Why Autotrader competitors fail, my proposal for a new entrant

[NOACROSS 414]

(Only slightly) off topic: I was speaking to a local estate agent this morning (I know they lie) and we got on to cars etc. and what I do/where the site was- and he said ‘does anyone still advertise on Autotrader?’  I said ‘yes, loads do but not me as they’re robbing greedy bastards’..as I do. 

I then wondered about Rightmove etc. Apparently it cost them about a grand a month to advertise up to 50 properties with photos and all that similar thing to Autoraper. 

He was moaning about that!

Anyway, who owns Rightmove? I wondered if they could successfully Segway into the car market as they clearly have the brand and market share. I would have thought it wouldn’t be too difficult a thing for them to do. 

[CarSalesTamworth 0]

That’s funny, and you’re correct.

I looked at the website theme before doing this and realised it wouldn’t be too difficult to modify it to display houses rather than cars.

The problem is, I know nothing about houses plus it is a heavily regulated sector, where used car sales is not so much outside of finance.

I wonder if they’re too busy fighting off the likes of Purple Bricks.

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12 hours ago, Area 51 said:

Last two sold had buyers 145miles apart! One was around 80miles from me the other over 70miles!... So a "local area" would not have sold these two... I guess it can depend on the car/spec/colour.. as billies will travel for their choice of motor ... "local area" deals may suit billies looking for something / anything for grand or two..

just my opinion though

 

Agree, but if it's free then maybe no harm if listing simple/automated.

8 hours ago, CarSalesTamworth said:

I wonder if they’re too busy fighting off the likes of Purple Bricks.

Purple Bricks are busy making a thumping loss. Only winner at the moment is Rightmove but even they seem to be having a few profit issues

 

11 hours ago, CarSalesTamworth said:

Even with just 9 dealers on-board for many local searches we have more vehicles than Autotrader, Motors, Ebay or any other main platform. 

EVs are a case in point.

This is because not all dealers are on Autotrader, Motors, Gumtree etc. But they are all on our site. (Or they will be)

I agree that might not help so much with buyers who are 75 miles away, but for buyers who live within the Tamworth area it should work really well.

We should be the most relevant site for most used car searches on Google.

Can I check for understanding. In Google natural search your listing are achieving higher positions than Autotrader, Motors, Ebay or any other main platform, e.g. for Electric Vehicles. 

How are you quantifying this? I'm just checking for understanding.

When I googled "Toyota Prius for sale Tamworth" the results in order were Motors, VantageTamworth (main dealer), Gumtree, Newsnow, RockpointBMWspecialists, Autotrader, Autotrader, Gumtree.

In fact googling 'Car Sales Tamworth", "carsales tamworth" failed to find you? I'll admit that googling "carsalestamworth" finally worked and you took places 8-10, with this page featuring higher.

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12 hours ago, CarSalesTamworth said:

I’m not sure it needs any traffic to be worthwhile from our point of view, but I get the question. 500 visits a day would do to start.

Soft launched in December, we’re going to get to 20 dealers before we do any selling advertising space. Facebook, Google (SEO and a little PPC) and a weekly email.

As revenue increases we will spend what is needed to ensure a return.

I'm a bit confused on the model. You're going to sell advertising space to local car related businesses? Will they get viewing stats and click through data?

My guess (and happy to be proven wrong) is that they'd be better of investing in their own sites and PPC campaign optimisation?

I think the weekly email is a good idea to the local market and I could see it linking in to Facebook page of some kind.

I might sound like I'm knocking it, but I've a reasonable amount of Ecomm experience from other businesses and it's a lot more competitive than it used to be, especially with people like motors chucking cash at it just to try drive some traffic to their site. Autotrader has the brand awareness build up over 40 yrs, it takes a lot of cash/effort to overcome that (though Niching is the best way). If it's free for dealers then nothing to lose from their side.

We operate in a relatively local market and our target customers are ones who need hand holding through the purchase generally so local is better (and they are more likely to turn up)