by the hurricane, analysts spotted growth in used-car shopping surpassed the national average by up to four times. Among used vehicles, these are the segments that are picking up speed:
— Vans and hatchbacks/wagons are two of the body styles that have picked up in interest along the East coast. Vans in particular saw up to 285-percent growth three weeks after Florence hit.
— Although truck interest is up as well, the type of truck varies across the affected markets.
— Three quarter- and 1-ton pickups are showing growth in the two most hard-hit regions of North Carolina (Wilmington and Greenville) that is more than 30 percent greater than national growth.
— Midsize pickup growth was the highest in the hard-hit regions of South Carolina (Charleston and Florence) as well as Greenville, N.C.
— Full-size pickup growth only outpaced national growth in two of the affected markets, Charleston, S.C., and Greenville, N.C.
Despite the popularity of SUVs and CUVs across the country, Jumpstart found that their growth didn’t stand out as significantly in the recovery areas.
Analysts insisted that one thing that is clear from the data. Affordability and utility are key among residents that are replacing family vehicles or seeking larger vehicles to help with recovery efforts.
Jumpstart also identified differences to those from Hurricane Harvey last year, most notably that Houston shoppers were significantly higher in truck replacements than what they’re seeing currently on the East coast. Analysts explained this development falls in line with both regional shopper preferences as the Southeast tends to skew higher in cars than Texas or the Gulf Coast.
“The analysis of post-hurricane shopper interest data can certainly help dealers and OEMs as they focus on re-stocking inventory or meeting demand for local residents looking to replace their damaged or destroyed vehicles,” said Brian Miller, senior web analyst for Jumpstart.
“We’re definitely noticing where a majority of residents are shopping for smaller- and midsize cars, vans and pickups, which indicates to us that many people are looking for affordable functionality that offer versatility in their replacement vehicles,” Miller added.
If you just turned a used Ford pickup or a certified pre-owned Chevrolet crossover, there is a strong chance it’s because your dealership customer just saw some form of branding campaign pushing the Blue Oval or the Bowtie.
The Nielsen Auto Marketing Report 2018 showed that by the time car shoppers are ready to buy, they have twice as many brands under consideration than when they started their search, reinforcing the dizzying array of choices buyers confront along their path to purchase.
Findings from the report then highlighted the importance of being top-of-mind with vehicle buyers, which accounts for 90 percent of a brand’s purchase intent, according to Nielsen.
“When it comes to automotive brand building, quality awareness is more important than quantity. Brands need to build salience and relevance with consumers, not awareness for awareness’ sake,” said Damian Garbaccio, executive vice president at Nielsen.
“To account for the nuances in a buyer’s path to purchase, automotive marketers need to employ an omni-channel strategy,” Garbaccio continued. “This means cohesive messaging that elevates the brand and converts shoppers into buyers. You need the right combination of buyer-based data, technology and measurement capabilities to make this happen.”
The report provided deep insight into the car buyer’s path to purchase. It looked at how advertising, demographics and brand market share impact buying behavior.
Six of the most significant conclusions included:
• 90 percent of all purchase intent is due to unaided — or top-of-mind — awareness
• Vehicle shoppers with unaided brand awareness have 10 times the purchase intent as those with only aided awareness
• 71 percent of vehicle shoppers recall the advertising they see on linear TV in the final days of shopping
• Purchase consideration for social media users is 25 percent higher than non-social media users
• Millennial purchase consideration nearly doubles during that demographic’s vehicle-buying journey
• Large brands have four to five times unaided brand awareness of smaller brands, leading to three to four times the purchase consideration
The Nielsen Auto Marketing Report is meant to help auto marketers better understand and act on the key drivers of long-term brand equity, shopper engagement and — most importantly — vehicle sales.
Nielsen says this year’s report makes it clear that marketers need to build deeper connections with consumers and balance brand building (for top-of-mind awareness) with customer acquisition tactics to encourage purchase decisions late in the buying process.
The research is based on quarterly online surveys of more than 9,000 respondents planning to purchase a vehicle in the next two years. Since 2012, Neilsen said more than 220,000 of its surveys have been completed.
The entire study can be downloaded here.
Paul Potratz often looks like he’s in exclusive company by his dapper appearance at Used Car Week and other industry events.
Well, POTRATZ now is among companies that are part of an exclusive project involving Facebook.
The dealership marketing firm was asked to participate in an exclusive Facebook Alpha Program focused on testing the efficacy of the Messenger Lead Ad type.
POTRATZ indicated the limited number of agencies asked to participate were required to run campaigns utilizing this revised ad format over the course of a four-week period in order to provide Facebook with comments and findings.
“Very few agencies were selected to join this testing group, and we’re honored Facebook thought of us and sought out our professional opinion on the quality of leads being provided by this ad type,” said Paul Potratz, the firm’s chief operating officer, in a news release
In order to be considered for the Facebook Alpha testing program, POTRATZ explained advertisers needed to be considered:
— Avid and proficient users of the platform for the purposes of advertising
— Generating above average lead counts for their clients
— Having substantial number of clients on Facebook
Throughout the two-phase program, advertisers were expected to define what constitutes a qualified lead for their clients; then track their success rates for review by Facebook, as well as their overall experience utilizing the ad type from creation to conversion.
