Just a FYI for some of the dates on eBay Motors changes recently announced.

May want to check out this conference.  I will be in attendance so if any customers want a free beer, let’s meet up.  Track me down, call your sales director, or 972-715-8600 and we’ll make it happen.

4th Digital Dealer Conference and Exposition
Orlando, FL
Gaylord Palms Resort & Convention Center
April 21-23

Day One
NADA convention and expo is a site to be seen.  If you are a franchise dealer or employee and have never attended, then you need to go or beg your dealership owner to go.  It is the coolest convention ever put on (especially in the car business).  This is 750,000 sq ft of exhibitors and over 20,000 dealers in attendance.  You gotta see it.  This is where vendors pull out the stops.

Ran into Rob Chesney, Vice President eBay Motors.  He has led eBay Motors for many years and done an incredible job.  We talked about all the publicity AutoRevo has been getting over the last few months.  Rob likes our blog (especially since we post eBay Motors information and training for dealers).

I met with CARFAX today and talked about the boring stuff, like all the stuff AutoRevo has implemented on their behalf to benefit our dealers, but looks like there is more to come.  They have a very cool new integration where we can dynamically generate CARFAX information on your stickers.  This is cool, because it can be done on the fly by the application and give a VHR overview of that specific car.  Very cool, I’ll talk to the CTO about that.

Next I met with CapOne Auto Finance.  Nothing really new there.  More talk about the finance market, blah, blah, blah, but there was one cool item.  They are focusing this year on maximizing the partnerships and dealers they already have in place.  Why is that cool for dealers?  For the first time they are maximizing their leads from existing sources instead of grabbing new market share.  I offered up integration of payment calculators, extended CapOne integration, and better placement of their ads.  All of those seem to be in the works, but with any big juggernaut it takes time.

Who caught my attention? OneCommand.  They had an 8ft LCD screen pointed right down a main aisle and a booth that was hoppin’.  Looks like they had every employee in the booth, but it was a good approach.  Loud colors, marquee lights like at an arena sporting event, lots of screens to demo the product, and most importantly getting people in the booth.

Day Two
If you have ever walked 750,000 sq ft of non-padded carpet at a convention you know the definition of “stiff”.  I should have bought a pedometer to see how far I walked.  Basically, I went into each area of the show, started on one side, and walked EVERY aisle.  To this day it still amazes me what it takes to run a dealership: from flooring in a service shop to sophisticated inventory management software.

I met with DealerTrack and Chrome Systems this afternoon.  They provide us the great data for our VIN decodes.  Chrome is an industry leading provider of automotive data and they have even done a case study on AutoRevo for our extended integration of their product(s).  We talked about vehicle videos and new car configurator so stay tuned for some possible future projects on theses products.

Later that day a strategic partner of AutoRevo brought me into their booth to do a demo for a big dealer group that went very well.  They absolutely need our product and the integration with this partner makes it a slam dunk.  We’ll see.

Now it was time to party!  DealerTrack puts on a party of all parties at NADA every year.  This year was no different.  They rented out a 3-story club in the heart of San Francisco and the place was packed with dealers and fun music.  Getting to spend time with partners, vendors, customers, and friends in the car business outside of work is invaluable.  I love getting to know people and this was the perfect opportunity.

Day Three
Nearing the end of the show I had a few last minute introductions I needed to get to.  I was able to catch-up with Curtis Kroeker, Director of Vehicles at eBay Motors.  Lots of talk about Local Market, but a better conversation was on eBay Stores for dealers.  They have done several experiments with dealers and eBay Stores.  The results are that it definitely works.  Done properly and optimized for search indexes the traffic to the dealers store and inventory really increases.  We have done our own test at AutoRevo with similar success.  We’ll see if we can make this into a viable option for dealers over time.

Overall this was a great NADA show.  It was a success for AutoRevo to continue in building relationships and meeting new dealers.  I’m already looking forward to next year!

eBay Motors is running a special beginning at midnight on February 9th, 2008 thru February 10th, 2008 at midnight where insertion fees will be $1 for passenger vehicles.  That’s right a buck, but the Final Valuation Fee will be $109.  That means if the consumer purchases the car on eBay your account will be billed $109 on that sale.

eBay is experimenting with lots of pricing promotions right now, but this may be a good one to take advantage of.

Good luck!

I don’t know about you, but when I read the news of new eBay pricing I was confused and needed a BIG spreadsheet to figure it all out.  I’ve talked to the groups at eBay to get a better definition as it relates to eBay Motors and our dealers.  Here are my findings:

1. Insertion Fees and Final Valuation Fees (FVF) are not changed [for now].
2. DSR is important!  What is DSR?  Detailed Seller Rating is now a critical factor in getting fee discounts on eBay Motors.  For dealers it is an average rating of your “item as described” and “communication” scores.  Buyers can rate you on a scale of 1 to 5 on these two areas.  Then the average of these 2 scores makes up your DSR.  If you get to a 4.6 average, that quailifies your dealership for a 5% discount on FVF.  If you get a 4.8 average or higher, that qualifies for a 15% discount on FVF.
3. Discounts are applied to Final Valuation Fees (FVF).  For eBay Motors there are many deals that get done after the listing ends so I don’t know how much of an impact this will have on a dealer’s bill.  Although, many car dealers use the “Buy It Now” (BIN) so this could have a solid impact for those.
4. DSR score averages are calculated on the current 30 days and not the lifetime of the eBay account.
5. It is important to only sell vehicles on your eBayID because otherwise the DSR will include “Timely Shipping” and “Shipping and Handling Charges” for buyers to rate.  Auto Transport has been excluded for dealers since typically the buyer arranges shipping and costs.
6. eBay feedback rating is now calculated on the current 12 month period and not the lifetime of the eBay account.  Depending on how your last 12 months have gone with eBay buyers this could be a good thing.
7. The discounts begin taking effect February 20, 2008 for listings posted after mid-night.

Overall, I still have a few questions, but this should give you a reasonable outline of the changes being made.

Here is a link to the Seller Update announcement on eBay.
Here is an overview of the Details Seller Rating.

Lots of new categories on eBayMotors.com, so I wanted to give you just a quick hit post with information.

New Categories

• Buick Enclave
• Infiniti EX
• Lincoln MKX
• Mazda CX-9
• Mitsubishi Endeavor
• Mitsubishi Evolution
• Mitsubishi Outlander
• Nissan Rouge
• Pontiac G8
• Saturn Astra
• Scion xD
• Subaru Baja
• Subaru WRX
• Volkswagon EOS