The Smart Way to Sell More Vehicles
Smart Web Concepts, at the nexus of Internet technology and automotive marketing, continues to stretch the fabric of the web
Smart Web Concepts was featured in the March Digital Dealer Magazine
In the words of the world’s greatest content provider, “O, what a tangled web we weave.” The Internet can be as tangled as anything gets, in both good and bad ways. And its intricacies, languages and lattice-like connections can appear daunting to even the most sophisticated of business owners. That’s why it takes a special skill to break through the web’s myriad knots and jargon to discover ways in which to profit from its usage.
And that’s where Smart Web Concepts comes in, an online dealer services provider committed to being your best ally in the battle of the eyeballs. The company is headquartered in Roseville, California, a town known for, among other things, having the largest auto mall in the state of California. In short, the folks behind Smart Web Concepts know the web and the cars you’re trying to sell over it.
“Our goal has always been to provide complete web solutions for dealer groups and auto malls, as well as single point dealers,” said Drew Pefferle, co-founder and CEO of Smart Web Concepts. “And to utilize technology to provide dealers with the best quality traffic, not just any traffic, to their own web site. We’ve been doing this for a long time, long before it was the cool thing to do.”
Chatting up your online ups
In just one example of how Smart Web Concepts leverages the latest technology to solve a dealership problem, the company introduced what it calls DealerChats, a solution designed to make web site visitors feel as if they are actually visiting a dealer’s store.
“We started thinking of ways of having the virtual experience of car shopping match the real experience,” said Pefferle. “You wouldn’t let a person walk around your lot unassisted. So why not escort them on your web site? That’s when we came up with DealerChats as a proactive and immediate way to talk with online shoppers.”
In many ways, DealerChats enables you to treat your web site visitors just as you would at your dealership. You can greet them on the lot. Sit them down at your virtual desk. Pre-qualify them. Discuss with them their vehicle preferences. Review their budget. Show them online brochures or push web pages with special discounts and promotions. You can even direct them to other departments such as finance, parts and service. In short, you can do just about everything you would do in your store except serve coffee.
Using DealerChats you can monitor your site from any computer with aconnection to the Internet. That means you can answer questions about listings from your home or while on the road any day or time of day. You can even be notified via text message when somebody is looking for more information. And who knows? While on your web site, visitors might even find something else that interests them.
Smart Web Concepts went beyond the capability to just chat. In fact, you don’t just get to talk the talk; you get to do the walk. They added what they refer to as live web statistics, enabling dealers to watch a visitor’s online activity in real time. Dealers can see how much time a visitor spends online looking at a specific vehicle, basically tracking their online steps. You can talk to the visitor about the vehicle, and even invite the shopper down to the store to check it out in person. Or you can automatically send the prospect an invitation, with custom text designed around what he or she looked at online. In addition to giving you a real time view of what a shopper’s doing on your site, DealerChats can run web analytic reports similar to what you get from a traditional log analysis product.
If you were to take a snapshot of a typical dealership lot, you’d probably see sales reps hanging around smoking or talking, waiting for an up to stop by. At the same time, however, prospects are already visiting your web site, looking for their next vehicle. This is the reality that DealerChats is designed to exploit, by enabling you to connect with these hot online prospects now, rather than wait for them to walk on your lot— and that’s assuming they ever do. DealerChats helps ensure they visit your dealership in person.
Other web products and services Inventory marketing – driving traffic to your store
SEO/SEM Services
The provider offers a full package of SEO (search engine optimization) and SEM (search engine marketing) solutions, allowing you to benefit from the power of search engines and online databases. They deliver on the basics, including detailed keyword analysis, customized web sitecontent, link building and manual search engine submissions. Plus, they make ongoing code enhancements and offer detailed reporting and analysis.
SmartMark
Smart Web Concepts runs inventory photos through its proprietary DealerControl Console to customize each image, ensuring that your contact information is clearly displayed. Putting your phone number and your URL (www.yourdealership.com) on the photos makes it easier for the shopper to follow up. These marked photos then get distributed via a vast network of inventory partners, including Google, AutoTrader,Yahoo!, Cars.com, Vehix, AutoBio, AutoMart, CarsDirect and CUDL.
SmartTarget
This unique Smart Web Concepts solution makes it easier than ever to market to Spanish-speaking buyers online, an expanding part of the retail market. You get automatic English-to-Spanish translation for all text on your web site, including vehicle data. Spanish-language graphics are available as well. The good news is you no longer have to lose prospective buyers solely because they can’t understand your site.
Analytics and measurement – tracking performance
SmartTrack
The provider offers full support for performance monitoring with its SmartTrack tool, enabling you to quantify the success of your web site and media advertising with real-time data. You can use custom numbers in your advertising or click to call/form to phone options. You can assign a custom number for your web, print and multimedia campaigns. Custom campaign numbers, for example, combined with Smart Tracking lets you know how each ad is performing. The result? You find out what works, learn more about your target market and see exactly what moves shoppers to become buyers.
Their tracking solution fully integrates with your SEO and SEM programs. For example, with Smart Track’s Dynamic Number Replacement technology, you can change numbers on the fly based on keywords or search engines. A different keyword or search engine displays a custom number giving you the tools to precisely measure your SEO effectiveness, saving you time and money.
Customer relationship management – managing your front office
SmartWeb CRM
The provider offers a full-featured, web-based customer relationship management solution named SmartWeb CRM. The tool is designed to track and manage captured leads from all sources, including the Internet, your call center, and of course, your showroom. Leads are automatically created with each prospect’s key information, identified by source and date/time stamped. Lead alerts and e-mail responders help you to communicate while the iron is hot. A “round robin” optional feature ensures that leads are automatically assigned and evenly distributed, should you elect to follow that process. Overall, the product deliverson the essentials of CRM, including complete lead history, auto-correspondence, scheduling and pop-up reminders.
