The first hour after an internet lead: a speed-to-lead plan for dealers

A shopper fills in the form on your website at 11:40 on a Saturday: "Is the grey Tucson still there? Does it have winter tires? I could come by this afternoon." That is about as warm as a lead gets. They have picked a car, they have a question you can answer in one line, and they have told you when they can come.

Now follow it. The form sends an email to the sales inbox. Three people can read that inbox, and each assumes one of the others has it. At 3:15 someone sends the template: "Thanks for your interest in our inventory! When would be a good time to come in?" By then the shopper has asked the same question at two other dealers, and one of them called back before lunch.

None of that is a people problem. It is a process with no owner. I build our CRM, so I spend my days inside this process: where leads land, who opens them, what gets written down. Here is the plan I would give a small dealer or a business development centre (BDC) for the first hour after an internet lead, and the days after.

What usually goes wrong in the first hour

Three things, nearly always in this order.

The lead sits in an inbox. Forms, marketplace leads and chats arrive as emails. An email is not a task: it does not say whose it is, and it sinks when the next one arrives.

Nobody owns it. When everyone can see a lead, nobody has to answer it — especially at lunch, in the evening or on someone's day off.

The reply is generic. The shopper asked about winter tires; the template asks when they can come in. It reads as if nobody read their message, because nobody did.

Where a web lead leaks before anyone calls

• —Form sent: arrives as an email, not a task with a name on it
• —Shared inbox: everyone sees it, so everyone assumes someone else has it
• —First reply: a template that does not answer what they asked
• —First call: hours later, by someone who has not read the message
• —Second touch: never happens, because nobody set a next step

What the research says about speed, and what it does not

The study most people quote is The Short Life of Online Sales Leads, published in Harvard Business Review in March 2011. The authors audited 2,241 US companies by sending each a web lead and timing the reply. Of those, 37% responded within an hour, 23% never responded at all, and among companies that replied within 30 days the average response time was 42 hours. In a separate study of 1.25 million leads at 42 US companies, firms that tried to reach a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it — which the authors defined as a meaningful conversation with a decision maker — as firms that tried even an hour later.

Two caveats. The data is from 2011, from US companies across many industries, not car dealers. And it shows what fast responders achieved, not what speed alone causes: a business that answers quickly is probably better at the rest of the follow-up too. Use it for the direction, not as a forecast for your lot: a shopper who just asked a question is easier to talk to now than tomorrow.

Closer to home, before their rebuild a web inquiry at our client Buy Metro Pre-Owned waited about five hours for a reply. One dealer group, one market — not a promise about yours. If you have never timed your own, send your dealership a test lead this week.

A speed-to-lead plan a small dealer can run

You do not need a call centre. You need five decisions, made once and written down.

1. Name the owner before the lead arrives

Every lead needs one person's name on it from the moment it lands. On a small lot, a rota works: one person on leads per shift, with a named backup for breaks and days off. With a BDC, the BDC owns first contact and the appointment, then hands the lead to a salesperson with everything said so far.

Settle the edge cases now. A lead that arrives after close belongs to the first person in next morning. A lead that arrives while the owner is with a customer goes to the backup. If most of your leads come in after hours, the after-hours article covers the options.

2. Send a first reply that answers their question

The first reply has one job: show the shopper that a person read their message. Answer their question in their words, ask one thing back, and sign with a name and a direct number. Use the channel they used, and keep it short enough to read on a phone.

3. Call with an outline, not a script

A first call goes better when it starts from what the shopper wrote. Read the lead before you dial.

No answer? Leave a short voicemail with the answer to their question and your direct number, then text or email the same. "Call me back" alone gives them no reason to.

If the lead is a trade-in question, the reply needs a range and a car to go with it; trade-in questions into appointments covers what to ask and what to send back.

4. Make the second touch add something

A missed call is not a no. The second touch should bring something new: a photo of the tires, a short walk-around video, the answer to a question they did not get to ask. "Just checking in" adds nothing, and shoppers can tell.

5. Decide when to stop

Stop when the shopper says no, buys elsewhere or asks you to stop. Otherwise, set a fixed number of attempts over a fixed period, then close the lead with a reason — bought elsewhere, no reply, not ready until spring. A reason teaches a manager something; a lead that just goes quiet does not.

These are starting targets, not research figures. Set your own, put them on the wall and check them weekly.

Why the shopper's exact words belong on the lead card

The whole plan depends on one thing: whoever picks up the lead can see what the shopper said. When leads live in an inbox, the salesperson calling at 4 p.m. has a name, a number and maybe the car, and opens with "so, what were you looking for?" The shopper already told you. Asking again is how a warm lead cools.

A lead card should show, on one screen:

• —the shopper's message, word for word, not a summary;
• —the car they asked about, with the stock number;
• —where the lead came from and when it arrived;
• —whose lead it is, and the next step with a date;
• —every touch so far, and what was said;
• —what the shopper agreed to hear from you, and when.

With that, the backup can take over mid-conversation and a manager can see which leads have no owner. That is the part I work on. On our builds, every lead from the website, the chat and the ads lands in the CRM as a card with the shopper's exact words, their name, number and the car, in a database that belongs to the dealer. The CRM is a one-time build, $1,999–$2,499 in USD, with no per-seat fees; the pricing page has the rest.

CASL basics for the follow-up

Speed does not suspend the rules. The full walk-through is in CASL for car dealers; this is the short version, written by a software builder, not a lawyer — check the sources.

• —Answering their question. The regulations under CASL exclude a message sent in response to a request, inquiry or complaint from section 6 of the Act, where the consent and unsubscribe requirements sit. A first reply that sticks to what the shopper asked is that kind of message.
• —Following up after that. Messages that go further — other cars, an offer, "still looking?" — rely on implied consent from the inquiry, which lasts six months. Past that, you need express consent.
• —What each follow-up carries. Your dealership's name, how to reach you, and a working unsubscribe, actioned within 10 business days. A STOP text must be respected.
• —Calls. Sales calls fall under the CRTC's telemarketing rules, not CASL. The Do Not Call List does not block a call to someone who made an inquiry in the last six months, but you still say who you are calling for, and if the shopper asks not to be called, their number goes on your own do-not-call list within 14 days and stays for three years (the rules at the time of writing).
• —Calling hours. At the time of writing, the CRTC's telemarketing hours are 9 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. on weekdays and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekends. Plan every follow-up call inside them, and check the CRTC page before you rely on them; rules like these change.

Before the next lead arrives

• Every lead source lands in one place, not a personal inbox
• Each shift has one named person on leads, and a backup
• The first reply answers the question and is signed by a person
• The call outline is printed where the phones are
• Every lead shows the shopper's words, an owner, a next step and consent
• Unsubscribes, STOP replies and do-not-call requests go to one list

Want to know where your leads land today, and who sees them first? That is part of the free 15-minute lot check — send us your URL. Or read more about the CRM.