Dealer Principal - October 2007 - (Page 13)

would when establishing a new relationship: Stranger, Acquaintance, Friend and Lover. With the innovative social interaction provided by CarTango, a seller has the opportunity to help a buyer progress through these stages until successful completion of the sale. New marketing principles, including interaction, dialogue and invitation are all part of CarTango’s program. These tools will help buyers build trust in sellers. CarTango will encourage dealers to designate a person to specifically nurture relationships that CarTango helps them establish. Instead of a customer feeling like a stranger and getting intrusive calls from dealerships, social exchange will take place online and the buyer will become familiar with the dealership and sales personnel through days or weeks of interaction online. Another aspect of CarTango that builds trust and ultimately moves a buyer through the Funnel of Love is that the buyer ultimately controls which sellers participate in the Tango, the process wherein dealers compete for a buyer’s business. In the Tango, Osborne explains, “the seller is made aware of what other vehicles the buyer is interested in and can consequently tailor their presentation to assert why the buyer should consider their vehicle. It creates a competitive platform for the buyer while “ giving the seller the advantage to develop a relevant presentation based on specific buyer intelligence.” Buyer intelligence will be available from global to individual levels which will help sellers enhance the performance of their dealership through things such as inventory optimization. In addition to third party lead generation sites, sellers are starting to promote themselves more using their own websites. Proprietary dealership websites, while helpful, may not be as effective as lead generation sites that concentrate on establishing buyer relationships. Osborne indicated that convenience likely drives buyers to continue to shop through third-party lead generation sites. At one site they can browse inventory from multiple dealerships instead of having to search one dealership site after another. “ CarTango has found a way to make its lead generation site produce more qualified leads, leads that may exceed the value of those garnered through the seller’s own website. One of the reasons sellers still want to push traffic to their website is that once a buyer volunteers information at a dealership’s own site, the lead tends to be more viable than those generated at current lead generation sites. CarTango, however, has found a way to make its lead generation site produce more qualified leads, leads that may exceed the value of those garnered through the seller’s own website. Although all car buyers will benefit from the unique deliverables provided by CarTango, Osborne is quick to explain that his company is sensitive to the unique issues female car buyers encounter when looking for a vehicle. Osborne describes CarTango as a female-centric matchmaking service for car buyers and sellers. “Women play a very primary role in the auto shopping process. They purchase 50% of all sold vehicles and influence over 80% of all car purchases.” Osborne further explains that women take the car buying process seriously. Women prefer using the Internet as their primary search tool when looking for a vehicle and they take approximately 17 weeks to research their purchase prior to making a final decision. With such an intense search process, women can benefit from using CarTango’s proprietary tools to help them manage their search process. www.dealerprincipalmagazine.com 1 http://www.dealerprincipalmagazine.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Dealer Principal - October 2007

Contents Reality Check Cover Story: Car Tango Does Your Service Menu Pass the Mom Test? Your Greatest Asset Your Toll Free Number Could Be Turning Customers Away

Dealer Principal - October 2007

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.