I'm working on a white-paper to present at the Automotive Marketing Boot Camp that compares the choices dealers have to advertise their used car inventory. One of the elements of the white-paper is to document how Vehicle Detail Pages (VDP) are designed and presented to consumers.

From a dealer perspective I have a problem with automotive advertising partners that run competing ads on the dealer's Vehicle Detail Pages (VDP). You may not have a problem with that as long as the website produces leads and calls, so I'd like to hear your opinion.

I also want to disclose that I have developed a platform to advertise car dealer inventory; the Automotive Advertising Network. Over the past 5 years I have been a keen student of what other automotive advertising companies are doing online. I have not included my own platform in this data to avoid self promotion.

What Amount of VDP Advertising is Fair?

I have and will continue to look out for the dealer when I write my blog posts. I want to educate dealers that there are choices on the market and how to best evaluate those options. I'm not writing to put down any specific platforms; I want to start a good dialogue on the marketplace as it exists today.

I decided to share some of the data that I will include in my final white-paper on how the many automotive advertising platforms stack up to each other.

What I did was to search for a used car in my local market, and see how many ads show on the listing pages and how many ads show on the Vehicle Detail Pages (VDP). Now, I have no problem with ads on vehicle listing pages since those pages are the property of the website owners.

However, I do have a problem with the brand leaks and distractions on actual car detail pages. These distractions come in the form of banner ads, Google Text ads, and links to third party services like insurance quotes, car financing, and vehicle research reports which take consumers to another website or take business away from the dealer.

In the first table, I have listed popular car inventory advertising websites, listed alphabetically. The first set of data shows how many ads are running on "listing pages". A listing page would be a search for a query like "used Chevrolet cars". The second columns of data are based on the single used car vehicle detail page.

Used Car Platforms Ordered Alphabetically

	# Ads/Links on Listing Pages	Example Listing Page	# Ads/Links on VDP	Example VDP
Autos.AOL.com	10	View	9	View
AutomobileMag.com	15	View	10	View
Automotive.com	15	View	10	View
Autos.Yahoo.com	8	View	6	View
Autotrader.com	8	View	10	View
CarGurus.com	2	View	0
Cars.com	4	View	6	View
Cars.Mitula.us	10	View	N/A
Cars.Trovit.com	13	View	N/A
CarsDirect.com	8	View	1	View
CarsForSale.com	7	View	5	View
EveryCarListed.com	2	View	1	View
Lemonfree.com	14	View	10	View
MotorTrend.com	13	View	8	View
Oodle.com	6	View	N/A
UsedCars.com	2		1	View
UsedCars.KBB.com	3	View	10	View
Vast.com	13	View	0	View
Vehix.com	2	View	2	View
Web2Carz.com	14	View	5	View

Ordered By Ads on Vehicle Detail Pages

	# Ads/Links on Listing Pages	Example Listing Page	# Ads/Links on VDP	Example VDP
CarGurus.com	2	View	0
Vast.com	13	View	0	View
CarsDirect.com	8	View	1	View
EveryCarListed.com	2	View	1	View
UsedCars.com	2		1	View
Vehix.com	2	View	2	View
CarsForSale.com	7	View	5	View
Web2Carz.com	14	View	5	View
Autos.Yahoo.com	8	View	6	View
Cars.com	4	View	6	View
MotorTrend.com	13	View	8	View
Autos.AOL.com	10	View	9	View
AutomobileMag.com	15	View	10	View
Automotive.com	15	View	10	View
Autotrader.com	8	View	10	View
Lemonfree.com	14	View	10	View
UsedCars.KBB.com	3	View	10	View
Cars.Mitula.us	10	View	N/A
Cars.Trovit.com	13	View	N/A
Oodle.com	6	View	N/A

Notes on Chart Data

When the Ads on the VDP says "N/A" (i.e. Cars.Mitula.us) it is because these sites syndicate data and drive consumers to the origination websites; they no not have their own Vehicle Detail Pages.