TRUE CAR and ZAG Cyber Bandits, Parasites or Good for the Car Business?
Jim Ziegler asks...
I am hearing a lot of discussion about True Car and ZAG. I continually scratch my head and wonder if desperate dealers are doing the marketing limbo "How Low Can You Go?"
Are we so bad at what we do that we have to line up and pay vendors to lose money? AND, who is giving these people access to your data that is used against you?
Who owns these companies and what might be their ulterior motive? Sometimes I ask questions to which I already know the answer.
Am I wrong?
What do you think... JIM
Jim Ziegler's Guidance and Recommended Action Plan:
Ten Areas We Need to Concentrate on to Bring This Monster to It's Knees...
- Government investigation of ALL Data Aggregators taking consumer information from dealers' DMS. Sadly enough, dealers who do business with TrueCar are exposed to liability charges. Cut off all access to unecessary data, no matter who takes it from the dealers DMS and make it illegal to "resell identifiable consumer data" and "transactional data".
- Educate Your Fellow Dealers; If anyone takes financial transactional data, they expose the dealer that allowed it to violations, especially if it is passed on to other vendors or shared.
- Educate Consumers to what they're doing with their information...
a. You buy a car from a dealer, do you really want your personal information, and maybe even your financial information, passed along and sold and shared by "God knows who?"
b. These People Charge the Dealer $300 which the dealers have to build into the deal
c. Your Privacy and the Security of your Information could theoretically compromise your identity if you do business a company that takes data from the dealership. - Educate Investors and potential investors they could possibly be mislead if anyone is telling them this is a safe investment because of all of the dealers pushing back, associations pushing back, and government regulators in many states coming after TrueCar's business model as NOT compliant, in some cases they're saying it is Not Legal.
- AMEX, USAA and all of their affiliates do not want the bad consumer relations this push back is creating with their members and customers.
- Cancel your dealership's Affilation with TrueCar. Tell people with TrueCar certificates that YOU don't honor TrueCar and you feel the company is NOT reputable. Educate consumers as to perceived data exposure if they buy from a TrueCar dealer. Make sure that each consumer knows that using TrueCar actually increases their vehicle cost by $300 to $400.
- Make the dealers selling at huge losses take all of those deals. Big problem right now is too many Nissan Dealers and others are taking huge losers to get the factory money. The TrueCar reverse-auction business model will continually push those numbers down until the factory money is non-existent. Consumers need to hear from many dealers, "We don't do TrueCar"
- Keep calling your National and State Dealer Associations demanding they get involved and stay involved... No excuses.
- Get the Manufacturers into the game. If GM, Ford, Toyota, and other majors change the rules about how we advertise and do business to protect the dealers, we can cut off their ability to set pricing. So keep it up at every dealer meeting. Call your Dealer Council Members and protest to your factory reps. Tell the manufacturers, if they want showroom and facility improvements, we need the ability to make fair profits.
- Tell everyone you know. Educate other dealers and industry people. Watch the Painter interviews... I believe this is the first time a vendor has publicly announced they intend to bring down the dealers and hijack our business, taking our profits and starving us out with our own data. Painter has said manufacturers and dealers should go bankrupt and he, in his God-like way "will control distribution..."
When the TrueCar-Yahoo Deal kicks in we need to stand firm and "Just Say No" we don't honor TrueCar deals.
Read this article as a reference: http://www.autonews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=%2F20110831%2FFIN...
AND, if you doubt the mission... read this... http://www.zag.com/websiteASSETS/whitepapers/ZAG-WhitePaper3.pdf
Comment
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Comment by Keith Shetterly on January 19, 2012 at 7:34am -
Just to point out that C. Kim was touting Penske's support for TrueCar. Ooops.
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Comment by Thomas A. Kelly on January 19, 2012 at 6:58am
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I would like to see this forum in mass place comments on the article Eric shared with us. Perhaps CNN will go back and set the record straight.
My comment:
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Eric....TrueCar claims sales in December '11 alone to have been over 30,000 vehicles?????
Articles like this unfortunately, is where dealer principles and owners get most of their information I suspect. Underestimating the threat and impact is something we DON"T need.
From CNNMoney article:
".......which it claims already accounts for some 2.8% of all retail auto sales. That proportion would translate to about more than 35,000 sales a year or about $10 million in revenue for Truecar."
