How often do you consult user reviews when making a purchasing decision?
Fact of the matter is consumer reviews and star ratings are increasingly influential when consumers are researching and comparing goods and services online. And that’s especially the case when it comes to areas such as car dealerships.
Now, car dealers Australia wide can champion their online business reputation on carsales.com.au to better engage and influence on-site car shoppers, and help generate more views and enquiries on their inventory.
In partnership with specialist review platform Podium, carsales will now display dealers’ aggregated star rating of customer reviews from platforms including Google, Facebook and Product Review alongside their inventory listed for sale.
Over 400 Australian car dealers currently manage their online business reputation via Podium. These dealers with a Podium account can now activate the carsales integration via the AutoGate store.
“Our new Dealer Reviews feature allows dealers to present their star ratings and online reputation to Australia’s largest and most engaged audience of car buyers,” explains says Ryan Svaghi, Product and UX Director at carsales.
“With consumers doing more online research than ever, the enhancement will help dealers stand out from the crowd. Above all, consumer ratings build confidence that car buyers are choosing a reputable and customer-focused business to buy from,” Svaghi stated.
The new carsales dealer review product aggregates a star rating, which then appears against the dealers listings, on both search results and details page. Consumers must be logged in as a carsales member in order to see a dealer’s star rating on a listing.
A further benefit of Dealer Reviews is that dealers can encourage customers to post review and share their experience. Via Podium’s integration with carsales’ AutoGate Inventory and Prospect Management system, Dealer Reviews enables dealers to automate review invitations from verified consumers, who have placed a sales enquiry or purchased a vehicle.
“With quick, easy and seamless integration with AutoGate, Dealer Reviews gives dealers the ability to easily manage reviews, automate invitations and grow the number of reviews from actual customers,” says Svaghi.
“A high star rating aggregated from a large number of reviews will highlight the quality of your business, staff and inventory you’re selling. It gives consumers more confidence that you’re the best place to buy from,” he adds.
The release of Dealer Reviews comes off the back of the success of ‘Buy from home’ feature introduced in April. Designed to give more clarity to carsales car shoppers around dealers that can facilitate an end-to-end online purchase, ‘Buy from Home’ is one of a suite of innovations carsales has rolled out in 2020.
For more information about how you can highlight your business’ reputation and influence on-site behaviour, click here.
To better understand the power of online reviews and reputation to generate better business outcomes, join Podium for a special webinar presentation for Australian car dealers.
Podium presents:
Key topics include:
– Why online reviews matter to your dealership
– How to use online reviews to climb up local search rankings
– Tips and tricks proved to help businesses collect 100s of new reviews
– Verified reviews through integration with carsales.com.au
