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Providing a “self-serve” model reduces call center volume, increases operational efficiency and drives a better experience for your customers. This simple yet strategic solution helps the entire industry streamline trade-ins and speed deal-making.

Greg Payne: 
And we’re back. 

0:06 
I’m Greg Payne, Marketing Manager with Cox Automotive, and I’m joined today by my colleague, Andy Mayers, AVP of Dealertrack Lender Solutions. 

0:14 
Andy, it’s so great to see you. 

0:16 
Thanks for joining me again today to talk about lender solutions. 

0:20 
Now, in our last podcast, you touched upon some solutions that could help lenders engage car buyers early in the journey and streamline the contracting and funding process. 

0:29 
That really was a big hit with our audience. 

0:31 
So what I want to do today is actually break down each of those solutions individually to help better explain and understand their value and purpose to our lender clients, to our digital retailing partners, and to the industry ecosystem at large. 

0:46 
I want to start off our discussion by talking about the first topic in our series, which I’m going to collectively refer to as our “small bytes.” 

0:54 
Now the first topic I want to talk about is Payoff Quotes. 

0:59 
Now, why is enabling dealers and consumers access to obtain payoff quotes on their own rather than going through a lender’s call center important? 

1:08 
And how, why and how can our clients implement this process? 

 
Andy Mayers: 

1:13 
Well, thanks, Greg. 

1:13 
It’s good to be back and I appreciate everybody joining us for this small bytes session as we experience and talk about the financing journey that a consumer goes through. 

1:24 
Payoff Quotes is a great example of operational efficiency that we can do to help our industry. 

1:30 
Today we have over 300 lenders available on our network that allows a dealer to actually get a payoff quote. 

1:35 
And for those that are familiar, you know that payoff quotes are a critical part of structuring a deal. 

1:40 
You need to know how much equity a customer has when they’re trading in that vehicle. 

1:45 
The customer is typically trading that in and that dealer is buying it. 

1:49 
So they need to know how much they have to pay off a lender — and most importantly, how much equity they can use. 

1:55 
So when you think about the payoff quotes, we have it in two different flavors. 

1:59 
We have one that sits on the Dealertrack platform today. 

2:02 
Dealer goes in and there’s information about a consumer, maybe an account number, a VIN number, something unique. 

2:08 
They’ll get a real time payoff quote from the lender — and it’ll tell them how long that payoff quote is good for and how much is outstanding and things like that. 

2:16 
So that when a dealer structures the deal, they know that they have to collect, you know, $3500 in a payoff amount. 

2:22 
Or like I said, if there’s equity and they’re using our KBB tools, they can value that vehicle and figure out how much can be used towards selling new products. 

2:31 
It also works online and it’s important as we’re going through a digital retailing strategy. 

2:36 
When a consumer wants to buy a car online, in order them for them to properly figure out how much they owe in their vehicle, they have to get a real time payoff quote — and there’s no more efficient way to do that than by being able to automatically do that through our pay service. 

2:49 
So those two things, Greg, allow the dealer and the consumer to figure out how much they owe on a vehicle or potentially when they, you know, combine it with their vehicle valuation tools like KBB, how much equity they have so they can use that to restructure the new deal and help them in the sale of the new vehicle. 

Greg Payne: 
3:10 
Wow, sounds like you’ve made a great case for why every lender and digital retailing partner can and should implement this simple but highly effective solution into their online experience. 

3:20 
And it sounds like you’ve also teed up our next topic for our Small Byte discussion. 

3:25 
Andy, thank you so much for joining us and thanks to all of those in the lender audience for listening to today’s discussion. 

3:31 
Join us next time as we talk about the next topic in our Small Byte series, payment services. 

Andy Mayers: 
3:38 
And thanks, Greg, and thanks for our lender partners interested in payout quotes. 

3:42 
You know, if you need to know more about how to get on the payoff quote system with us, let us know and we will see you again soon. 

Predictive insights and analytics are changing the way automotive dealerships operate. From optimizing marketing campaigns to predicting sales needs, predictive insights use Artificial Intelligence (AI) and data to anticipate trends, improve decision-making, and boost efficiency.  

This guide will introduce you to the world of predictive insights, explain how they differ from predictive analytics, and highlight how they can help your dealership excel across various functions.  

Included in this guide:  

What Are Predictive Insights?  

Predictive Insights vs. Predictive Analytics  

What Are the Benefits of Predictive Insights?  

