IRVINE, Calif. -

Stemming from a belief that more than 98 percent of shoppers take no action during visits to dealer websites, Autobytel unveiled a new solution last week for dealer members and manufacturers aimed at connecting stores with potential online buyers.

Executives described the live chat capability provided by ActivEngage as a pathway for dealers and OEMs to add this tool to their websites. They contend ActivEngage’s ActivConcierge can engage website visitors with a virtual meet and greet and can act as an online sales force, increasing purchase request generation by assisting and qualifying shoppers.

Autobytel asserted ActivConcierge can impact dealerships immediately by turning informational websites into conversational websites, thereby multiplying the number of qualified purchase requests generated. The company pointed out dealerships using ActivEngage have indicated that they experienced increases in the amount of purchase requests they receive from their own websites.

One dealer shared his feedback. Bruce Hartz is with the Bob Bell Ford Hyundai Kia in Glen Burnie, Md.

“Autobytel is a true partner to us — in addition to providing us quality purchase requests, the company also offers tools for our own websites to help increase our chance of making a sale,” Hartz stated.

“We always wanted to add real-time chat to our website, but didn’t have the capabilities or resources,” he continued. “Autobytel is offering us another simple solution and we are looking forward to implementing the new chat feature to our website.”

Executives from Autobytel and ActivEngage emphasized chat reps continually train on product knowledge and individual store promotions and specials to ensure seamless chat experiences for website shoppers.

Furthermore, the companies indicated ActivEngage can provide dealers real-time user statistics, keyword analysis, powerful reporting and insight to help make their websites more efficient and produce more sales.

“We want to do everything we can to help our member dealers and manufacturing partners succeed,” stressed Jeffrey Coats, Autobytel’s president and chief executive officer.

“By offering them easy-to-use products and services that can increase their close ratio, we believe we can do just that,” Coasts continued. “Now, in addition to our WebLeads+ product, we can offer our member dealers and OEM partners another powerful software tool to maximize the performance of their own websites — all designed to help them sell more cars.

“While live chat is a useful and coveted tool, the logistics and programming are often daunting and overwhelming — especially for a small business like a dealership,” Coats went on to say. “By aggregating our resources and partnering with ActivEngage, we can provide a simple, easy and cost-effective solution for dealerships and OEMs to add live chat to any website. This feature helps our member dealers and OEM partners increase their close ratio by connecting immediately with potential customers.”

Todd Smith, ActivEngage’s co-founder and president, insisted that “We are excited to offer our ActivConcierge service to Autobytel’s dealerships and manufacturers around the nation.

“With this new service offering, Autobytel is taking another proactive step to ensure that their dealers generate the most purchase requests possible,” Smith asserted.

“Dealerships have indicated that purchase request generation from the dealer’s own website has increased on the first day of using our live chat,” he added. “Autobytel is a clear leader in automotive retail; we look forward to our partnership and serving their dealer and manufacturer body.”