By: Earl Brown, Autofusion (2023)
We think commercial vehicle sales are long overdue for a disruption, and it appears that the people who buy those vehicles tend to agree. Commercial vehicle shoppers have (so far) been left behind in the race to streamline sales digital processes and move towards more modern retailing systems. At the end of the day, these buyers want a solution that helps them eliminate guesswork and save time.
Whether it’s a small business looking to build a simple work truck with snowplow or fifth wheel capability, or a regional home service brand looking to update their aging fleet of heavy-duty work trucks and specialized cargo vans, these buyers all want to be able to find exactly the right vehicle for their needs, without having to become subject matter experts on a complicated 400-page commercial ordering guide.
As you probably already know, these buyers are self-sufficient and busy, they want a turnkey, point-and-click shopping experience that helps them get the right vehicle for their jobsite without diverting too much of their time and energy from the business at hand. In a survey of commercial truck buyers by Modern Work-Truck Solutions Magazine, they cited dealers online research and informational capabilities as being cumbersome and opaque, or altogether nonexistent.
• Commercial buyers want dealers to help them find relevant information efficiently. They don’t want to deal with roadblocks in the sales processes, like confusing pdf order guides loaded with unfamiliar nomenclature, hard to understand build logic, and vague pricing information.
• They want to be able to research and spec models and options in an accurate and easy-to understand way. These shoppers need to be able to visualize and understand the various body styles, features, options, and added equipment you offer, to determine what is a good fit for their vocational needs.
Continuing to offer an analog-only sales process will unnecessarily create friction points that separate your commercial shoppers from the resolution they are seeking, which will only serve (in the long run) to cost you significant opportunities. Instead, you may want to consider partnering with a data-driven automotive software developer, like Autofusion, to build the perfect end-to-end online shopping experience for your busy work-truck shoppers.
Autofusion already leads the Retail “build & price” revolution and has been hard at work building stunning and effective commercial-grade lead platforms for Ford Pro, E-Series, Super Duty, Transit Van, and Mercedes-Benz Sprinter dealers. We’ve learned in the process that these buyers care as much about getting accurate information and saving time as they care about getting the right vehicle for the job. Not only are these shoppers using our tools to research the vehicles, options, and configurations, but they are using them to place legitimate pre-orders with the dealer.
It’s a simple, but powerful, value proposition for any dealer who’s doing even a modest amount of commercial business. Some of the most obvious benefits of Autofusion’s commercial vehicle ‘Custom Order Tool’ include:
• Ability to presell inventory, lower inventory turnover rates and floor-plan costs.
• More effective merchandising that builds value and protects your profit margins.
• A more engaging and value-driven customer experience, delivering better conversions.
• Spec legitimate factory orders, without pushing your shoppers to the OEM site.
For the dealer and the buyer, the process couldn’t be more turn-key, by the time your commercial shoppers are done building their vehicle on your website, the only thing left to do is to confirm and submit the order to the factory, then finish the paperwork. It’s that easy!
We build your dealership’s custom product configurator to be highly engaging, fun for the shopper, factory accurate, loaded with important and educational merchandising content, and easy to use on any device. You get a perfectly designed customer journey, and the shopper gets everything they need to make a decision, in a way that makes them much more likely to convert than if you just dropped them off at the SRP and hoped for the best.
Learn more about this game-changing software and schedule your demo today, or contact our Sales team at 1-800-410-7354 or sales@autofusion.com to get these big wheels turning!