Use Cases for Dealerships  

What Are Predictive Insights?  

At their core, predictive insights in the automotive industry involve using dealership data and analytics to identify customer behaviors, and offer actionable strategies. By analyzing consumer online shopper activity and data like vehicle searches, trade-in value, dealer website traffic and more, predictive insights empower dealerships to anticipate customer needs and their readiness to purchase. 

Predictive insights connect your dealership’s CRM with shopper data from online marketplaces that enables dealers to create powerful personalized shopper experiences that drive more sales. 

Predictive Insights vs. Predictive Analytics  

While the terms “predictive insights” and “predictive analytics” are often used interchangeably, they serve distinct functions: 

Predictive Analytics is a broader term encompassing the methods, statistics, and tools used to predict potential outcomes using historical and real-time data. For instance, it might use statistical models to anticipate sales growth trends.  

Predictive Insights, on the other hand, refer to the actionable recommendations derived from predictive analytics. If predictive analytics provides the forecast, predictive insights show how likely a buyer is to make a purchase, as well as shoppers’ priorities.  

To put it simply, predictive analytics tell you what’s likely to happen; predictive insights tell you what to do about it.  

What Are the Benefits of Predictive Insights?  

Predictive insights aren’t just for tech giants—they can benefit any business ready to leverage data effectively. Here are five key advantages of incorporating predictive insights into your dealership or business operations: 

1. Consumer Knowledge: Powerful data capabilities from predictive intelligence help to indicate your shoppers’ interests. By measuring online activity, predictive insights can identify shoppers who are more likely to make a purchase. 

2. Prioritization: Helps salespeople and BDC agents prioritize leads based on their readiness to purchase, ensuring that efforts are focused on the most promising prospects. 

3. Proactive GenAI Communications: Dealerships can deliver tailored communications that resonate with customers powered by data from predictive insights tailored to the unique needs of individual consumers. This not only enhances engagement but also builds trust and fosters long-term satisfaction by addressing individual needs effectively. 

4. Increased Efficiency: By providing insights into customer behavior, sales teams can work smarter, not harder, and improve their overall efficiency. 

5. Improved Customer Retention: By understanding customer behaviors and delivering personalized experiences, dealerships can foster stronger relationships, ensuring customers return for services, upgrades, or new purchases. 

How Can Predictive Insights Help Your Dealership?  

For automotive dealerships, predictive insights offer immense potential to optimize operations, personalize customer interactions, and drive growth. Here’s how they can be applied across key areas within your dealership: 

1. More Impactful Marketing 

Predictive customer insights can identify patterns in your consumers’ preferences and behaviors. As consumers spend time online, some providers capture this data, and your dealership’s CRM can build a behavior profile of their buying journey. .This data can help you create a marketing strategy that targets ready-to-buy shoppers with powerful, timely messaging just in time to deliver the perfect deal.  

2. Focused Sales Efforts 

AI-driven insights can analyze buyer patterns to identify which vehicles or features will be in demand in the coming months. This helps dealerships focus on staying relevant and meeting the needs of today’s buyers.   

3. Task Prioritization 

Determining which leads are most engaged can help your sales team keep track of whom to prioritize and when to pick up the phone. With data that helps to identify engagement strength, it’s easier to set clear follow-ups, and keep track of hot leads. 

4. Intelligent Segmentation 

Predictive insights helps dealers target their marketing efforts to be more effective. With the help of a powerful, modern CRM, predictive insights can create more intelligent audience segmentation.  

5. Build an Omnichannel Experience 

Creating a seamless buying experience with your customers at every stage of the process—whether they begin online, in-store, or a mix of both—is vital to today’s shoppers. With predictive insights, dealers can help bridge the gap between each step, allowing buyers to go back and forth as they evaluate their options.  

6. Staffing Optimization  

Your sales team is dedicated to delivering the ultimate customer experience. So, understanding which customers to prioritize and when to reach out is paramount. Predictive insights enable your team to identify where shoppers are at in the buying process, removing the guesswork, helping your team prioritize and focus on in-market shoppers who are more likely to buy.  

7.  Enhance Your Marketing 

Your next car-buyer is likely inundated with hundreds of messages from multiple sources. So, getting your marketing offer through will require a holistic approach. Predictive insights can help dealers deliver multi-media marketing across multiple channels such as email, text, direct mail, social media and more. 

