ATLANTA -

Regional third-party vehicle sale website KSL Cars announced Wednesday that advertising dealerships can now use online chat features  to connect with potential buyers.

The Utah-based company has added Contact at Once live chat capabilities in the site’s automotive ads.

KSL Cars will bundle Contact At Once in its auto dealer packages, officials noted.

“More and more shoppers prefer text and chat to old-fashioned lead forms and they like the instant access, as well as the convenience,” says Lloyd Hecht, Contact At Once director of business development.  “Advertising with mobile and desktop text and chat options can draw more attention and appeal to shoppers who might be reluctant to call or email.”

KSL Cars offered a few factors that led to the new partnership, noting that the company chose Contact At Once in part because of its “ease of use and implementation.”

“Our advertisers can be chatting with potential car buyers in a matter of minutes,” Eric Bright, KSL’s vice president of e-commerce said.

“Contact At Once was the first to put live chat in online automotive classifieds and they have unique features that make the software especially well-suited for connecting thousands of shoppers with dealers through chat in ads,” Bright continued.

And this may come as welcome news to Utah dealers as consumers and potential buyers turn towards web-based research during the search for a new vehicles.

In fact, in a recent study commissioned by website chat company Contact At Once, one in three users of auto website chat bought a vehicle after having an online conversation with a dealer.

During the study, Polk analyzed 10,000 Contact At Once chat transcripts in which consumers volunteered personally-identifiable information, the company shared, and included conversations originating from dealer, OEM and third-party advertising sites.

“For years, Contact At Once has observed auto dealers experience a 25-percent lift in customer contacts from their Web sites and advertising products when they start using live chat, but this is the first industry analysis that empirically proves chatters are buyers. It validates the many anecdotal reports we have received from dealers that chat does help them sell cars,” says Marc Hayes, Contact At Once founder and executive vice-president of strategy.

To read more about the study, see the Auto Remarketing story here.