Search behaviour review – July 2020

Robust car-shopping activity continued in July on carsales.com.au – Australia’s #1 for cars.

According to carsales’ internal data, Australian car-shoppers undertook 32.5 million sessions in July 2020, up 20% on the same month last year.

A total of 81.9 million detailed views of inventory were undertaken, an increase of 34% on the same month last year, and buyers were highly engaged. They spent an average of 7 minutes and 26 seconds per session.

So with buyers out in force, what brands, models and segments were Australian consumers searching the most across new and used inventory?

And what was on their minds outside of normal search options?

Dive into our July search behaviour review below for the answers to those questions and more.

Consumer interest in prestige car brands continues

In July 2020, Mercedes-Benz generated the largest view volume increase on new inventory on carsales.com.au, up 288,000 views or 38%, compared to July 2019. Closely following Mercedes-Benz were principal rivals, Audi and BMW.

Mitsubishi and Ford completed the top five (in view volume increase), with both brands fueled by the ongoing success of their rugged Triton and Ranger utes. The popular LCVs were the two most-searched new vehicles for the month, with rivals Toyota HiLux, Volkswagen Amarok, Nissan Navara, Isuzu UTE D-Max, Mazda BT-50 all featuring in the top 20.

Sedans are still popular in the used arena

The Toyota LandCruiser continues to reign supreme as Australia’s most-searched used car. July 2020 was dominated by searches for SUVs and LCVs, with the Toyota HiLux, Ford Ranger, Nissan Navara, Mitsubishi Triton all featuring prominently.

While consumer interest and sales of brand new sedans continue to fall and some OEMs abandon the segment altogether, Aussie-made family-favourites such as the Holden Commodore, Toyota Camry and Ford Falcon continue to find favour with used car shoppers.

Holden and Toyota generated the biggest increase in view volume in July, up 54,000 and 25,000 respectively. Holden was boosted by continued interest in pre-loved Commodores, with the family-favourite up 46,000 views in the month.

The Mazda2 was another big mover, up 17,000 views compared to June, potentially fuelled by the influx of first-time buyers and new license holders visiting carsales.com.au seeking safe, reliable and affordable motoring. 

New body styles enter top 10

Surprisingly, often-forgotten body styles such as ‘Wagon’ and ‘Convertible’ entered the top 10 most searched keywords in July.

While the wagon body style now lives in the shadow of SUV, convertibles may increase in demand over the back half of 2020 as road trips and domestic travel become the new holiday normal.

However, consumer preference for go-anywhere SUVs was still evident with ‘4X4’ and ‘4WD’ ranking highly.