DealerRefresh

Obstacles, Observations and Opinions of an Automotive Internet Sales & Marketing Manager

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Introducing the Refresh Fridays “Live” Weekly Series on DealerRefresh

Earlier this year we began experimenting with a new broadcast concept. The idea was to conduct a periodic live broadcast that was casual and fun yet productive for us and for the audience. After a few tests, Refresh Fridays was born.

“Refresh Fridays” is a recurring webinar series broadcast live on DealerRefresh (most Fridays), hosted by Ryan Gerardi, Jeff Kershner, and Tom LaPointe where we catch up on that week’s (and upcoming) events and activities, hot topics and discussions on the Blog and in the Forums, and where we explore other topics and subjects related to Auto Retail, often times with a guest (or two).

Special Guests every week

In addition to the hosts, we often invite one or more Guest Panelists to appear on the live broadcast or dial in. Ideally, everyone joins through video conference. When that is not possible then you can dial in via phone.

The Refresh Fridays concept

The live broadcast is capped at 30-minutes because we want people feeling the need to tune in each week and come back for more, knowing it won’t interfere with their day.

The idea behind Refresh Fridays is to be MEMBER-FOCUSED. DealerRefresh has more than 8,500 registered members and reaches more than 30,000 people each month through the blog, forum, email, and social media. By focusing on our members’ needs and interests, we are able to bring the content and conversations to life that are occurring digitally and socially.

Recording and Distribution

Each Refresh Friday is recorded and edited. In some instances, we produce and release it as a standalone video and podcast. In other instances, we only extract bits and excerpts to include in other DealerRefresh media productions. The original Facebook Live recording is also always available on Facebook.

Sponsorship

DealerRefresh has strong media partnerships with many of the conferences, events, and expos in Auto Retail. We also have a growing alliance of strategic partnerships, alas “Sponsors” that support what we do and make it possible. Refresh Friday is not meant to be a platform for anyone to push an agenda or a branded message. We do of course use Refresh Fridays to bring awareness of and spark interest in the activities of DealerRefresh and our members.

How to Join the Refresh Fridays Live Streaming 

Facebook

Anyone can view Refresh Friday broadcasts live on the DealerRefresh Facebook page. People can also view unedited recordings of these broadcast in the Videos section of the page.

Zoom Webinar

Viewers may also register with Refresh Friday where they can reserve a seat on the live webinar broadcast. Registration is required only once and by doing so, registrants will receive an email reminder one day and one hour prior to each scheduled event. Registrants are not required to attend and they do receive exclusive access to some of the related content.

SMS Opt-in

You may also opt-in to receive text alerts by texting DFRESHLIVE to 555888. Please note that depending on your carrier and plan, Standard Message & Data Rates May Apply.

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Digital Dealer 23 Review with Kevin Frye #DD23

Kevin Frye at Valley of Fire

Contemplating the future of automotive at the Valley of Fire

I thought it might be a great idea to take some peyote, spend some time in the desert, and meditate on the future of our industry before starting Digital Dealer 23. As my mind wandered in the desert heat, a vision overtook me…

I should work to create a conference where dealers and vendors in the automotive industry can gather together to share the latest and greatest on how to be the best digital dealer in automotive. And I should have them gather in a city in the middle of a desert with bright neon lights, dazzling entertainment, and fantastic food and service. Wait? What? Holy hallucination! Someone already has done this and it is called Digital Dealer?

Time for me to straighten up and begin my recap of Digital Dealer 23 in lovely Las Vegas! [Read more…]

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Cars.com Enhances Car Shopping Experience With Latest Feature, Salesperson Connect

CHICAGO, September 12th, 2017 – Cars.com is announcing its latest car shopping feature, Salesperson Connect, which helps connect dealership salespeople directly to in-market shoppers before visiting the dealer lot, creating a more personalized car shopping experience for consumers.

DealerRater, a Cars.com company, launched DealerRater Connections earlier this year to help connect consumers directly with dealer salespeople through dealer reviews. This latest feature upgrade integrates DealerRater data with the Cars.com Vehicle Details Page (VDP), providing shoppers with access to information critical to making a buying decision on what Cars.com refers to as the 4P’s: Product, Price, Place and Person. Salesperson Connect is available for dealers nationwide who are currently DealerRater Connections customers.

