Autotrader - Where it's going wrong

I make no secret of my current disliking for the Trader Media Group. Here is the body of the e-mail I recently sent to their sales director:

Who are Autotrader to me?

I should add that I am referring to the digital side of the business, not the magazine.

From what you said to me earlier, I believe some of your colleagues may have lost sight of the pure essence of the company. Essentially you are the means in which I broadcast the cars I have to sell to the public at large. You own nothing more than a domain, some servers and what appears to be a patented search system.

This facility is available to me from a number of your competitors, eBay, motors, carmony, vcars, pistonheads to name but a few.

Where you have an advantage is your branding, your heritage and your technical superiority. This was important to me when I chose your company as a partner for me in 2007 when I started my business.

Where has it gone wrong?

The catalyst for much of my unhappiness comes from a lack of an Autotrader representative for a period of some eighteen months. There is no excuse for this, during this time I spent over £10k and had no relationship with which to speak of.

I cannot recall exactly but I would imagine there has been at least three rate rises within this period. Each time, a colleague of yours in your call centre would explain the new technology which was being launched to mitigate for each increase.

It is important to consider the car market at the time of these increases. We have seen dramatic falls in the number of new car sales which naturally have a knock on effect to the market as a whole. This is without considering the worsening wider economic climate.

Product Weaknesses

When I was asked to comment on the new artwork and beta concept a few months ago, I reported back saying something like 'looks like a five year old has done it'.

When it was launched, the functionality of the site was appalling. How a company like Autotrader can launch a site with so many technical flaws is incomprehensible.

The most concerning part for me was the reaction of the most important people in the whole process, the users. If you have not seen this then I would urge you to look at it:

http://tinyurl.com/y8wrf24

Then there is the new 'technology'.

Launching products like enhanced advert sizes, pay per click and promoted listings is hardly driving the market. I accept BETA is a great product in concept but as referred to earlier, that was not ready at launch.

I do not want to see advertisements for breast enlargement alongside my cars. As lovely as my friend's wife is to look at, I do not want to see any form of advertising next to mine. You are a classified car site, that is what I want to see, that is what customers want to see.

I notice from your latest dealer panel, you expect us to be amazed by telling us we can have a 'fully branded' display if a customer clicks into our car. That is exactly what we should have in the first place.

Cost

I have just used some of my saving in my package reduction by signing up to a 15 car agreement with motors.co.uk. The cost of this is £81.25 + VAT. Autotrader is approximately £500. I cannot confirm exactly as I am waiting for a new invoice.

I can list a car on eBay with nine pictures for 28 days for £12.99 including VAT. Some £150 for fifteen cars, if I sign up for an eBay motors package it would be less.

Can you honestly say you believe Autotrader is worth that much more?

One of my biggest issues is the lack of product flexibility. I cannot use itemised pay per clicks, I cannot chose not to have video, I have to sign up to a specific number of cars. If I had the ability to be more precise with my spend, I might spend more.

Motor dealers are notorious for spending money at advertising as a knee jerk reaction, this used to be done through an advert in the paper but dealers are not using this any more for obvious reasons. Here is a glaring business opportunity for Autotrader to take yet it fails to do so.

Lack of Proactivity

I had a phone call from Vodafone when my contract was close to the end saying that they had reviewed my deal and they had a new one which would save me a lot of money. I now spend a third of what I did but I am still with them. I could have spent a third with O2 or Orange but they kept me on board.

I have been overspending for six months or so, I am sure you have the technology to write reports which isolate dealers in my position but where is the outbound call?

I had been a subscriber to Autotrade Mail since we started in 2007 and was very happy with the product. I received a letter a month ago telling me the cost of the service was increasing by 25%. I asked Laura (sales manager) why, 'because we have not had a price rise for ten years' she replied, 'yes, but what about all the extra subscribers you have now, shrinking margins etc etc'......silence. Exactly the sort of blatant profiteering that we are seeing with Autotrader.

I finally met my local representative some two weeks ago. When I told her that I had heard you had a retention team that was cutting deals to existing customers, she told me she could do nothing about it and had to liase with someone else.

What is her function? As lovely as it is to see a nice girl with a pretty smile asking me what business is like, I am afraid I am too busy to indulge in meaningless chit chat. She said to me 'there is a brick wall up and I can't get over it' during her visit, 'that is because you don't have any ladders' I replied.

The irony of it all

What makes me laugh the most is the new CRM hat that everyone at Autotrader is wearing. You are telling me that I will get monthly visits and reviews and that essentially you want to cuddle me.

The current pricing and product actions do little to reassure me your long term goals include building customer relationships.

You now want to put prices up from March the 1st.

This is not a good start for the new regime......