Fact: Your Best Sales Opportunities Are Hiding in Your Blindspot

What if I told you that your dealership’s best opportunity to make a sale today is a shopper you don’t even know exists? 

Think about it this way: how likely are you, a modern shopper, to fill out a form on a website for a product you are thinking about buying? If you are like most shoppers, you will probably browse a couple of websites, do some price comparisons between several retailers, do your own research on the specific features that matter to you, and read some reviews to assure quality and that the product will meet your needs before you simply walk into the store of your choice to complete your purchase. No forms included. 

The same thing is happening behind the scenes at your dealership. You have shoppers who are deeply engaged with your marketing – they are clicking on ads, reading your emails, browsing your website, and possibly even engaging with your chatbot, learning all about your vehicles and your services, but are not converting on your website. 

In short, you have incredibly high potential in-market sales opportunities that you are missing simply because they have not submitted a lead. They will never make it to your call lists and will never be directly engaged by your sales team because you don’t even know they exist.

The funny thing is, these shoppers actually want to be spoken to. They are actively looking to purchase their next vehicle and could probably use a little human help in getting some answers, understanding their options, and finalizing their decisions. They are perfectly primed for your sales team to move in, make a personal connection, and drive towards a deal.

So, what can you do to ensure you are not losing out on the major sales opportunities that are hiding in your blindspot? 

The solution is simple, really. All it takes is a powerful Customer Data Platform (CDP).

Using an Automotive CDP to Eliminate Your Sales Blindspot

When you leverage a CDP at your dealership, you bring all of the data sources in play at your dealership together into one place. That data is then cleaned, normalized, and used to build 360° profiles that track every engagement a shopper has had with your dealership along their customer journey. 

The beauty of a proper automotive-centric CDP is that the technology gathers data in real time, which means every action taken by a shopper is updated in their profile instantly. This ultimately enables you to easily identify those shoppers who are actively engaging with your marketing, but may not be submitting a lead. 

CDPs offer powerful filtering tools, allowing you to build highly-specific, targeted lists. You can slice and dice your data instantly, pulling from multiple data sources at once to identify shoppers based on their behaviors and preferences to create high-probability opportunity lists for your sales team. 

If you filter your shoppers based on specific email open rates, website browsing activity, ad engagements and more, you can easily identify those shoppers who are actively seeking to buy a new car but are lurking behind the scenes rather than submitting a lead, and pass it over to your sales team to reach out and engage.

The Non-Converting Shopper Journey

It’s no secret that brand loyalty dropped significantly in the last few years. According to J.D. Power consumers are less likely to make a repeat purchase from the same OEM unless there is a particular value prop they are looking for or a high level of quality that they have enjoyed.

This essentially means that, in today’s world of retail automotive, you cannot make any assumptions about your shoppers – even if they have purchased a vehicle from your dealership in the past. Those high-value, high-intent opportunities that are browsing your website and engaging with your marketing are performing research, looking to find their next perfect vehicle on their own. What happens at the end of that research is anybody’s game. 

Take, for example, a customer named Tim who purchased a vehicle at your dealership 5 years ago. You are still sending Tim marketing emails on the regular, from service reminders, trade-in opportunities, exciting offers and more. More importantly, Tim recently started opening your emails, clicking on the content, and browsing your website. In the last 3 weeks, Tim has opened 6 emails, clicked on 4 links, browsed 5 different vehicles on your website, and engaged with your chatbot. Tim is now an active, high-intent shopper at your dealership – but you don’t even know he exists.

This is the danger of your sales blindspot. More likely than not, your team will never reach out and speak to Tim. Tim is actively researching, clicking around, working to find his next vehicle but has not filled out a form on your website which means he doesn’t make it to your call lists. 

The Combined Power of Dealership Data and Human Engagement

The reality is, if your team were to reach out, more likely than not, shopper Tim would be grateful for the call, happy to get help answering his questions and receive some direction from a more human perspective. 

Data is undeniably a critical player when it comes to empowering the art of the sale. With a Customer Data Platform (CDP) in play at your dealership, you can empower your team to identify these high-interest, highly-engaged opportunities, ensuring TIm doesn’t fall through the cracks and end up buying from your competitor. 

By leveraging the filtering capabilities of a CDP, your sales team can zero in and spend their time on effective phone calls, rather than on massive CRM lists pulled by last touch date, ultimately improving your workflows and optimizing operations.  

Beyond just identifying these shoppers, the CDP provides your sales team with the full picture of the shopper so they can engage them with content that matters in real time. A CDP helps them to see which car Tim currently owns, how much equity he has in the car, what his car is estimated to be worth in a trade-in, which vehicle he is interested in, and more. All of this information can then be used in the follow-up phone call to help build a relationship with Tim and provide valuable, relevant information that will ultimately bring him into your dealership for his next purchase.

Shine a Spotlight on High-Intent Opportunities With Fullpath

There is no reason your dealership should miss out on these high-intent opportunities. They are there, primed for the taking, all you need to do is find them. A CDP is the key to unlocking your dealership data so you can stop searching for a needle in the haystack and shine a spotlight on even the most stealth dealership shoppers. 

Fullpath’s Customer Data Platform is designed to do just that. Fullpath uses identity resolution technology to create singular, comprehensive 360-degree profiles of every shopper that includes every interaction with your business on their sales journey, from dealership visits, to website interactions, email engagements, ad clicks, and more.

By combining your data with Fullpath’s powerful, hyper-specific CDP filters, you can identify those high-intent opportunities that are hiding in your blindspot and build a personalized, exceptional customer experience for each shopper that will ultimately lead to a sale. If you are ready to see how Fullpath can help you optimize your sales strategy, get in touch with us here or at get.started@fullpath.com  so we can schedule your personalized demo.