ATLANTA and BANDON, Ore -

Manheim saw mobile traffic to its website more than triple in the second quarter, and now a third of its customers use a mobile device to tap into Manheim.com.

According to the Manheim 2012 Q2 Update released Tuesday, there were 4.76 million mobile visits to Manheim.com during the second quarter, up 368 percent from the 1.02 million mobile visits during the same period of 2011.

“This signifies that mobile is becoming increasingly popular in the auto remarketing industry, as dealers leverage their smartphones to conduct business at their convenience,” said Joe George, senior vice president of product development at Manheim.

And on the consumer-to-dealer side of the market, it appears mobile has a significant stronghold, as well.

According to data from CNW Research released last month, the proportion of new-vehicle shoppers using smartphones to gather vehicle information climbed from 2.44 percent in calendar-year 2008 to 26.78 percent in the first half of 2012.

The latter sum is also more than 10 percentage points higher than the proportion of new shoppers using mobile devices for research in full-year 2011 (16.03 percent).

For full-year 2010, that proportion was 11.41 percent, compared to 4.94 percent in 2009. So there certainly has been a rapid increase in usage over the last four-and-half years.

“Looking at individual markets and brands, Los Angeles is among the strongest for use of a smartphone for auto data searches,” said CNW president Art Spinella, sharing more details into the firm’s findings.

“In L.A. — including the entire DMA and the San Fernando Valley — Chevrolet buyers, for example, climbed from just below 9 percent in 2008 who used a smartphone for car or truck information searches to well over 41 percent in the first half of this year,” he continued.

Despite this growth, there are a few obstacles in the way of automakers reaching these consumers, CNW suggested.

“First, consumers are vehemently opposed to unsolicited ‘pop up’ ads or any mobile text messages,” Spinella explained. “While not against solicited texts, the vast majority — over 90 percent — say they would prefer and will visit automakers or dealers who have a clean, easy to use, mobile-specific website adapted for the small screen.”

He went on to note that “the mobile user also has a fluctuating use of this device depending on where he or she is in the purchase funnel. Finally, mobile marketing has to be consistent and well-funded.”

Other Manheim Findings

Sharing more of its quarterly digital findings, Manheim pointed out that its digital visits have climbed 12 percent from last year. The company also noted that a quarter of all Manheim transactions in the second quarter were done via online buyers.

Manheim said that more than 30,000 customers have bought units online this year, with over 20,000 customers selling a unit online.