For better or worse, the internet has become an indispensable appendage in our every day lives. Many of us would rather spend every minute glued to the web than have to face the wild west of the disconnected world our forbears suffered through. Why bother dressing up nice, showering, wrestling with flossing and brushing, when you can pop on some pjs and surf the web from the comfort of your home? Sites like Amazon have pampered us with an all-inclusive shopping experience, offering anything from a to z.

Car buyers go online

The online market continues to grow in the wake of the millennial shift. Online purchases have increased from 3% to 10% of total retail sales since 2008, and project to continue to grow at similar pace in the coming years (US Census). This trend extends to the automotive market, where the average number of dealerships visited has decreased from 5 to 1.6 in the past decade as customers spend more time researching online and less time window shopping in dealerships (McKinsey 2014). Why waste time skipping from dealer to dealer when all the information you need is sitting a search away? According to an Accenture study, car buyers value saving time as much as saving money, and are willing to drop a little more change for a more fluid experience.

The missing piece

Like all new things, there are some kinks that still need to be ironed out. While less dealerships are being visited, millennial customers are visiting the dealership they purchase their vehicle at more times during the shopping process than their less digitally inclined counterparts (Accenture). The online experience is not servicing all components of the customer-dealer relationship. Where are we falling short? For one, the internet can make us forget how important it is to listen to others. Customers shopping in the United States highly value salespeople who demonstrate attentive listening, nearly twice as much as customers sampled in China (Accenture). Most online dealer services only offer text chat, hardly the face to face sales we are used to.

Marrying online and offline – The lesson for Dealerships

How can we work towards the old time comfort of face-to-face interaction with the modern appeal of comfort, convenience, and speed? While many dealerships have already started offering web chat on their websites, tools like uShare.to which also offer video and voice chat for the website let you retain the impact of in-person car sales even in the web environment. Moreover, tools like uShare.to go beyond the initial interaction, and simplify the entire sales cycle. You can easily involve other stakeholders in the conversation – need a quote from your sales manager? Need to bring in a banker to finish the deal? Simply add them to the online conversation without anyone having to dance around busy schedules or to drive over to the dealership. Why bother bouncing around from email to web platform to in person conversation when you can host the entire process through uShare.to. And don’t forget about after sales support – have an issue or question about their new purchase? Your customers can connect right away to your agents through video chat, easy peasy. The customer is never forced to visit the dealership during the sale process – they only have to show up when they need to give their shiny plaything a spin, collect the keys, or drop in for the occasional servicing.

If the technology to improve customer experience exists, why isn’t it implemented? Ignorance and convenience prevents the implementation of new systems in favor of the way it has always been done – if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Did you know over 75% of medical communications are still done over fax (Vox)? Many new technologies are too daunting to try to implement, and a whole system overhaul often simply isn’t feasible. Tools like uShareto bridge the technology intimidation with a focus on customer experience, and fit right into your existing processes and technology.