Harness the Power of Predictive Insights  

Integrating predictive insights into your dealership’s operations isn’t just a trend—it’s a vital move to stay competitive in the automotive retail space. With applications in marketing, sales, back office, and fixed operations, the potential for growth and efficiency is unparalleled.  

If you want to take your dealership’s sales  to the next level with predictive insights, it starts with choosing the right tools and strategies. Explore how tools like VinSolutions’ advanced CRM can support your business goals.  

Are you ready to redefine your dealership’s potential? Learn how to take a new retailing approach and leverage predictive insights visiting https://www.vinsolutions.com/dealership-software/automotive-artificial-intelligence/  

Watch our latest 15 minute webinar hosted by Matt Warpinski, Director of Performance Management at Xtime, as he showcases hands-on tips on how our new reporting capabilities will help you and your team uncover actionable insights for enhancing your overall service experience.

Learn about new, modernized reporting views, increasing customer insights with detailed appointment and repair order metrics, and tracking performance with real-time dashboards. This recorded session, which includes Q&A, will help you stay ahead with Xtime’s cutting-edge solutions.

In Cox Automotive’s 2024 Power of Data research study, four out of five dealers agree: Data can help them forecast trends, generate and capture demand, become more efficient, and maximize profits. And yet, only 26% of dealers are confident in insights provided by third-party vendors.  

The recent surge of third-party tools that provide data and leverage AI-generated insights means dealers have seen results that are all over the place. Dealers face three major challenges: 

• The technology providing insights does not have access to real-time customer data 

• The data is inconsistent across multiple dealership systems and tools 

• The data simply isn’t detailed enough 

Given these concerns, it’s no surprise dealers have been hesitant to invest in solutions that can use this data to automate workflows and provide AI-driven insights. With the right partner, dealers can leverage granular data that is clean, consolidated, and ready to activate.  

How dealers can ensure the quality of data 

There are two key things to consider as you evaluate your data for use with AI and automation applications:  

• Choose the right data source. Quality, real-time, consolidated data is foundational to the success of newer technology like marketing automation and AI, but not all data sets are created equal.  

For example, the solutions offered by Cox Automotive are powered not only by the dealer’s first-party data, but also by consumer data from 82 million unique visitors of Autotrader, Kelley Blue Book and Dealer.com—insights spanning the full shopping and ownership journey.  

The level of detail that comes with this behavioral data makes all the difference. It empowers sales managers to craft winning deals in real time and pinpoint the exact moment customers are ready to buy.  

• Consider what you have technology doing vs. what you have people doing. Be realistic about what your technology does best and what your people do best. Look for solutions that can identify shoppers who are more likely to buy—even before they ever submit a lead. Trusting those insights and acting on them can give you a huge competitive advantage, especially if you level up your communications with generative AI. 
   
  But your people are still going to be best at 1-on-1 conversations. Don’t fall victim to the all-or-nothing mindset; you need your people and your technology to work together. 

Key questions to evaluate data 

• Where is the data coming from? Does it give a full picture of the consumer’s intentions? 

• Is the data current and accurate? Is it available in real time or is it batched? 

• How specific is the data? Is it gathered directly from a specific buyer, or is it based on “similar” shoppers?  

How dealers can evaluate predictive insights 

Predictive insights and machine learning aggregate data to help guide decision-making and improve business results. They power the recommendations you see on most retailing sites and are some of the most powerful AI tools available to the automotive retail industry today.  

With the right data, tools, and partner, predictive insights can identify current, high-quality leads who are more likely to close than other lead types, helping the sales team prioritize their efforts.  

Going one step further, these insights can provide a detailed picture of a shopper. They reveal even more about the consumer: what they are looking for in a car, their overall budget, their payment ranges, and their intended trade-in vehicle—intel that empowers sales managers to put together winning deals in real time and pinpoint the exact moment customers are ready to buy.  

Key questions to evaluate predictive insights 

• Are the insights delivered at the right time with real-time information? 

• Are the predictive insights shopper-specific and actionable? Are they based on real actions from each unique shopper? Can the insights provide buying signals about the shopper?  

• Are the insights incorporated into day-to-day dealer workflows? Are they easy to access by your staff within existing tools? 

With access to consolidated, clean, ready-to-activate data delivered in real time, dealers can unlock powerful insights that reveal more about car buyers: the make and model they’re interested in, their monthly payment range, and even how ready they are to buy.  

