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 David T. Gould on January 23, 2012 at 1:58pm
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@ Keith: I have had other occasions here where I did not see the whole picture on another contributors posts. I have no intention of diverting the good done here by dwelling on this. I have stated my opinion and highlighted a couple more of your comments.
@ David: I make no apologies for bluntly defending any dealer(s0 from wrong-headed negativity from these blogs in any effort to call them out. Comparing anyone to Charles Kim . . . sigh. Oh well, then--let's ask the dealers on here if they'd like their name in lights for trying honestly to make their business better AND then getting snookered by a vendor. In TrueCar's case or any others'. The answer from them will be "no", unless they have either agreed to it as help to OTHERS or decided themselves to do that. As to Brian, I'm not name dropping. I was right in the middle to see that mistake, and again I applaud his efforts. He did the right thing. And this effort to "out" dealers is as wrong as that one was. Dealers don't need that kind of help. Ever. Thanks.
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Comment by Scott Falcone on January 23, 2012 at 1:52pm
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If someone wants to "educate" a dealer as @David is suggesting and nothing else, then perhaps the method to do so is privately and not publicly. My guess is no matter how you word this "outing", even with positive intent, it will somehow turn negative in the end. Keith is right in regards to the negative added value scenario and David if you are championing an additional effort to further educate dealers, my hat is off to you! Just give it some more thought on how to best get the word into their hands is all I would suggest. Continued success.
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Comment by Keith Shetterly on January 23, 2012 at 1:24pm -
@ David: I make no apologies for bluntly defending any dealer(s0 from wrong-headed negativity from these blogs in any effort to call them out. Comparing anyone to Charles Kim . . . sigh. Oh well, then--let's ask the dealers on here if they'd like their name in lights for trying honestly to make their business better AND then getting snookered by a vendor. In TrueCar's case or any others'. The answer from them will be "no", unless they have either agreed to it as help to OTHERS or decided themselves to do that. As to Brian, I'm not name dropping. I was right in the middle to see that mistake, and again I applaud his efforts. He did the right thing. And this effort to "out" dealers is as wrong as that one was. Dealers don't need that kind of help. Ever. Thanks.
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Okay Keith... I am taking a break for a couple of minutes before I post any further responses to insure my "emotion" is not construed as a negative part of my input here. (for the record, your response "@ David: I'm in the front lines after this point, too; it's time for brains, not emotion, and outing a dealer for negativity is NOT smart. Brian Pasch didn't get it, either, until he did it (on a totally different subject than TrueCar, however) Fastest disappearing blog in history, and I applaud him realizing that error."is insulting and one of the worst examples of condescension and name dropping I have seen in this thread outside of Charles Kim)
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Comment by Keith Shetterly on January 23, 2012 at 1:04pm
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@ David: And it's not a "few remaining". Not by a long shot. To be clearer, there are folks here who have told me they HAVE the list of current TrueCar dealers. And they don't publish it for the reason that it appears, no matter how it is set up, as a shaming effort. It's not needed. What's needed is to get them the information and help them come to this the way that other dealers have. With only the fanfare they pursue. Thanks.
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Comment by Keith Shetterly on January 23, 2012 at 12:58pm
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@ David: I'm in the front lines after this point, too; it's time for brains, not emotion, and outing a dealer for negativity is NOT smart. Brian Pasch didn't get it, either, until he did it (on a totally different subject than TrueCar, however) Fastest disappearing blog in history, and I applaud him realizing that error.
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So to be clear Keith. Posting a dealers name here is negative publicity? I never suggested negative comments be associated with the "outing" of those dealers that are currently utilizing TrueCar / Zag. I get why a vendor would not want to risk their relationship with a client over this type of disclosure. I don't get why posting the names of current TrueCar users here is negative publicity. It simply states the same thing a consumer would find when they submit a lead through TrueCar / Zag In Network and Out of Network online web price service, that that dealer is a participant. You felt strongly enough to be in the front lines up to this point, we all appreciate that. Maybe now it is time for some others around the country to step up if they agree that participating dealers should be identified as part of the True Transparency involved with this effort. Reminder to others: This is not a subvert attempt at suggesting there should be retribution towards any dealers named. We are all on the same team... This is an attempt to make all efforts available through our professional community to reach out and educate those few remaining who are still unaware of the issues addressed here in this post.
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Comment by Keith Shetterly on January 23, 2012 at 12:21pm
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@ David: Jim hasn't called out a single dealership; I've been right here on the frontlines of this myself, quite a bit, and I haven't done so. I won't call them out on these threads except if they okay me to if they quit. Calling them out and putting it on their SERP results for a customer . . . extremely bad move. Never right that I've seen, and I don't expect it to be here. My request is that you don't do it, and my advice to anyone reading these blogs is to never call out a negative publicly. It doesn't, and won't ever, change a dealer's mind. A very strong "SEO Company" tried that "negative example" himself with the same theoretical thinking. He pulled that blog in a hurry, Please don't encourage folks to do that same mistake; if it was a good idea, Jim would've already done it. It's wrong. Thanks.
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@ Keith. I understand the ramifications of SEO, relationship and bad press. Do you think Jim did not when he took on the entire industry? Dealers should be aware of their dealership's adverse actions. Should we all wait for them to be fined in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to "tell them so"? I consider this to be a pivotal point in TrueCar's down fall. Making dealers aware of their exposure with TrueCar, particularly now while they are in the legislatures spotlight, is a service to them not a detriment in my opinion. I get your resistance. Good Selling, DTG
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First @ Eric... in my opinion, the follow documentation from PAA is valid:
"Over the past several weeks, PAA has been closely monitoring the activity surrounding TrueCar and has received phone calls from dealers regarding TrueCar’s program.
There are several subscription-based sales-marketing programs which require a dealer to pay an annual or monthly fee for vehicle sale leads. TrueCar’s program, however, provides that it is only compensated if the introduction it arranges between the dealer and customer results in a sale. Programs that set dealer fees tied directly or indirectly to a transaction involving the sale of a new or used vehicle appear to constitute the unlawful act of brokering. Pennsylvania law prohibits brokering as set forth below.
All dealers should carefully review their relationships with third party lead providers for compliance with all state and federal laws. When evaluating a relationship with a third party lead and/or sales provider, a dealer should consider the following:
1) Pennsylvania prohibits a person from acting as or holding themselves out to be a broker in the advertising, buying or selling of any new or used vehicle. A broker is defined as any person who, for any direct or indirect commission, compensation or other consideration, arranges or offers to arrange a transaction involving the sale of a new or used vehicle or establishes or offers to establish a plan or program involving the sale of a new or used vehicle and who is not:
i) a licensed dealer or a licensed employee of a new or used vehicle dealer; or
ii) a licensed representative or a licensed employee of a manufacturer or distributor.
2) Dealerships are required to know which third party companies are accessing their DMS, and ultimately where their customer information is going and for what purposes the information will be used. Federal law requires dealers to protect customer information and inform customers, through a privacy notice, what will happen with nonpublic personal financial information. Allowing various third party companies to access a DMS may not be in compliance with a privacy policy and a security process at a dealership.
3) A dealership should ensure that all third party companies with which the dealership has entered into agreements to market vehicles to customers are complying with all of the advertising laws and regulations regardless of the advertising medium (i.e. internet, print, television, radio etc.).
PAA will continue to monitor the situation involving TrueCar and other third party lead and/or sales providers. As additional information becomes available, PAA will update its members. If dealers have questions regarding the activities of a third party lead and/or sales provider, they should contact their attorney."
If anyone has an issue with this, I will take down immediately... If someone else can confirm, I hope this assists.
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