Closing the Experience Gap: How Dealers Can Compete in the Age of Direct-to-Consumer
Dealers have irreplaceable advantages that no direct-to-consumer brand can replicate. The challenge is meeting customers where they already shop. In this session, explore how a dealer-first digital storefront bridges that gap.
This session shares lessons learned from building the storefront from the ground up: how setup and onboarding were designed with dealer feedback, how F&I fits into the digital experience, and how the future of digital storefronts has been considered for dealers. The dealer partner shares perspective from inside a store: why they chose to join, what surprised them once they were live, and what results have looked like in practice.
Attendees leave with a clear understanding of how a dealer-first digital storefront works, what dealers control, and how customer shopping activity is creating new opportunities for dealers to reach buyers and grow their business.
Key Takeaways:
- Expand your reach with confidence: Attendees will understand how dealers reach new audiences through a digital storefront, and that clear lines of ownership sit with the dealer throughout every transaction
- Identify the experience gap: Attendees will be able to identify ways they can seamlessly transition the customer experience from their digital storefront into the dealership
- See the path forward: Attendees will leave with a practical understanding of how digital storefronts fit into their existing operations, and how customer activity on those storefronts is creating new ways to reach buyers who are actively shopping
Speakers
Related Sessions
From Rankings to Recommendations: What 1,600 Automotive Searches Reveal About Winning Google AI Overviews—Plus Content Tips to Gert More Consistently Get Cited
Google’s AI Overviews are reshaping the automotive search landscape, o
…Google’s AI Overviews are reshaping the automotive search landscape, often replacing predictable rankings with volatile, citation-driven visibility. This data-backed session shares 1,600 automotive search queries across Pensacola, Kansas City, and Da
…Google’s AI Overviews are reshaping the automotive search landscape, often replacing predictable rankings with volatile, citation-driven visibility. This data-backed session shares 1,600 automotive search queries across Pensacola, Kansas City, and Dallas to uncover when AI Overviews appear, which dealerships get cited, and why some persist while others disappear.
This session breaks down how AI Overviews behave across transactional, commercial, a
…Google’s AI Overviews are reshaping the automotive search landscape, often replacing predictable rankings with volatile, citation-driven visibility. This data-backed session shares 1,600 automotive search queries across Pensacola, Kansas City, and Dallas to uncover when AI Overviews appear, which dealerships get cited, and why some persist while others disappear.
This session breaks down how AI Overviews behave across transactional, commercial, and informational searches, as well as what that means for dealership visibility at every stage of the funnel. You’ll see how crowded today’s SERPs have become, what role traditional rankings still play in citations, and whether the same dealerships appearing in Google are also being recommended in platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude.
Most importantly, the findings will be translated into practical content tips, showing how top-performing dealership pages are structured, written, and enriched to consistently earn citations. You’ll walk away with clear, real-world tactics to move beyond rankings and start optimizing for recommendation.
Key Takeaways:
- Discover what high-performing dealership pages do differently, from content structure, context, and formatting to media usage and topical depth, as well as how to apply those insights to your own site
- Learn how often AI Overviews trigger for transactional, commercial, and informational automotive searches, and where dealerships have the greatest opportunity to be cited
- Gain a framework for aligning your website, content, Google Business Profile, and brand to increase your chances of being cited in Google AI Overviews and platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude
RCS: The Channel That Will Redefine How Dealerships Sell and Service Cars
The text message has been the workhorse of dealership communication fo
…The text message has been the workhorse of dealership communication for a decade, and it's about to be replaced by something dramatically more powerful. RCS (Rich Communication Services) is the next-generation messaging standard now live on every iPh
…The text message has been the workhorse of dealership communication for a decade, and it's about to be replaced by something dramatically more powerful. RCS (Rich Communication Services) is the next-generation messaging standard now live on every iPhone and Android device in America, built directly into the native messaging app consumers already use every day. No app download. No new platform to learn. Just an exponentially richer experience deli
…The text message has been the workhorse of dealership communication for a decade, and it's about to be replaced by something dramatically more powerful. RCS (Rich Communication Services) is the next-generation messaging standard now live on every iPhone and Android device in America, built directly into the native messaging app consumers already use every day. No app download. No new platform to learn. Just an exponentially richer experience delivered in the channel your customers are already in.
Dealership leaders will learn exactly what RCS is in this session, as well as why it matters right now, and how to deploy it in a way that produces measurable results fast. Attendees will see real use cases built specifically for automotive: interactive inventory carousels that let buyers browse vehicles without leaving their messages, one-tap service scheduling with calendar integration, verified brand identities that replace phone numbers with dealership logos, GPS-powered directions to the lot, advisor selection, and real-time two-way conversation, all in a single message thread.
This isn't a "future of technology" session. RCS is live, it's proven, and the dealerships that adopt it in the next 12 months will own a channel advantage their competitors won't be able to close quickly. Come learn what it is, what it can do for your store, and how to launch it before the lot down the street does.
Key Takeaways:
- Explain what RCS is and why it’s different from SMS, MMS, and OTT apps like WhatsApp, and why it matters specifically for automotive retail, and benchmark current SMS and digital engagement performance against RCS performance data to understand the revenue gap being left on the table
- Identify the highest-impact RCS use cases for their dealership across sales, service, and consumer retention, with concrete and immediately applicable examples
- Understand what a dealership needs to launch RCS, and develop a prioritized action plan for piloting RCS at their store or group within 90 days
AI Discoverability: Tech Gets You Found, Content Gets You Chosen
AI search is evolving at a pace that makes even the latest insights fe
…AI search is evolving at a pace that makes even the latest insights feel outdated almost overnight. The good news? The fundamentals behind AI discoverability are far more stable than the headlines suggest.
This session focuses on what actually drives
…AI search is evolving at a pace that makes even the latest insights feel outdated almost overnight. The good news? The fundamentals behind AI discoverability are far more stable than the headlines suggest.
This session focuses on what actually drives visibility: the combination of your website’s technical foundation and your dealership’s content strategy. Getting both right is what determines how - and if - your dealership shows up across AI-powe
…AI search is evolving at a pace that makes even the latest insights feel outdated almost overnight. The good news? The fundamentals behind AI discoverability are far more stable than the headlines suggest.
This session focuses on what actually drives visibility: the combination of your website’s technical foundation and your dealership’s content strategy. Getting both right is what determines how - and if - your dealership shows up across AI-powered search experiences.
This session breaks down how to evaluate your current AI visibility, identify real opportunities, and avoid chasing every new acronym or trend. You’ll leave with a clear, practical framework for navigating AI search as it evolves, and the right questions to ask to make sure your strategy (and your partners) are keeping up.
Key Takeaways:
- Evaluate current AI visibility trends and uncover opportunities using a practical framework to identify gaps, strengths, and areas for improvement
- Understand the key drivers of AI discoverability by identifying the roles of the website technology and content strategy as the two arms influencing how dealers appear in AI-powered search results
- Develop a strategic approach to AI search with actionable tips to adapt to ongoing changes without chasing short-term trends
