If you’re like most dealers, you manage multiple third-party lead providers. Those providers probably all promise you the moon and the stars. You hear things like: More quality leads than anybody else! More closed sales! The best ROI in the business! There are great providers out there who live up to their promises, but you have to be able to identify those high-performers to quit throwing money away on bad ad spends. That requires data analytics. 

Buerkle Honda, part of the Buerkle Automotive Group in Minneapolis, Minn., recently came to this realization. The dealership was facing low closing rates on Internet leads and an inability to track phone ups back to a lead provider. “Like a lot of dealers, our ad spend was based on gut instinct,” explains General Manager Dudley Peterson. “But that wasn’t helping us identify which providers were actually driving sales. We had to take a look at our data.”

The dealership needed a platform that could pull data from its DMS, CRM, dealer portal (for phone call info), and Google Analytics, and analyze the overall performance of both the Internet and phone sales channels. 

With a platform in place (the dealership chose FrogData for its real-time analysis and side-by-side provider comparisons), Buerkle got a shock. An investment of $20,000 a quarter to a leading provider turned out to net only two quarterly sales. “I couldn’t believe how bad the results were,” says Peterson. “We quickly cut that provider and put that money towards providers with proven results.”

Before you think a situation like this could never happen to your dealership, keep in mind that Buerkle wasn’t capturing phone-ups in its CRM. This is a common problem for a lot of stores out there, and one that makes it impossible to get an accurate tally of how calls convert to sales. 

Once Buerkle was able to connect phone call data with the leads and sales in its CRM and DMS, it could see how many calls ended in a sale. This provided a complete picture of the overall efficiency of each lead provider. This in turn provided clarity in the overall cost per lead and ROI from every lead provider. 

The confidence of knowing actual versus “perceived” performance for each provider allowed the dealership to sever ties with underperformers and reallocate that money. Buerkle also decided to invest in a BDC to further improve the profitability of Internet sales by improving closing ratios. 

“Now we’re looking at our data in a very different way,” explains Peterson. “With all the information on one platform, it’s easy to analyze and make decisions that are backed by data and insights instead of just gut instinct.”  

There are many dealers like Buerkle who have seen outstanding returns on their data analytics platform investment. These dealers consistently monitor performance and adjust their ad spend to align with their needs and goals. 

Don’t let your gut instincts cost you money.  By learning how data analytics can help you hone in on your best lead providers, you can see similar results to Buerkle and get the most ROI out of every ad spend.