Many industries are filled with complicated terms that are hard for people outside the field to understand, and the automotive industry may take the cake when it comes to this. It is notorious for jargon that confuses and frustrates many consumers.
Traditional online vehicle search functions only amplify this problem. The usual year, make, model, and style search forces consumers to wade through confusing names and may inadvertently eliminate many good vehicle choices. In addition, these types of searches do not allow retailers to gather valuable market intelligence regarding consumer preferences, which can help in targeted marketing. In short, traditional searches are about the vehicle, not the consumer, and are therefore stumbling blocks for many shoppers.
In the early 2000s, some automotive websites began implementing "lifestyle" searches. Named because they often depend on consumers answering a list of lifestyle questions -- questions that sought to categorize people as "sporty," or "career focused," or "family focused," for example -- these searches exposed consumers to a broader range of vehicles, but also forced them to pigeonhole themselves as a particular type of person. In addition, lifestyle searches still operate by focusing on the vehicle -- segmenting vehicle options by attributes like doors and engine size -- instead of on consumer needs.
It's time to go one step further and implement needs-based searches. These searches focus on the needs of the consumer, not on the vehicle. They are personalized and go beyond vehicle-centric options like engine size to what a consumer needs out of a vehicle. They allow consumers to search based on a number of different factors like gas mileage, available headroom, or off-road capability.
And now is the best time to implement this type of navigation. A recent independent study, commissioned by Chrome, revealed that a majority of consumers who bought or leased vehicles in the past 12 months changed vehicles because of their needs. Of particular note, 23 percent wanted better gas mileage, 8 percent needed more seating capacity, 7 percent didn't need as much capacity, 6 percent wanted more leg or headroom, and 4 percent wanted a vehicle with off-road or towing capacity. With traditional year, make, model and style searches, there is no way to help consumers find vehicles that match these needs quickly and easily.
The benefits of implementing needs-based searches
Educate consumers
Needs-based searches can expose consumers to a broad range of vehicles that may have never been on their radar. Allowing consumers to search by gas mileage, for example, may help them discover many vehicles they had not considered. Alternatively, they may learn that a vehicle they had their eyes on is not the best choice when fuel economy is a deciding factor.
Sell more new and used vehicles
Needs-based searches can also help you sell more new and used vehicles. With new vehicles, this type of search helps consumers understand which vehicle choices are available and showcases inventory that may not have previously made the consumer's short-list.
For used vehicles, this type of search helps consumers navigate what, by definition, is a limited supply, since they can only choose from what is on the market or on a preferred dealer's lot. By helping them focus in on what is really important in a vehicle, the consumer can better locate a range of vehicles that fit their needs.
Gain market insight
Needs-based searches provide the opportunity to capture valuable demographic information and information about consumers' needs. Tracking user patterns can indicate the types of vehicles that consumers are searching for and help drive stocking or ordering decisions. This information can also be used to build a better customer profile, which allows for a better consumer experience.
Enable regional-based searching
A consumer in Florida may need cooled seats, while a consumer in North Dakota may need heated seats. Needs-based searches enable this type of specificity for a competitive advantage. A website that offers quick and easy access to this type of detail will offer much more value than a website with traditional search functionality where consumers have to comb through data to find specific details.
Factors to consider before implementation
There are technology solutions available that can make implementing needs-based searches time and cost-effective. These solutions can provide all the data and delivery, but what is key is conveying a search to the consumer in a way that intuitively makes sense and that meets the end objectives of your business model. You must determine what data to present, and how to lead consumers down the right path. To do this, two steps are required: identifying if you want to enable basic or advanced searches, and determining how to structure a search so that it meets the objectives of your business model.
Enabling basic or advanced searches
Needs-based searches generally fall into two categories: basic and advanced. The more advanced you get, the more tools you will be supporting, so it is important to accurately assess your capacity. A basic search provides consumers multiple ways of filtering available vehicles.
Consumers can search by factors like price, body type, and fuel economy. These searches can also expand to include features like seating or cargo capacity and horsepower. Automotive retailers who have a broad consumer base may want to implement a basic search because they work well for both casual shoppers and for consumers who want explicit details. Vehix.com, for example, has a broad user base, so it allows consumers to search by body style (convertible, coupe, SUV), type (hybrid, luxury, compact), or by price in $10,000 increments. Consumers can also do a traditional year, make, model, and style search.
Mazda.com also has a noteworthy basic search under its Mazda Model Selector. The company provides thumbnail photos of each model on one page. As a consumer hovers over a model, the photo magnifies, while filter tools at the side of the page indicate price, seating capacity, fuel economy, and horsepower. When consumers find a good fit, they can click on the model for more details.
An advanced search would form questions around needed features so consumers wouldn't be filtering vehicles, but narrowing down choices to find a better match. Often these types of searches take the form of a survey. A good example of this type of advanced search is CarZen's CarConsult online tool.
CarConsult consists of multiple questions in the categories of needs (price, car size, usage), features (comfort, convenience, entertainment, safety), brands, traits (safety, green), and personality (classic, cutting-edge). It then returns a list of vehicles ranked by compatibility with desired attributes. In this way, CarZen streamlines the car search process and introduces consumers to vehicles they may not have previously considered.
Advanced search requires additional design consideration to convert target consumer needs to matching vehicle information. For example, you might use a scale of 1 to 5 to rank the importance of a consumer need for "powerful acceleration." You might then calculate the power-to-weight ratio of vehicles and then match the ratio ranges with each of the five points on the scale.
The challenge with an advanced search is to strike a balance between having enough parameters to be valuable, but not so many that consumers get bored or frustrated. CarZen solves this problem by offering a "Review Matches" button on every page of the survey, so consumers can get results at any step in the process.
An important point to remember when doing this is to weight the survey with the most important questions first. Advanced searches do require monitoring so they can be fine-tuned if consumers seem to be dropping out in the middle of the process.
Structuring your needs-based search
The structure of a needs-based search depends on two primary factors: your audience and your business model. You have to know who is visiting your site and what type of information they seek. Once you answer these initial questions, you can create an experience that meets their expectations.
A simple way to pose these questions is to include an online consumer survey for your website visitors. Questions could be as simple as asking what is driving them to consider a new vehicle, with multiple choice answers. Be sure to include an "other" option where consumers can write in a reason you may not have anticipated. Also, consider including some kind of incentive, such as an oil change coupon, or the chance to win a gift card to a popular local or national store, to encourage participation. Ideally, you should also use A-B testing to run two parallel versions of various pages or workflows to learn which version yields the best result or user experience.
Your business model will also help you narrow down your end objective. For example, media sites depend upon advertising revenue. They can use needs-based searches in the automotive space to introduce more website pages for advertising and to better target advertising to the consumer. Automotive buying sites want to generate high-quality vehicle leads. They can use needs-based searches to help a consumer narrow down vehicle choices so that when they submit a lead, it is better qualified. Dealerships want to sell more vehicles. They can use a needs-based search tied to their inventory to increase the number of vehicles that match consumer needs and convert leads to sales at a higher rate. A consumer who goes through the process of matching his or her needs with a particular vehicle in inventory is essentially pre-qualified before ever setting a foot on the lot. Even better, tracking the workflow of this consumer on your site and providing a summary to your sales team along with the lead gives the salesperson valuable insight into the consumer's likely vehicle preferences.
Implementing needs-based searches alongside traditional searches is an optimal way to ensure consumers can quickly and easily find the vehicle that best meets their needs. As a result, automotive sites can capture more consumer traffic and drive up look to buy ratios.
Pete Batten is general manager, Chrome Systems.
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