Vehicle Merchandising 2.0

The landscape for selling cars online

When selling cars online, it’s not just about automation, just feeding your inventory to 3rd party sites.  Focus on these areas and you will separate your inventory from your competition.  More views, more clicks = more phone calls, emails and cars sold!

Everyone knows that when it comes time to sell your house, curb appeal matters.  It can mean the difference in selling your house or not.  When a house has great curb appeal, it makes people, pause and take in the view.  From there, they want to see inside!  Wow, I wonder what it looks like inside!

Does your inventory have this same type of “curb appeal”?  When they find one of your vehicles online, does it make them want to click and take a look inside?  Want to click so they can find out more about the car?

The difference between your car getting clicked on and looked at has to do with a lot more than just the price.

It’s all about the Curb Appeal

There are 5 key Areas to focus on with AutoTrader
The 5 key areas below are your opportunity to grab the Internet browsers attention and get them to click on your vehicle.  The more clicks, the more views, the more phone calls, the more emails = more appointments = more sales.  This is your online “Curb Appeal”.

The Main Picture
Make this picture count.  Great angle, dealership building and name in the background if appropriate.  Crisp, clean shot that makes the car look sharp.

Price, Photos and Videos
T price needs to be competitive, max out on photos (27 with AutoTrader) and utilize videos (example: real video walk around of the car, video of salesperson and video of dealership).

Selling Comments/Creating Custom Comments
There are a couple of way to write custom comments with the most effective being a combination of both Descriptive and Selling.

You have about 5 sentences to grab the Internet Shoppers attention so make it count.  Don’t use all CAPS, use a combination of CAPS and normal text to grab their attention.  Think of the things that they always ask you on the lot……people want to know if it’s a One Owner, Local Trade, Balance of Factory Warranty, Newer Tires, Super Clean and with certain cars, performance!  Tell the cars story.

Make sure that you doing everything you can to have your cars noticed on Autotrader.com, Cars.com and other websites where your cars can get lost in the mix?

Why Me
This is where you can write 2 slogans, “why me” and/or your dealership website.

Vehicle Description
When vehicles are uploaded into your vehicle management software, always check to make sure it is the right MODEL.

Now go through and rate your listings on the following key areas: