Each quarter, the Cox Automotive Industry Insights team surveys U.S. automobile dealers, both franchised and independent, in an effort to measure how they are feeling about the auto business and vehicle sales, both new and used. It's called the Cox Automotive Dealer Sentiment Index (CADSI) and it focuses on both current market conditions and prospects for the coming three months. 

In Their research, Cox found that a large majority of dealers are nervous for summer sales. The optimism found in the first quarter, is no longer there.

Cox Automotive Chief Economist Jonathan Smoke says it's one of the main take aways from the quarter 2 survey, "The biggest concern coming from this quarter’s survey is that expectations for the market moving into the summer have diminished substantially."

In Q1, 70 percent of dealers were extremely optimistic about future months, now only 56 percent of dealers feel that way.

So what is holding dealers back from thinking positively about the future months? Well there are a few reasons. 

1. Market Conditions
2. Limited Inventory
3. Credit Availability for Consumers
4. Competition 
5. Expenses

The good news, however, is that current (Q2) market attitude is fairly positive. 

What are your thoughts on Q2, and feelings coming into Q3?

WATERBURY, VT - Wizely, a digital marketing company focused on the intersection of advertising, analytics & product development, is launching today at the CMO Digital Insight Summit in Sarasota, Florida. 

Wizely is founded by automotive industry veteran and product innovator James Grace, whose previous successes include include patenting time-shift radio (“TiVo”) in vehicles for Cadillac, developing the precursor to Apple’s “CarPlay” functionality for Chevrolet and developing Dealer.com's big-data based nGauge & Attribution analytics products.

“Someone once told me that wisdom is knowledge put into practice and Wizely is being founded on that principle,” said Grace. “It’s one thing to know about the latest trends, buzzwords and technologies but it’s another thing entirely to turn that knowledge into products and services that make an impact.”

Wizley will focus on two critical areas where businesses tend to struggle; strategic product planning and people-based digital marketing. 

Unlike traditional marketing approaches that target audience segments or device groups, people-based marketing techniques target actual people.

Wizely Consulting Services will help companies develop solid product roadmaps and integrate analytics and data into their product and go-to-market strategies. Wizely Digital Marketing Services will help clients use data and analytics to develop truly targeted marketing and advertising campaigns using people-based marketing techniques rather than “spray and pray” approaches.

“For years I have been talking about the quality gap phenomenon where measures like impressions, visits, and spend increase substantially year-over-year while conversions, revenue and profit show much less dramatic increases,” said Grace. “Wizely will help clients address this quality gap in their products, services and advertising.”

The founding of Wizely builds on Grace’s history of thought leadership and innovation in the automotive industry.

“James has been a really valuable part of our RampUp thought leadership events.” said Natalie Salser, Director of Customer Advocacy at LiveRamp. “He is launching Wizely at precisely the right moment when so many businesses are struggling to put people-based marketing techniques into practice.”

The team behind Wizely has ambitious goals for the company, including a people-based marketing product to be released toward the end of 2018.

About Wizely

Wizely was founded on the principle that quality and results matter and that our clients shouldn’t have to choose between state-of-the-art ideas and impacting their business in measurable ways they understand.

Wizely is about putting knowledge, experience, and capability into practice to benefit our clients. Delivering amazing results and having a great time doing it are core to our DNA.  Visit us at Wizelydigital.com

We are rounding out the top five forum posts for May 2018.

To create this list we take many things into account including the amount of views, and the amount of interaction in the comment section.

May 2018 Top Forum Posts 

What Project Management Software Do You Use?

Posted by Jordan Scott, Digital Marketing Director of the Davis Automotive group.

Amazed at all the options available for Management Software, Scott asked the DrivingSales community which are best and why.

Check out what the community has to say here.

Anonymous Reviews Disappearing From Google?

Posted by Andrew James, Digital Marketing Manager for DrivingSales.

Intrigued by google disabling anonymous reviews online, James asked the community if this will be beneficial in the long run.

What do you think? Add to the discussion here.

Managers Confirm Appointments?

Posted by Derrick Woolfson, a Business Development Manager.

Woolfson asks if it's worth it or not for managers to confirm appointments.

Have an opinion on the matter? Click here!

Taking Development Seriously

Posted by Brandin Wilkinson, Presient/Owner of Woodworth Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram Ltd.

Wilkinson states that personal development is something dealerships don't take seriously enough.

Do you agree? Join the conversation here.

Autonomous Car Testing Doesn't Seem to be Going so Great

Posted by Sherri Riggs, Community Manager at DrivingSales.

After researching how many autonomous car crashes there have been, I realized we are farther away from autonomous vehicles being the norm than I thought.

Add your thoughts on AV's here.

If your dealership isn’t implementing live video into your social media strategy, you should rethink that.

A new study by IBM and BrandLive shows by that by 2020, 82 percent of all internet traffic will be video based, and a growing percentage of that video traffic will be live video (like facebook live, instagram live, etc.)

According to their study, viewers stay tuned in eight-times longer when watching live video compared to on-demand video. On top of that, of the two hundred companies involved with this study, 25 percent stated live content is more of a top priority for them in 2018 than on-demand content. And nearly 95 percent say in general, sharing and using live video will be an important part of their marketing strategy.

There a few ways to go live on social media. The most popular are through Facebook and Instagram.

How to Go Live on Facebook:

1. Go to the homepage of the account you want to go live from (It can be a personal page or company page)

2. On the left hand side of your screen, under your company name or personal name, you will see a button that either says “Post” or “Publish”

3. From there you will get a handful of options in a drop down menu, choose “Live Video”

4. You will get a screen that says “Tap to add a description”, there you can describe what your live video is about

5. Now look for the button at the bottom of the screen that will start the live video.

How to Go Live on Instagram:

1. Go to your home page

2. Swipe your screen to the right

3. On the bottom of the screen you will see multiple options, choose “Live”

4. Follow the prompts to “Start Live Video”

For ideas on live content, or reasons for your dealership to go live on social media, click here.

Test driving can be a pain in the butt for the customer. Test Drives can take hours out of their day, they have to travel to get to the dealership, and has potential to be socially uncomfortable as well.

But one dealership, who spoke with DrivingSales News, is trying something that they think will change the game of test drives completely.

Koch Lincoln of Alberta calls their new web feature ‘On-Demand Test-Drives’ and It gives the customer the opportunity to test drive their vehicle of choice from home.

Here’s how it works:

1. Customer goes online and orders a vehicle they want to test drive

2. A product expert delivers the car straight to the customers home

3. The customers gets to test drive the vehicle for 48-hours and returns at the end

Les Koch, Director of Sales for Lincoln Koch says they are always thinking of new ways to give buyers the ‘wow-factor’, “It is important that every touch-point of our business is personalized, professional, friendly, and helpful. No matter what part of the purchase journey the customer is on, they will be treated like a VIP.”

Their ‘on-demand test-drives’ are so new, they haven’t had a chance to gather any feedback from customers, but expect it will be well received.

From an outside perspective, this seems like it could be a risky move, but has potential to have a large payout.

What do you think - Is this something you would try?

What are concerns you’d have doing this at your own dealerships?

(To learn more about this dealerships innovative feature, click here.)

The automotive industry in Canada is changing and adapting quickly to new technology. This will affect how your company does business there, BUT the Canadian Dealer Forum will help you through the growing pains.

To sign up, click here!

To read about the Automotive Tech Revolution, click here .

Improving technology in the automotive sector is at the forefront of the Canadian Automotive Industry’s mind.

In a report titled “Drive To Win” Mr. Réal Ray Tanguay, Automotive Advisor to the Federal Minister of Innovation, Science, and Economic Development of Canada, outlines Canada’s “Technology Roadmap”.

The Roadmap has 5 aspects to it, which Tanguay says are disruptive, but will help Canada in the long run, “Major advances to both products and manufacturing processes are accelerating innovation throughout the auto industry...These technological advancements will present new business models and opportunities”.

Maturing Powertrain Technologies

This revolves around battery and fuel-cell electric vehicles and how they offer higher energy efficiency, lower emissions, greater energy diversity, and new vehicle designs.

Lightweight Materials

Canada is focusing on stronger lighter materials to help reduce vehicle weight without sacrificing passenger safety.

Rapid Advances in Connected Vehicles

Connected vehicles come in two categories: vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V).

With this new technology cars will precisely know where every other car is on the road.

Shifts in Mobility Preferences

Mobility preferences refer to “pay-per-use” transit instead of owning a car.

Canada is seeing more and more young people (50% of generation Y) move towards this model of mobility, and are working to create revenue around it.

Emergence of Autonomous Vehicles

Similar to what is happening in the United States, Canada is working on how to regulate, test, and make autonomous vehicles the norm.

The question isn't if it will happen, but when?

To join a discussion and learn more about the future of the Canadian Automotive Industry and what it means for your company, click here.

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Trust is one of the most powerful human emotions. We are biologically wired to make our decisions based on trust. It has never been more important to the auto industry than now as it transitions from pure sales and service to autonomy, mobility services and electrification.

The second annual AMCI “Trusted Automotive Brand Study®” again confirmed that trust accounts for more than 50% of a consumer’s decision to repurchase or recommend an automotive brand.

While we saw an erosion of trust in the 2018 study, particularly among luxury brands and with both luxury and non-luxury dealers, some brands have made great strides. The recipients of AMCI’s 2018 Trusted Automotive Brand Study® awards are:

MOST TRUSTED LUXURY – Genesis, INFINITI, Tesla

MOST IMPROVED LUXURY – Acura, INFINITI, Mercedes-Benz

MOST TRUSTED NON-LUXURY – Chevrolet, GMC, Kia

MOST IMPROVED NON-LUXURY – Chevrolet, Honda, Volkswagen

This is the second year both Genesis and Kia have been industry trust leaders. These and other young brands are setting the standard. Chevrolet’s performance in 2018 shows that large, established brands who focus on trust can really achieve great results.

“We are very pleased to see more automotive brands focusing on trust but there is a lot more work to be done. The top automotive brands Trust Indices are still below 50 on a 100 point scale and lag behind many other familiar consumer product and retail categories,” said Dave White, President, AMCI Inside.

For further information contact: Ian Beavis, Chief Strategy Officer, AMCI Global, ph: 714-813-6300, email: ibeavis@amciglobal.com.

About the Trusted Automotive Brand Study

In January 2018, AMCI conducted its 2nd annual Trusted Automotive Brand Study (TABS). The study was executed in collaboration with C Space, a global customer agency. A nationally representative sample of 2,500 owners across 34 brands participated in the study.

About AMCI Global

AMCI is a leading global automotive marketing agency committed to serving every part of this vibrant industry and creating advocates for automotive brands. Founded in 1984, AMCI has grown to include three distinct practices: AMCI Live, dedicated to consumer and industry product activations and events; AMCI Testing, focused on using the latest technology and methods to evaluate and compare all aspects of automotive products; and AMCI Inside, devoted to working with dealerships to employ best practices and improve the customer experience. With over 15 million consumer drive experiences in the last 10 years alone, as well as thousands of dealerships all over the world to improve the customer experience, AMCI works with every major automotive brand across the globe.

Headquartered in Los Angeles, AMCI has offices in Detroit, Atlanta, Nashville, Dallas, London and Beijing. Discover AMCI at https://amciglobal.com/ or follow us on Twitter at @AMCIGlobal. AMCI is part of the Omnicom Group Inc.

About C Space

C Space is a global customer agency that marries art and science to create rapid customer insight and business change. C Space works with some of the world’s best known brands – like Walmart, Samsung, IKEA and more – to build customers into the ways companies work and deliver on “Customer Inspired Growth.” By building real, ongoing relationships with customers – online and in-person – brands can stay relevant, deliver superior experiences, launch successful products and build loyalty. C Space’s customized programs are tailored based on specific business needs and include private online communities, immersive storytelling, data & analytics, activation events, innovation projects and business consulting.

Headquartered in Boston, London and Shanghai, C Space also has offices in New York, San Francisco and Mexico City. To learn more, visit www.cspace.com or follow us on Twitter @CSpaceGlobal. C Space is a part of the Omnicom Group Inc.

Contacts

AMCI Global
Ian Beavis, Chief Strategy Officer
714-813-6300
ibeavis@amciglobal.com