Dealer Controlled Marketing Services
February 2011
WHAT’S NEW AT FORDDIRECT
FordDirect names Galpin Ford and Hines Park Lincoln
2010 Internet Dealers of the Year.
The Ford and Lincoln Internet Dealer
of the Year awards are given annually
by FordDirect at the National
Automobile Dealers Association
(NADA) Convention and Exposition
and honor top dealerships for
achievement in Internet sales.
Internet Dealer of the Year winners
are determined by a formula that
ranks total sales as well as Dealer
Leo Hillock, OCE/EVP
close rates for 2010. This year’s
FordDirect
winners, announced by Leo Hillock,
office of the chief executive, executive vice president, were Galpin
Ford of North Hills, CA and Hines Park Lincoln of Plymouth, MI.
Honorable mention Internet Dealer of the Year winners for Ford
were Bill Brown Ford, Livonia, MI and Varsity Ford, Ann Arbor, MI.
Honorable mention Lincoln Internet Dealer of the Year winners were
Nick Mayer Lincoln in Westlake, OH and Crest Lincoln-Mercury in
Sterling Heights, MI.
In making the announcement, Leo said, “Consumers rely on the
Internet during all phases of the vehicle shopping process. The
Ford and Lincoln Internet Dealers of the Year worked diligently to
create a world-class Internet shopping experience that brings online
shoppers into the showroom. Dealers who take full advantage of
opportunities to connect with potential customers and maintain
relationships with existing customers online will see great benefits
through increased sales and service business.”
FordDirect Dealers sold 275,000 vehicles through FordDirect
Internet referrals in 2010 – 19.8% of total Ford Retail Sales.
FordDirect webcast updates changes to Ford Commercial
Truck website
On January 17th, FordDirect launched a webcast detailing changes
to the Ford commercial truck website.
The old commercial site
was a 5-year old platform
that had limited funding
and no integration with
the current Ford site.
There also was no robust
lead-capture or routing to
Dealers.
The new commercial truck site will:
• Leverage the 6 million visitors to Ford.com
• Deploy inventory, B&P, and the Compare feature
• Deliver leads and information about handraisers to Dealers
• Improve media plans to drive even more interest, traffic and leads
Commercial truck vehicles accessed from the global navigation dropdown will link to nameplate pages. Each page will feature multiple lead
paths:
• “Quick Quote” – Will be a feature for all 8 commercial truck
vehicles starting in Q1
• Build & Price – Overlaps vehicles starting in Q1 through existing
Lead Processing System
• Build & Price – For unique vehicles through legacy commercial
truck site
• Inventory – In the planning for 2011
Dealers currently enrolled in FordDirect New Vehicle Marketing
Services will automatically receive Commercial Truck leads. If
you are not enrolled in New Vehicle Marketing Services call your
FordDirect Regional Operations Manager at 866-550-7812.
INDUSTRY UPDATE
20% of car buyers use social media for research
According to a recent survey of online vehicle shoppers by
Chrome Systems, Inc., a subsidiary of DealerTrack Holdings,
Inc., automotive retailing sites can increase brand awareness and
attract more shoppers with a savvy mix of robust research tools
backed up by social networking. The survey found that 20% of
surveyed consumers who purchased or leased a vehicle in the
past 12 months have used social networking sites to research
or get opinions on a vehicle. Brand loyalty has also dropped
among auto buyers. Only 35% of potential buyers and purchasers
wanted to purchase the same brand of vehicle they owned
previously. As a result, Chrome Systems said it is more important
than ever for manufacturers and dealers to find alternative ways
to stay connected with existing customers and to reach out to
new potential buyers.
Cars.com to post Dealer reviews
Ward’s reports that Cars.com will begin posting consumer
dealership reviews on its Automotive Marketplace website
beginning in March. According to Cars.com it’s a win-win for
consumers and Dealers. They say 80% of reviews are positive
and that a few negative reviews are better than no reviews at
all. At first, a Dealer must be signed up for a consumer to post
a review. But by this summer, all Dealers will be listed on the
site for consumers to leave a review. Cars.com said it will offer
training to Dealers on how they can get good reviews and handle
bad ones.
Auto makers to rev up ad spending
Reuters reports that auto manufacturers increased advertising
during the industry comeback last year. And that trend is
expected to continue and mirror sales growth this year. The hot
areas for automotive manufacturer spending will be TV and the
Internet.
(…continued on page 2)
(What’s New at FordDirect continued...)
FORD
INTERNET DEALER OF THE YEAR
Galpin Ford, North Hills, CA
Hines Park Lincoln, Plymouth, MI
Galpin Ford serves Los Angeles and surrounding areas with showrooms in
North Hills, Van Nuys, Valencia and Mission Hills, California.
For the second year in a row, Hines Park Lincoln has been named an Internet
Dealer of the Year. Located in Plymouth, MI, Hines Park Lincoln has been
serving the Detroit area for more than 40 years.
Bert Boeckmann, owner of Galpin Ford said, “We are extremely honored
to be named the Ford Internet Dealer of the Year. Our Internet sales have
been a major part of Galpin Ford’s
continued success. This award shows no
matter where we meet a customer, online
or in the showroom, that we are able
to provide them with the best possible
customer service.”