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Comment by Keith Shetterly on January 18, 2012 at 6:35pm
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Car Research, a CRM company, takes an EXTREMELY strong dealer-protective and data-protective stance--essentially, they're first to take a strong public stand that they do NOT share data with anyone and only use the data as a dealer directs. No selling of data! No remarketing to your customers! No condescension! ON A DEALER'S SIDE RIGHT OUTTA' THE GATE FOR YEARS NOW AND STILL GOING FORWARD! WONDERFUL!!!! Here's their email announcement:
January 18, 2012
You may have recently learned that many automotive vendors and independent third party marketers have built their business model around sharing/selling your customer information. Dealerships across the country have unwittingly allowed access to their customers' most sensitive information, including but not limited to: Name, address, email, VIN, contract rate and term, as well as aftermarket products purchased. These Trojan Horse tactics are a direct assault upon your customer base and ultimately the Blue-sky of your franchise.
Imagine a competitor across town, or a public dealer group that knows virtually everything about your customer. For example, they are aware that your customer is 16 months into a 60 month contract; paying 7% interest, purchasing service and gap products. How difficult would it be to target that customer for new backend products? How grateful will your customer be when those nice people call and save them $1,500 by selling them a warranty that you could have sold? They are aware that your customer's current payment is $325 per month, with only 5 payments remaining. How grateful will your customer be when those same nice people save them $25 per month on a brand new car that you could have sold?
We challenge you to take immediate action and review your existing agreements with any vendor with access to your customer information. Question your relationship with any CRM company, Inventory Management company or Third Party Lead Provider that states they have the authority to aggregate, share or sell your information to an affiliate or third party! You should "red-flag" statements within your agreements that are similar to this actual excerpt from a CRM vendor's current Dealer Agreement:
- Customer hereby grants to (Vendor XYZ) and its Affiliates a perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free, irrevocable right and license (i) to use, copy, perform, display, distribute and modify the Performance/Transaction Data in any manner or medium, now known or hereafter developed, for (Vendor XYZ) and its Affiliates' business purposes, and (ii) to prepare statistical analyses based on such Performance/Transaction Data ("Statistical Data"), which (Vendor XYZ) and its Affiliates may use to improve their services and may combine with other similar data from other customers and disseminate and otherwise use in aggregate form.
We want you to know that CAR-Research XRM has not, and will not, share, sell or trade your private customer data, short of a government subpoena, or with your consent. CAR-Research XRM guarantees that your data is safe and will only be used (in conjunction with your efforts) to help you sell cars!
In closing, your bottom line, and ultimately Blue-sky, is being impacted everyday that you elect to share your proprietary information with the world. Take action today and contact CAR-Research XRM to discuss our Data Safeguard Guarantee. For 17 years and counting, we are the Gold Standard in the CRM industry.
Patrick Kelly
President and COO
CAR-Research XRM
www.car-research.com
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As of 10 minutes ago....using "below invoice" in Michigan
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Comment by Randy Fry on January 18, 2012 at 8:20am
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everyone going to NADA in Vegas needs to look Painter and gang up and buy them a (few too many) drinks and let nature take its course.........
just sayin.........
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Comment by Stanley Esposito on January 18, 2012 at 7:59am
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I went to check out the truecar site to see if there are any changes. On the bottom of the sreen is a testimonial:
"I saved $3,850"
Wade Scheckla says,
"I found prices that were actually less expensive than used cars that we were looking at. The deal we got through TrueCar was $3850 below invoice. I will never buy a another new car any other way other than TrueCar.com. It's the only way to buy a new car
I thought they were taking "invoice" out of the equation? Why is anyone dealing with these people? They are just trying to hang on long enough to grab as much $ they can. I hope all of you keep the pressure on these guys!
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Mr. Kim spewing hatred for the dealer community, ADM members and followers....while his marketing team does a disingenuous, public suck up to regulators and dealers certainly does TC no good....so I say let him spew!......and most importantly, we make sure the dealer principals and owners understand the hatred that is directed towards them by these life sucking characters.
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Comment by James Easter on January 17, 2012 at 4:21pm
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My comments on the Automotive News survey that I completed regarding TrueCar:
"Their policies & company statements have done nothing but make the car-purchasing experience for the consumer more difficult, in addition to working against the very dealers who make them even able to EXIST in the first place. This business model serves nobody's best interest, except TrueCar themselves - it just serves to tear down everything that great dealers stand for on a daily basis - and that is to sell & service our clients in an exceptional way on every visit, with utmost integrity!"
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Comment by James A. Ziegler on January 17, 2012 at 11:26am
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Scott Painter, Charles Kim and Staff of TrueCar greet Car Dealers at the NADA Convention in Las Vegas.... actual video
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