Only VinSolutions Predictive Insights empowers sales managers with exclusive insights that tell them exactly when a shopper is ready to buy. 

In automotive, there is no bigger task ahead than the shift to electrification. While there are still concerns about costs and charging infrastructure, sales show that more people are adopting EVs. In the first quarter of 2025, EV sales increased by 11.4% compared to last year. Interestingly, this growth is coming from brands other than Tesla.  While Tesla’s sales declined, new models from Acura, Audi, Chevrolet, Honda and Porsche helped boost overall EV sales. 

At Cox Automotive, we remain optimistic about the future. Despite some ups and downs, and starts and stops in regulations, we see a strong interest in EVs among consumers. Our data shows that an average of 4.4 million households have shown interest in electric vehicles over the past 90 days. 

Additionally, research and shopping for EVs on Autotrader and Kelley Blue Book have remained stable, with a 9% increase in New Car Visits year-over-year. Similarly, we’ve seen Hybrid and Plug-In Hybrid shopping increase by 11% year-over-year.  While interest varies across different regions in the U.S., we’ve seen an increase in EV and Hybrid shopping across all Census Regions, even with lower gas prices.    

Download our latest EV and Hybrid shopper data and explore advertising opportunities with Cox Automotive to reach this highly engaged audience.  

In the meantime, continue preparing for the rise in EV adoption, and read our blog on increasing consumer adoption of EVs. Here’s a snapshot of a few insights and the actions you can take to focus on EV sales: 

Insight: Shoppers are skeptical about making the EV switch.  

Action: Incorporate more EV related material in your content. EV buyers actively seek information online, consuming more content than their (ICE) counterparts. Since the concept of EVs is still new to some shoppers, they rely heavily on content, especially videos, when researching online 

Insight: EV Shopper demographics are becoming more mainstream.  

Action: Use data to your advantage and work with your digital marketing partner to ensure your EV advertising is getting in front of more consumers that are interested in EVs. Additionally, provide more education around EVs about what manufacturers sell EVs, and the different models and varying price ranges can help with awareness.  

Insight: Dealers need to feel confident to sell EVs.  

Action: As a dealer, ensure you are reaching out to your OEMs to help educate consumers on their line-up, on the key differences and benefits of EV vs. ICE, as well as provide information on EVs listed for sale. 

The road to electrification certainly has not been a linear progression, but there’s a lot to be optimistic about with exciting new products and a robust and growing consumer base.   

Blend online and digital processes in six easy steps

The most successful automotive retail stores are integrating online and in-store processes. Learn to create a hybrid experience that saves time, builds trust, and improves the car buying experience. This simple checklist will help you balance online processes with digitally supported in-store steps to build a unified experience.

With Dealer.com’s AI-powered Experience Optimization, shoppers see the most relevant vehicles, offers, and content the moment they land on your site—no matter how they browse or where they started their journey (Autotrader, KBB.com, or your own website). Advanced AI analyzes every click and interaction to deliver a truly personalized experience. 

How AI-Powered Website Personalization Works 

Experience Optimization is Dealer.com’s website personalization engine. It unifies privacysafe firstparty signals from Autotrader, KBB.com, and Dealer.com, then uses AI to dynamically adapt critical elements across your site—inventory tiles, banners, specials, and recommendations—based on each visitor’s shopping behavior and budget signals.  

What changes for each shopper (automatically): 

• Inventory & Recommendations: Prioritized vehicles that match body style, trims, and price ranges they’ve been exploring. 

• Payments & Incentives: Modern specials and offers aligned to declared or inferred budget. 

• Content & Calls‑to‑Action: Home page hero, SRP/VDP modules, and service promos tuned to their interests. 

What Dealers Get: Measurable Lift, Less Manual Work 

By leveraging browsing behavior, search history, and entered data to personalize the experience, dealers see more engagement and more leads – 2x VDP views and +33% lead submissions compared to non-personalized experiences.*  

See It In Action 

Ready to turn more shoppers into leads with a site that adapts in real time? Schedule a quick demo and we’ll show you how to start using Dealer.com’s AI-powered personalization to transform your website, and your results.   

*Source: Statistics based on 9,582 Dealers that have utilized Modern Specials, comparing shoppers that only saw Personalized Specials impressions vs shoppers that only saw Non-Personalized Specials impressions from 01/01/2024 – 07/31/2024.