[Read more…]

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The Autonomy Quatrains ….a Reality Check.

Nostradamus would be having a field day.

When pondering the impact of Autonomous Driving Vehicles, the predictions about the future of automotive (and the resulting impact to society) are, if anything, vast. In a world that requires constant content, everyone has an opinion and the ability to publish their opinions. So they do.

The Unbridled Technophiles:

  • Less than 4 million autonomous cars will replace 50% of all commuter traffic in the U.S.1 With roughly 250 million people in the U.S. living in urban communities, 3.75 million autonomous vehicles will handle 50% of peak commuter traffic in the country.
  • Overcrowding will officially come to an end.1 One thing that symbolizes overcrowding more than anything else is traffic. Once traffic flows smoothly, people will begin to regain control of their lives and our sense of feeling overcrowded will begin to disappear.
  • Driverless technologies will cause 1 in 4 jobs to disappear.1 Over the next 2-3 decades, driverless technologies will be either directly or indirectly responsible for the loss of 25% of all of today’s jobs.
  • We won’t need to teach our children how to drive. Today’s infants will wonder how or why we let people drive cars.

The Unbridled Technophobes: [Read more…]

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TransparencyAI Acquired by Semcasting

Bringing Deterministic Attribution to the Auto Industry

NORTH ANDOVER, MA – (August 23, 2017) – Semcasting, creators of the patented IP targeting technology Semcasting Smart Zones®, today announced the acquisition of Orlando-based Transparency AI (TAI), an automotive marketing attribution company. The transaction was a purchase of assets for an undisclosed amount.

Since September 2015 Semcasting and TAI have worked successfully together to bring attribution and media solutions to auto dealer groups and the top online auto-listing publishers. Transparency AI uses Semcasting’s IP matching and Universal Data Exchange (UDX) to connect online and offline customer activity on online publishers’ sites that host individual and dealer group inventory for sale. Auto dealers can measure the impact of their promotional marketing spend against the traffic on publisher platforms and track it directly to the purchase of a car.

“We have been working hand in hand with Transparency AI for nearly two years, creating significant value for publishers and the auto dealer groups through attribution reporting,” said Ray Kingman, CEO and Founder of Semcasting. “This acquisition formalizes our partnership and is a natural extension of our core strategy of delivering deep insight through data to marketers in key markets – such as automotive, health care, finance, politics and retail.”

According to eMarketer, the U.S. automotive industry is projected to spend $9.94 billion on digital ads in 2017 and digital ad spend will reach $14.14 billion in spending by 2020. Semcasting and TAI offer a deterministic attribution solution for publisher’s and dealer’s ad spend.

With Semcasting technology, clients can deterministically identify an auto buyer across the entire customer journey. It links a customer ID across multiple online platforms; matches consumers to dealer repair, test-drives and website visits, and matches audiences served on behalf of the dealer and to select pages in online auto listing sites.

“The automotive industry has always been aggressive in its adoption of online and lead-generation technologies that improve results,” said Jon Lamb, GM of Semcasting Auto Solutions Group. “Being able to prove the impact of online and offline activity at scale across-channels, locations and devices ensures that auto dealers and publishers are going to have the insight they need to optimize their ROI on ad spend.”

The TAI team will continue to operate out of their Orlando and Minneapolis locations as the Semcasting Auto Solutions Group.

About Semcasting

Semcasting is the next generation in Data as a Service Platforms, providing actionable intelligence for marketing services, CRM enhancement, and manufacturing logistics on any Internet-enabled device. Our Semcasting Smart Zones® platform maps real consumers and businesses to their internet delivery points. Semcasting matches customers, prospects, and devices to the locations and media they prefer, enabling analytics and advertising to be targeted with nearly 100 percent reach and unrivaled accuracy. Semcasting is headquartered in North Andover, Massachusetts.