We spoke with Galpin Ford Internet sales
manager, Darren Arnaud, about their
Internet department. He said, “We follow
up every lead in a timely manner and
(L to R) Row 1: Dave Meadows, Ali Vafee;
we sell the dealership. We have a lot to
Row 2: Joe Brooks, Mike Jaffe;
offer customers. It’s a great shopping
Row 3: Carlos Alfaro, Dustin Gibson;
Row 4: Peyton Michaels, Darren Arnaud
experience. We have a restaurant and
Starbucks. We carry over 4,000 vehicles and sell our service. We give the
customer reasons to do business with us. We set what we call our ‘Internet
VIP Appointment,’ which gives the customer the red carpet, bypassing the
traditional buying experience - we wait on them instead of them waiting on us.”
Darren said, “We have four Internet coordinators that handle all of our
leads. We train every week on how to handle phone calls and emails. They
set the appointments then I call to confirm and introduce myself. I greet
them when they come in and turn them over to one of seven salespeople
who handle Internet sales.”
Darren said, “95% of the time
we do not give a price on
Internet leads. We will give
MSRP. If the customer insists
we will give a price but we try
to sell the dealership and get
them in first.”
Galpin Ford uses almost
a dozen lead providers.
But, according to Darren,
“FordDirect leads provide our
best closing ratio. We’ve also
been getting a pretty good
response for used vehicles
from Craig’s List.”
GALPIN FORD
INTERNET METRICS
Average Closing Ratio
12%
Ford Internet Sales
25%
To find out more about Internet
sales at Hines Park Lincoln we
talked with Ryan Kolb, who serves
as Internet/BDC manager among
other positions.
Shown Left to Right: Deanna Pfile, Ryan Kolb,
Amanda Bryant
“We’re proud to have won this
award two years in a row,” said
Ryan. “Our team does a great
job and they work very hard at
contributing to our success.”
As far as what they’re doing, Ryan said, “We continue to focus on enhancing
our Internet process to engage our customers where they choose to shop.
We’re staying consistent. We treat customers the way we’d like to be treated.
We do constant training, both on the phone and with process. That’s a big
deal to us. We don’t stop with the training. As more and more customers
look online, we feel sales from Internet referrals will continue to grow to be
a bigger part of our business.”
When it comes to those referrals, Ryan said, “We don’t use any other
lead providers for new vehicle sales other than FordDirect, Ford and our
own website. We’ve dabbled with other new car lead providers but haven’t
used them for about two years now. We just found that for what we were
spending those providers just weren’t producing results. However, for preowned vehicles we do also use
AutoTrader
and
Cars.com
HINES PARK LINCOLN
in addition to our three main
INTERNET METRICS
sources.”
Average Closing Ratio
Enrolled in FordDirect:
• New Vehicle Marketing Services
• Pre-Owned Vehicle Marketing Services
• Call Tracking
• Call Track-10
• DealerConnection
Like all Dealers, Galpin Ford is part of the In-Plant Inventory Pilot*. “I like
that,” said Darren. “I’ve made a lot of deals where customers have gone
to our website and the vehicle is not yet in stock. They contact us and I’ve
been able to get them in and sell them on a vehicle we have in stock.”
When asked about advice, Darren said, “There’s much more to the deal
than price. Sell your dealership. You’ve got the trade, interest rates, your
service department. There’s no reason to give cars away on the Internet.
You can make more money.”
*The In-Plant Inventory Pilot lists ordered vehicles in a dealership’s new vehicle inventory
before they are shipped to the dealership.
20%
Ryan said, “All of our leads
12%
are handled by our Business % of sales from Internet
Development Center. What they
Enrolled in FordDirect:
will do is schedule appointments
• New Vehicle Marketing Services
for our sales staff. They answer
all questions and provide a • Pre-Owned Vehicle Marketing Services
price if requested along with • DealerConnection Premier Customization Service
alternative vehicles. When the
• Search Engine Marketing
customers come in they meet
with a sales manager. Managers
know everything that is going on with the customer. They have access to all
records and conversations and know what the customer is looking for. So
when they come in they meet with the manager and are then handed over
to a salesperson.”
“My suggestion to anyone is be consistent,” said Ryan. “Follow-up, followup, follow-up. It’s a long term contract. There are people who will buy
within a week of submitting a lead and others it will take a couple months.
It’s all about staying in front of the customer – not bothering them, but
being consistent. We judge every lead individually. At a minimum we will
follow them for 90 days and then on a case by case basis we’ll go out to
180.”
CONTACT US!
Copyright © 2011
4 Parklane Blvd. Suite #675, Dearborn, MI 48126-4218 (Toll Free) 866-550-7812 (Fax) 866-259-8667
General questions: [email protected] DealerConnection and SalesPoint Techical Support Center: 866-762-3673
Operations Managers: Heather Blunt
Dave Greenhalgh
Lisa McGuire
Ryan Modica
Tracie Nichols
Howard Witzke
313-248-5427
[email protected]
313-322-3302
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313-323-7744
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313-317-7311
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313-323-1912
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313-323-7247
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