POTRATZ is currently one of the few agencies recognized by Facebook as a Facebook Adverting Agency. The company has multiple clients currently focusing all of their advertising efforts on Facebook, having helped these companies make the switch from more traditional advertising means; increasing the effectiveness of their marketing and overall success.
To learn more about POTRATZ, visit potratzny.com.
SpinCar now has more financial resources to enhance its marketing solution for dealer inventory.
The digital automotive merchandising software provider announced on Thursday that it has closed a $22 million financing round led by Wavecrest Growth Partners, with participation from auto and tech industry veterans David Metter and Harpreet Grewal.
SpinCar highlighted the new capital will be used to fund company growth and continued investment in product innovation to meet accelerating market demand for digital automotive merchandising technologies.
SpinCar’s digital automotive merchandising platform leverages advanced 360-degree display technology and proprietary behavioral data to reinvent the way in which dealers, OEMs and third-party automotive marketplaces can engage with vehicle shoppers. The platform can transform static online merchandising content into immersive, VR-enabled experiences, complete with virtual interior and exterior tours as well as tagged, touchable hotspots that allow consumers to explore key vehicle features in rich detail.
By capturing precise vehicle and feature interaction data in real-time, SpinCar can enable dealers to personalize every consumer touch based on the specific needs and interests of individual shoppers. SpinCar’s VINtelligent Retargeting solution can deliver personalized digital ad units for greater marketing effectiveness along the entire car buying journey.
The company mentioned dealers using the SpinCar platform report greater than 30 percent increases in online consumer engagement and conversion rates, as well as 20 percent to 30 percent faster inventory turnover, particularly for used and certified pre-owned vehicles.
“In a world where consumers are just a click or swipe away from a myriad of information sources and alternative purchasing options, every digital interaction for a car shopper represents a critical moment in the purchase journey. SpinCar is enabling local and national auto dealers to bring the personalized showroom experience directly to prospective car buyers wherever and whenever they want. Our platform is generating measurable results for dealers of all sizes, and this investment will enable us to expand our industry reach at an even faster rate,” SpinCar co-founder and chief executive officer Devin Daly said.
“Wavecrest’s customer-first approach and unrivaled B2B SaaS experience make them the perfect partner for our next phase of growth,” Daly continued. “We’re excited to work with their team and network of operators as we accelerate our efforts. This capital will allow us to bring new products to market faster, enhance the services we provide to our customers and partners and expand our world-class team.
Describing the investment, Deepak Sindwani, managing partner at Wavecrest Growth Partners added, “SpinCar provides market-leading technology to a very large industry in the throes of digital disruption. We were impressed with the company’s value proposition, business performance and unique data assets. We look forward to partnering with Devin and his team to transform the way that vehicles get purchased.”
In addition to Sindwani, Grewal and Metter have also joined the company’s board of directors.
Harpreet is a 30-year veteran of SaaS businesses. Most recently, he served as general manager and CEO of Constant Contact after the company’s $1.1 billion sale to Endurance International in 2015. Previously, he was a chief financial officer of public and private SaaS companies.
Metter is the co-founder and president of AutoHook, which was acquired by Urban Science in 2015. He is a frequent speaker on the topic of digital innovation at dealer conferences.
Presidio Technology Partners acted as the financial adviser to SpinCar on the transaction.
Perhaps you know the name Fiserv. However, Charles Sutherland explains why the industry should get to know Firserv again — but now as Sagent Lending Technologies.
In this episode of the Auto Remarketing Podcast, Nick connected with Sutherland, who is the chief product officer at Sagent Lending Technologies, to discuss how the company landed at its new brand moniker and what else is to come from this financial services provider.
The full discussion can be found below. Download and subscribe to the Auto Remarketing Podcast on iTunes or on Google Play.
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It’s Saturday afternoon around Bristol Motor Speedway, and Chase Elliott is outside his RV, graciously answering a hodge-podge of questions from a few reporters ahead of that night’s race.
Sporting jeans, sneakers and Kelley Blue Book-emblazoned golf shirt and hat, NASCAR’s young and perhaps brightest star fields inquiries about the famed short track, his Atlanta Braves and, yes, how he shops for a car.
“Obviously, KBB,” he said of the latter, generating some laughs. “I mean, in all honesty, not just because I’m wearing their shirt, but it is a great place to go and look, and see what a car’s worth. (And) if you’re selling, what you should price it at.
“Obviously, that’s a great resource. But honestly, I haven’t been in the market for many cars. I have a couple,” Elliott said. “And I actually have gone through KBB and looked at some of the prices and where things should be. I think that’s a great place to start and figure out what you want, and how bad you want it.”
Elliott, whose No. 9 Chevrolet Camaro’s primary sponsor for that August race in Bristol was Kelley Blue Book, is among several sports figures representing Cox Automotive brands KBB and Autotrader.
