Cox Automotive is making a major play to digitize the entire car-buying process by redefining automotive retailing with its subsidiary MakeMyDeal and subsequently launched Digital Retailing solution.
MakeMyDeal offers an innovative communication platform that provides a forum for dealers and consumers to structure the terms of a deal entirely online, said Mike Burgiss, vice president of digital retailing at Cox Automotive and founder of MakeMyDeal.
MakeMyDeal, first launched in December 2013, and the beta platform became available in June 2014. In March 2016, Cox Automotive brought together Dealertrack, Dealer.com, and MakeMyDeal to deliver a new Digital Retailing solution. In combining these products, the consumer can now not only start and agree to their deal terms online, but also transition to in-store to finalize the deal, according to a company press release.
The Digital Retailing solution — which integrates MakeMyDeal into Dealertrack’s secure credit application and sales and F&I portal — is essentially like the PayPal for automotive and provides a “consumer-facing, trusted experience,” Burgiss told Auto Finance News yesterday.
The digitized platform helps dealers stay in control of the deal structure, while also giving more control over the terms to the consumers to keep them engaged throughout the purchase process, pushing them towards the final “yes,” Burgiss added.
Through the platform, consumers are able to begin structuring a deal by visiting the dealership’s website and immediately personalizing the deal using the self-penciling experience, Burgiss said. Borrowers can then input the purchase price offer, their credit tier, desired length of term for financing, down payment amount, and more. The deal can then be worked in-store by dealership personnel through the sales and F&I portal, the Digital Retailing Showroom app, and with CRMs.
“The extension of this process allows it to be more transparent, while maintaining the dealership at the center,” Jason Barrie, vice president of market performance and F&I solutions at Dealertrack Technologies, told AFN.
Currently, 2,600 dealers are utilizing this self-penciling tool, “plus an additional 1,300 that take credit apps only on the website,” Burgiss said. The digitized platform can also bring in between 20 and 50 or 60 opportunities to sell per month, he said, depending on how well the dealer process can handle these opportunities.
Atlanta-based Cox Automotive brands already include Manheim, Autotrader, Kelley Blue Book, vAuto, Xtime, NextGear Capital and more.