A user-friendly interface makes it easy for any member of your salesteam to add and update leads from any computer. Plus, owners and managers can quickly analyze sales performance. Both real-time and comprehensive reporting makes it easy to see what’s going on at any point in the day, week or month. You can view reports about your lead activity, user activity, closing ratios, cost per lead, lead sources and more.
Perhaps what makes their CRM product stand out from so many others is the provider’s willingness to create a custom solution, if needed. Antioch Auto Center found the Smart Web Concepts’ flexibility to be the cream separator when evaluating potential CRM solutions, most of which they found to be too “cookie cutter.” Another client, Auburn Honda credits SmartWeb CRM with playing a crucial role in going from 12-cars a month average to 43-cars a month average. The dealership found the product’s follow-up features as largely responsible for their increased sales.
Customer service and tech support
Smart Web Concepts is proud of how it uses and repurposes technology to help dealers become more successful. But when it comes to supporting those same dealers, the company likes to do it the old fashioned way, with a “real human” in their support department handling your questions during regular hours. Unlike so many providers today, they answer the phone and do not rely on an automated phone system.
From singles to groups to auto malls
Almost from the beginning Smart Web Concepts set its sights on a complete suite of web tools and to serve not just individual stores but the special needs of larger enterprises, such as auto groups and automalls. The provider believed taking the conventional group site to the next level, would give online visitors everything they need in one convenient location. Visitors could search an entire group’s inventory, apply for credit, request quotes, ask questions, and so on. Today a Smart Web Concepts group web solution is not a jump linked to another site. Instead, it’s designed as a complete system that will enhance a visitor’s overall shopping experience and is used by such auto groups as Future Automotive Group (with six locations) and Zamora Automotive Group (with 12 locations), to name but two.
Strengthening your web site through partnerships
Smart Web Concepts understands how the Internet’s complexity combined with dealer challenges require solutions that are flexible enough to integrate well with other solutions. Toward that end they recently forged key partnerships with DealerTrack, Chrome, Carfax and Auto Dealer Traffic.
Smart Web Concepts will use Chrome data and web services, and the Chrome Video Showcase of dynamic vehicle images and full-motion videos to enhance their suite of dealer services. Access to Carfax vehicle history reports has been integrated into the administration area of the dealer’s Smart Web Concepts web site, where dealers can purchase Carfax reports and view the status of reports they’ve already run. Auto Dealer Traffic and Smart Web Concepts plan to work together to develop proprietary software designed to give dealers top-rankings on the leading search engine sites, including Google, Yahoo! and MSN.
Get smart…web concepts
We all know that using the Yellow Pages is yesterday’s news and old technology. Today, when shoppers let their fingers do the walking it’s usually over a keyboard. The web is where it is, where shoppers are more likely to first check you before taking the next step. The catch is, they can also find your competition. That’s why Smart Web Concepts offers a full online suite of web solutions, including site design, lead management and optimization packages that help shoppers find you first whether you’re a single store, part of an auto group or reside in an auto mall. Plus they offer an easy-to-use CRM solution to help keep those clients happy once they buy.
“Dealers savvy enough to embrace their entire dealership as an Internet store have a huge competitive advantage over the old Internet department way of thinking,” summarized Pefferle.
For nearly a decade, Smart Web Concepts has pushed the latest technology to generate additional leads and sales for dealerships. Their solutions execute on a core philosophy of three key components of dealership success: drive traffic, track performance and manage clients.
To close the same way this profile opened, we’ll defer to the Bard and note that when you use the Internet the smart way… all the world is your lot. And you could soon find yourself saying over and over, “Is this a sales lead which I see before me?” To find out more about Smart Web Concepts and their smart line of web products, call 1.888.490.9933 or visit www.smartwebconcepts.com.
Smart Web Concepts
Smart Web Concepts Inc., headquartered in Roseville, CA, was established in 1999 to provide innovative online solutions to new and used car dealers nationwide that include highly successful automotive Web programs and lead management systems. Their solutions are specifically designed to be compatible with all major players in the automotive industry. Smart Web Concepts also creates custom applications for innovative companies seeking a unique design. For more information, visit www.smartwebconcepts.com.
Drew Pefferle
CEO and Founder
Native Californian Drew Pefferle has been in the auto business since the age of 15, starting with an early stint at a local auto repair shop. He loved the job and the field, and shortly after decided to make it his career. After graduating at the top of his class in auto repair school, Pefferle landed a position with a Toyota dealer. He continued to take auto repair classes and before long achieved Master Toyota Technician status. In 1989, Pefferle opened his own auto repair shop in the Sacramento area, which quickly grew to more than 55 full-time employees over several locations. In the late 1990s, he created an interactive web site for his own auto repair business. Smart Web Concepts evolved out of that effort. A strong believer in continuing education, Pefferle continues to expand his business and technical knowledge and encourages his staff to do the same.
Fred Beltjens
Chief Technical Officer (CTO)
The car business is part of Fred Beltjens’ DNA. His father served as an accountant and consultant for many auto dealerships, including the San Francisco Auto Center, one of the first auto malls in the country. Beltjens’ father was CFO and chief developer of a new DMS (dealer management services) product called CAMS (computerized automotive management system). Beltjens joined his father in supporting retail automotive stores and installed CAMS into dealerships nationwide as well as supported and trained others on its usage. In 1986, CAMS was sold to Reynolds and Reynolds and became part of what is known as the ERA system. In the mid-1990s, Beltjens developed the first automotive web site in the Seattle, Washington market. He also helped develop web programs for the auto industry, including Ford’s Business Preferred Program. Beltjens relocated to Sacramento, Calif., in 2001, when he joined Smart Web Concepts as its CTO.
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