You may have seen the Autotrader logo during NBA coverage or SEC football on TV, but you have likely also seen Cox Automotive represented by professional athletes themselves.
That includes Elliott's NASCAR peers Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano on the Autotrader side of the business — Elliott races on the Hendrick Motorsports team; Logano and Keselowski race for Team Penske — as well as basketball legend Dominique Wilkins, who was partnering with Autotrader during the NBA All-Star Weekend this past February to help to promote its new site.
“It’s been our pleasure to work with them because they’ve understood immediately what we’ve been trying to get across,” be it an overall branding message or marketing a specific product, said Greta Crowley, the vice president of marketing for the group that includes Autotrader, KBB and Dealer.com
And that’s not by accident.
‘We want somebody who’s approachable’
Asked in a phone interview this summer how Cox Automotive goes about about looking for brand spokespeople, Crowley said that with NASCAR, for example, “we leaned heavily on Hendrick and Penske, and we had an honest conversation and said, ‘Here’s what our brands stand for.
“‘And we want a partner who’s authentic and wants to be a partner. We want somebody’s who’s approachable.’ And same for the NBA,” Crowley said, noting how Cox Automotive shared their marketing/audience with the league and asked for recommendations on players.
Cox Automotive also goes through an internal vetting process, including the background of the spokesperson and whether or not he or she would resonate with the audience the company is targeting.
Sports fans also ‘passionate’ about brands
Whether it’s the branding on a stock-car or a marketing presence on TNT's NBA coverage, Cox Automotive has found sports to be a natural fit for marketing, including — but not limited to — the television medium.
From an overall marketing perspective, “we know that sports is still one of the only channels that people are watching live,” Crowley said.
“They’re getting with their friends, they’re talking about it throughout the day and all of the weekend,” she said. “It’s something that we know that people are still really passionate about and that they are passionate about the brands that also support their favorite sports.”
Crowley, whose past experience includes working on the NASCAR support team at an agency associated with Home Depot, said this passion fans have for their drivers’ sponsors “was one of the most eye-opening things for me with NASCAR.”
And with Cox Automotive’s involvement in NASCAR sponsorship, what’s stood out has been “how much the fans love any of the brands that support (the drivers),” Crowley said.
What’s more, fans have even reached out to Autotrader and KBB on social media, requesting hero cards or simply sending happy birthday wishes to their favorite driver.
“That’s been a huge reason for us to get in front of any of these sports fans. And also each of the different sports offers a different audience and diversity, which we can’t always reach with a standard television buy or a search ad,” Crowley said. “So, it gives us some flexibility with our dollars.”
Not only is brand association more intertwined with NASCAR than most other sports, Crowley has found that fan access to drivers is much more prevalent, through things like the hot pass that allows spectators to watch near the pits.
Different purposes within marketing
The goals of these sports marketing campaigns can also vary, ranging from general brand awareness to more specific messaging tailored to a certain product or service.
“We know that with a lot of these sponsorships, depending on how you can structure them, it is all about brand awareness … how do you get that logo out, how do you get your brand mentioned so many different times? There’s a few layers below that we’re constantly looking at too, and saying, ‘how do we slide in a product messaging?’” Crowley said.
For instance, Autotrader had been working with NASCAR drivers about specific messaging on the Accelerate product for next year, helping them to weave it in naturally during conversation with fans.
“With Dominque, we had very specific messaging with touting the all-new Autotrader and some of the enhancements there,” Crowley said, referring to the campaign with Wilkins earlier this year.
“We knew that we needed somebody who was not only familiar with the brand but had experienced it” and Wilkins was a great fit, having bought multiple vehicles via Autotrader, she said. And it’s a “bonus” when they’re able work with someone like Wilkins who was already using their product, Crowley said.
Hendrick connection
Going back to Chase Elliott, what he might count as a bonus is that the owner of his team, Rick Hendrick, is the founder and chairman of the Hendrick Automotive Group of dealerships.
That connection can also make car-shopping easy.
As far as his ride away from the track, Elliott started off with a black Chevrolet Silverado at age 16 and now drives a Tahoe. He calls himself “a Chevy guy” as part of the Hendrick team.
“And the boss has a lot of different dealerships,” he said, referring to Rick Hendrick. “It’s kind of funny. His race team’s obviously Chevrolet, but he owns a bunch of different car dealerships, from across the board. I think pretty much everything but Ford, I feel like.
“Having that connection with him, and if you are interested in a car, I don’t really look any further than him,” Elliott said. “Because if I were to go buy a car somewhere else, I think I’d get in trouble.”
EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the debut story in Auto Remarketing's “DRIVING FORCE: The Business Intersection of Sports & Automotive” series, which will discuss the car industry's involvement in sports business — be it through marketing partnerships, ownership stakes, working as sister companies under the same corporate umbrella or other business ventures.
Got an idea for this series? Send it to senior editor Joe Overby at joverby@cherokeemediagroup.com.
