11 Expensive Craigslist Mistakes Dealers Are Still Making
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Selling used vehicles is profitable when they move quickly, but usually maintaining and selling a solid inventory of cars isn’t easy. The energy, the time, and the money spent on sourcing the best cars can end up feeling like a lot of wasted effort.
Especially as fast-moving cars are increasingly hard to come by today and most of the sourcing options like auctions bring lower profit margins by the time you’re done paying for auction fees, inspections, transport, and reconditioning.
You are probably wondering how some car dealerships can move their inventory so fast. That’s why we’ve gathered 5 simple tips that can be a game-changer for you.
1. Use Data to Find Your Strengths
A sales manager or dealership owner can only know what’s going to sell in 14 days versus 60 by paying attention to current trends and having reliable tools and data. The good old gut feeling is still important when it comes to acquisitions as long as you’re keeping track of what has sold well in your area in the past. You can have your instinct but data proves that they can sometimes be wrong, so instincts + data is a winning solution
During this difficult situation, SUVs and trucks dominate the market in certain areas. That’s information that can help you with turning your inventory faster. Knowing the demand of your market can help you with making decisions about what kind of vehicles should you buy in the first place. For example, dealers in Southern California should be considering stocking up on Convertibles, as the social restrictions are being lessened - affordable convertibles are a safe bet!
2. Adaption is a key
Like all new pieces of technology, inventory management, and CRM systems only work if people want to use them and understand how to use them. WizPoster tool is very user friendly, automated and you have constant support from a Craigslist expert. Your inventory will be auto-imported and car description will be instantly created with one click. So that you can focus on turning leads into sales.
3. Choose the right channel
The old days of getting people to come into the dealership thanks to colorful balloons and waving flags are gone for now. Today, dealers must rely on digital tools like Craigslist cars at their disposal in order to get the exposure they need to increase sales. Craigslist for car dealers is one of the best venues for this. And automating this the right way, is key. Automating it the wrong way will cost you thousands of dollars.
People who think that Craigslist is dying haven’t checked the numbers lately. It’s now the 8th most visited site in the United States according to Alexa with over 19 page views per visitor and spend almost 14 minutes’ time on site. People go to Craigslist with a purpose to buy cars, that’s one of the most popular purposes on the site.
But you need to use Craigslist wisely. With a website like Craigslist you’re getting a chance to triple the number of leads and with good automotive Craigslist posting tool you will turn them into sales. Save money and post 13+ cars per ad with WizPoster and schedule a posting at the right time of a day.
4. Set the right price
One of the most important things for attracting car shoppers is pricing. If you’re offering financing, you MUST make sure to advertise the monthly payments on Craigslist.
For Facebook, make sure to advertise your payments. And if you really want the most bang for your marketing dollar, create a Facebook retargeting campaign and continue to advertise your inventory with monthly payments to car shoppers who have visited your website - every time they’re on Facebook or Instagram. (We’ll cover this in another post)
5. Keeping track of leads
The Craigslist car shopper closes fast! To be exact, Craigslist shoppers buy almost 13 days faster than traditional online buyers. This makes it important for your team to have a good process that gets leads to your sales manager as quickly as possible.
When car shoppers call or message you over the Craigslist ad, these leads will be instantly created in the WizPoster CRM system. After that, the system will automatically assign that lead to the right salesperson. So that you can easily keep track of them and stop losing leads.
Did you know that without an automated posting tool 2 out of 3 callers never reached a salesperson? Just think about all those potential customers and money lost.
To turn used inventory quicker you need the right tool and the right channels. The average time for which a dealer sells a car using WizPoster is 17 days.
Let us know what you think about this post by sending us a message. We’re here to help!
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