Harness Reviews into Real-time Data to Make Your Store a Destination Dealer
Today’s car buying market faces competitive advertising exposure through mobile devices, tablets, laptops and desktop computer interaction all vying for the attention of your potential buyers. What if you captured real-time analytics from the #1 buying market, women, and transformed your showroom into a destination for even more women customers?
Women are buying 45% of all vehicles today, and are the decision makers that are not only willing to write reviews but go on to choose to create difference-making data for the dealership. Hard numbers are generously provided and result in unbiased reports regarding a dealership’s performance. A stunning nine in 10 of women who write reviews on Women-Drivers.com also opt into a 25-question survey summarizing their dealership visit.
Are you harnessing the model to collect unprecedented pre-and post-purchase analytics about what your #1 buyers wants?
Bonus: Game-Changing Pre-and Post-Purchase Feedback
With 92% of women writing reviews that follow through with the opt-in survey, organic, game-changing data is made available. Dealerships get a big-picture view of women’s experiences and preferences when purchasing, shopping and in the service drive. Unearthing third-party data like this is unavailable anywhere else in the market.
“It’s like the ‘JD Power’ of research for our dealer group about our own female clients and shoppers,” says Chris Saraceno, VP and Partner at Kelly Automotive Group and a 30-plus year veteran of the auto industry. “Women are expressive and generous in sharing not just their reviews, but their visit experience. The Women Satisfaction Index® Dealer Data Reports are packed with amazing, useful information.”
It’s like giving dealers a bonus. The reviews are pivotal, and digging past them to the rich market data to improve what is going well and correct where customers drop off is the real added jewel. The qualified insights help take any guesswork out of the equation for dealers.
In the WSI® Dealer Data Reports, individual dealerships and dealer groups discover the dynamics behind several topics, for example.
A. Understand customer touchpoints to improve the process:
- How strongly dealer reputation means to them
- Top third-party websites they are visiting
- How many ‘Like” dealer’s Facebook page
- How many find dealer’s website helpful
- Preference in communication follow up; email, text or phone.
B. Optimize the consumer journey and experience
- Top reasons women buy from their sales advisor
- What customer did not like about the dealership visit or their sales advisor
- Did not buy from the brand dealership closest to them
- Distance they are travelling
- Amount who have purchased here before
- Percent that plan to return to dealer’s service drive and when
- Reasons why women do not return to dealer’s service drive
5 Intake Insights
The notion that price is important to women is nothing new. Consider it a given.
Year after year, however, the feedback women provide proves that one thing matters even more – the quality of a dealer’s Sales staff. Hands down, they say, the treatment they receive is the No. 1 predictor of whether they will buy from a particular dealership. What does that mean? It means devising and delivering a memorable shopping, purchasing and servicing experience.
This is one example of how insights gleaned from WSI® Dealer Data reports can directly benefit dealerships. Yet, women also report that their No. 1 choice of resource is their local dealership’s website, where they search for information prior to making a purchase decision.
Women report that websites that are product-driven are less appealing than ones that are lifestyle-based. A winning website illustrates how a particular vehicle or dealership will help meet her day-to-day needs, whether it involves transporting children, toting a kayak or carpooling with coworkers.
What other results can dealerships look for to beef up their bottom line? Performance can transition showroom Sales Advisor signals from customer awareness into a call to action.
(5) Women’s Insights of Benefit to Dealerships:
- Help her trust you – Quickly engage conversation warmly.
- Treat her with respect – Participate by listening closely to what she has to say.
- Satisfy inquiries presented – Thoroughly answer each question, showroom or offline.
- Appreciate her effort – Know the importance of time and money at hand
- Follow her lead – Honor the research and leverage a woman brings to the showroom.
While these may sound like no-brainers, half of women report they go to 3.2 dealerships, on average, before making a purchase. The other half, however purchased new vehicles on their first visit! Key differentiators included a sense of feeling respected, listened to and validated—all of which helped them trust in the Sales Advisor and purchase process.
Client-Centered Approach
The insights outlined above suggest a need for one thing: a client-centered approach.
While women certainly appreciate vehicle or product knowledge, dealership teams routinely earn well regarded reputations among female customers when their approach translates as trusted advisors rather than information repositories. Related optics bear this out, with advanced analytics showing a clear connection between women’s car buying needs and their customer service expectations.
The same goes for car dealers who ensure that women’s needs (and voices) are represented in online or print advertising—and reviews. Alongside Sales Advisor demeanor and great value, the 2017 U.S. Women’s Car Dealer Report notes that dealer reputation ranks among a woman’s top three reasons for choosing a dealership.
Dealer Distinction
Dealers who integrate the customized data available from their very own women consumers have the opportunity to boost both their sales performance and reputation by speaking directly to the needs of the women driver’s marketspace in their region – thus gaining market share.
In addition, dealers learn how a woman processes the poignant balance of wish list goals with her shopping choices at the showroom level. Top dealers are transforming their sales and shaping future showroom, shopping and buying actions for women consumers. Find out why women travel longer distances to do business with a dealership that establishes a trust, the kind that opens doors for more increased sales volume.