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LotLinx Integrates with VistaDash, a Premier Marketing Analytics Tool

Strengthens TURN and Gives Dealers More Efficiency in Tracking and Measuring Results

CHICAGO, August 17, 2017 — LotLinx, the leading VIN-specific digital marketing solution for the auto industry, today announced its collaboration and mission with VistaDash to give dealers unbiased marketing metrics and greater insight into how to better achieve their business goals. VistaDash is a platform developed with the understanding that dealerships need a better, more efficient way to track and measure their marketing efforts, and is the result of research from PCG’s Brian Pasch and is now fully linked to LotLinx TURN™, a platform that gives dealers valuable metrics on shoppers targeted, total spend, sold VINS, conversions, and engagements on VDPs. LotLinx customers can seamlessly access VistaDash metrics from their TURN dashboard, and now have an enhanced ability to make better marketing decisions to improve their ROI and digital ad spend.

VistaDash is the brainchild of automotive digital marketing expert Brian Pasch, whose book “Swimming with the Digital Sharks” has been hailed the auto industry for its research on digital advertising inefficiencies and dealers’ inability to obtain actionable marketing metrics. VistaDash’s metrics that inspect ad traffic quality allow dealership managers to quickly inspect and identify ways to increase their Return on Ad Spend (ROAS). VistaDash was developed by PCG Companies, an industry leader in online marketing strategies and education for the automotive community.

[Read more…]

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Dealers Still Own Their DMS Data…For Now

Information is power – it’s a truism we all know. But in the 21st Century, access to information is where the real power lies. This point has been illustrated with crystal clarity in the recent CDK / Reynolds & Reynolds lawsuit brought by Authenticom. The public fight between these companies is finally getting its day in court and the first round has made headlines throughout the auto industry.

CDK and Reynolds & Reynolds handle the vast majority of the data management software sales for the auto industry. CDK alone boasts more than 27,000 retail client locations and is the primary provider of data management systems (DMS) to most of the top US dealer groups.

Reynolds also represents a large portion of the market and bundles DMS solutions with consulting, training and management systems for the entire dealership. Both companies also offer data integration, the combining of separate data to present one, unified view. Simply put, the two companies represent the lion’s share of the data available in the auto marketplace.

When you’re dealing with that much information, you’re also talking about a lot of power.

[Read more…]

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What Traditional Dealerships Can Learn from Carvana

If you’ve been in the car industry, you’ve probably heard of the new dealership on the block, Carvana. They are known for their car vending machines. That’s right, vending machines.

Carvana’s mission is “to change the way people buy cars by providing a completely painless and transparent car buying experience online, eliminating the need to take the intimidating trip to the dealership.”

Their aim is to provide exceptional service and cut the dealership costs, saving customers $1,500 or more on their vehicle purchase.

Carvana’s business model is quite intriguing, but the real reasons why traditional dealerships can’t compete with Carvana are different than what you may think.

[Read more…]

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Cars.com Testing VDP Lead Form Featuring Sales Employees

Today Cars.com announced a possible HUGE CHANGE to their VDP.

IF you’re signed up with DealerRater’s “Connections” feature, your Cars.com VDP is in for a possible HUGE change!!

Take a look…

DealerRater Connections on Cars.com

DealerRater Connections on Cars.com

DealerRater Connections on Cars.com

This is what I call… a “Ballsy” move.

And DAMN I LIKE IT!! Being a proponent of online reviews, reputation and word of mouth, this really takes it to another level. This is either a real game changer or a complete mess.

Knowing Alex Vetter, and speaking with him after the Cars.com acquisition of DealerRater – I have a really good understanding of his vision and I completely understand the visionary behind this. Therefore this possible huge change in the Cars.com VDP doesn’t surprise me.

Are you/we ready for this? 

Comment over in the forums.

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Digital Dealer 22 Review with Kevin Frye #DD22

Can Peyton Hoffman Keep Me from this 5-Hour Energy Drink & another Digital Dealer review?

Woo hoo! It’s spring break!

I mean – “Hey boss, is it OK if I go to Digital Dealer 22 in Tampa to learn about the latest and greatest in automotive digital?”

Use your noggin knucklehead!

The last approach might be more successful if you want to join fellow dealers in sunny Florida to work, train, and network 24/7 to become a better digital dealer when you return. And who doesn’t want to go to Tampa, Florida for Digital Dealer 22 after a long, cold winter? Are you ready to begin this recap? [Read more…]