Comments on: Are you getting all your Internet Leads?

By: Mr. Tweet: Your Personal Networking Assistant!

Mr. Tweet: Your Personal Networking Assistant! — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 09:05:40 +0000

[...] ); }); Best News in Automotive for 2009-11-28 Top Members | Popular News 2 Likes Dealership lead routing procedure for CRM and ILM Automotive dealers working with a new CRM or ILM company need to get a handle on where Internet [...]

By: Just signed the contract with Vinsolutions - DealerRefresh Automotive Technology Forums

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 21:07:14 +0000

[...] lead generators, etc NOW to an email address YOU control, something like webleads@DEALERNAME.com . Dealership lead routing procedure for CRM and ILM Then once you get the new CRM email address from VinSolutions, it will be a simple change. Also, [...]

By: Jeff Kershner

Jeff Kershner — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 05:53:54 +0000

Great best practice article and a nice reminder. Thanks Alex.

We have our own (1) lead addresses (per dealer). And before being with a group I always excised this practice as well.

Something very simple and but often overlooked. This also provides and easy way to get an additional copy sent to your phone for backup. There are some CRM’s that somehow, sometimes are not dependable enough to rely solely on their inbox for accuracy or speed of delivery.

By: Matt Watson - VinSolutions

Matt Watson - VinSolutions — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 01:27:04 +0000

@Chip

We receive data from every DMS and inventory company and we send data to hundreds of online classifieds…. You could argue that the standard should be STAR and almost no one uses it. But since everyone already has it all setup and it works, no one wants to change it either.

http://www.starstandard.org/

By: Chip

Chip — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 00:00:29 +0000

What I like about the web service is that it would have a request and a response, email of course lacks the response which I think is a big deficit. Maybe neither is a perfect solution, but the number of leads by email that don’t make it into a CRM from our system is unknown at this point as we have no way to track it once it’s emailed off to the provider. If we don’t know, that means the dealer doesn’t know, and the lead is never known to exist.

I will say I’m very happy that most providers accept the ADF spec. More standardization now means a much better future in terms of technology growth. Now if we could just standardize inventory feeds!

By: Matt Watson - VinSolutions

Matt Watson - VinSolutions — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 16:08:58 +0000

@Chip Email isn’t perfect but neither is using web services. The good thing about email is it has built in mechanisms for failure, queuing, and resending. A simple web service doesn’t have those mechanisms. So it would have to be more robust, which most OEMs have created for their lead delivery systems across web services.

The biggest problem with web services would be standardization. There are somewhere around 30-40 CRM providers and hundreds of companies that send leads to those CRMs.

Special finance leads should be required to send over web services. A lot of special finance lead providers send SSNs in emails in the ADF XML leads…. which is really bad. They should definitely be sent via secure web service.

By: Ray

Ray — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 15:09:07 +0000

Good stuff, having your leads go into a duplicate database sometimes can get confusing, however it is probably the only way to monitor lost leads. But remember email leads are increasing at a slow pace nationwide, so concentrate on your phone leads. Develop a system that allows easy entry on a consistent basis of all incoming phone calls. Get those into your CRM/ILM and follow up. Use tracking numbers and double check if all calls are being handled correctly, capitalize on missed opportunities and if they are entered into your database.

By: Chip

Chip — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 06:46:13 +0000

Along these lines, and with the inconsistency of email – I’ve always wondered by CRM providers don’t provide an API to load in leads directly from lead providers. Most have adopted the ADF spec, but none that we’ve come across offer a way to send leads server side.

Great tip for the controllable email address to forward to the lead provider. As we deal with this weekly, it would be great for more dealers to adopt this best practice.

Chip-

By: Matt Watson - VinSolutions

Matt Watson - VinSolutions — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 23:25:54 +0000

This is a great tip. Dealers should be able to funnel all of their leads this way except for manufacturer leads since those are not usually sent via email.

The only concern is making sure the email forward doesn’t slow down getting the leads to your CRM. You don’t want to adversely impact your response times.

I have seen instances before with email delivery issues between the dealer and their CRM related to email delays from SPAM prevention. So you may want to ask your CRM provider to white list the IP addresses of your email servers if you are having any delays in the delivery of the email leads.

By: Gerald

Gerald — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 22:59:33 +0000

Great reminder of best-practices. I have done the same thing with each store I have taken over. The challenge, is knowing which companies you are SUPPOSED to be getting leads from. A disjointed store/process allows for a number of holes to appear where lead providers can slip if you’re not paying attention.