Speed to lead: how fast should a dealership reply to an online lead?
A dealership should reply to an online lead within the hour, and ideally within minutes. Harvard Business Review research found firms that tried to contact leads within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify them as firms that waited even an hour longer. Social Agencies builds the one-inbox setup that makes that speed normal.
What does the research say about lead response time?
Research published in Harvard Business Review in 2011 found that most companies answer online leads far too slowly, and that speed within the first hour changes the outcome sharply.
In "The Short Life of Online Sales Leads", James Oldroyd, Kristina McElheran and David Elkington audited 2,241 US companies with a test lead. 37% responded within an hour, 24% took more than 24 hours and 23% never responded at all. The average response time, among companies that responded within 30 days, was 42 hours.
A separate study in the same article covered 1.25 million leads at 42 US companies. Firms that tried to contact a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as those that waited even an hour longer, and more than 60 times as likely as those that waited 24 hours or more.
| Finding (HBR, 2011) | Figure |
|---|---|
| Companies audited with a test lead | 2,241 |
| Responded within an hour | 37% |
| Took more than 24 hours | 24% |
| Never responded | 23% |
| Average response time (responders within 30 days) | 42 hours |
Where do dealership leads get lost?
Dealership leads get lost in the gaps between channels: marketplace emails, website forms, Facebook messages and personal cell phones that nobody checks as one list.
Each channel on its own seems manageable. Together they make a job no one owns, so leads sit unread over lunch, after hours and whenever the salesperson who holds that phone is off.
The fix is not to watch more channels harder. It is to pull every channel into one list the whole sales team can see, so a lead never waits on one person's phone, and a manager can tell at a glance which leads have had no reply.
- Marketplace lead emails going to an info@ address one person checks once a day.
- Website forms sending to a mailbox nobody has open on their phone.
- Facebook and Instagram messages answered only when someone opens the page.
- Texts landing on one salesperson's personal cell.
- Missed calls with no record of which vehicle the caller wanted.
How do you set up a dealership to reply to leads fast?
Set up one inbox for every channel, push each new lead to the right salesperson's phone, and log it against the vehicle it is about.
The steps below turn reply speed from a habit you hope for into a system you can check.
- Route marketplace emails, website forms and ad leads into one shared inbox.
- Put call and text buttons on every vehicle page that name the unit.
- Send each new lead to the duty salesperson's phone as a notification.
- Record the vehicle, the source and the time received on every lead.
- Mark the time of the first reply, so slow answers show up on a list.
What should happen when a lead arrives after hours?
An after-hours lead should get an instant acknowledgement that names the vehicle and says when a person will reply, then land first in the morning queue.
Get My Auto suggests dealers ask any website provider this: "A lead comes in from my site at 9 pm on a Sunday. Walk me through the next five minutes." The honest answer for many dealers is that nothing happens until Monday.
An acknowledgement buys you the night. It should confirm the vehicle is still available if the feed says so, promise a reply by a stated time, and never quote a trade-in value or credit decision on its own.
How does a dealer measure lead response time?
Measure the gap between the time each lead arrived and the time of the first reply, and review the slowest ones every week.
An average hides the problem. Look at the slowest ten leads each week and ask where they came from and who held them. The pattern is usually one channel or one time of day.
Dart Motors moved its leads into one inbox, and a sale closed the day it went live. Nothing about the shoppers changed. The lead simply reached someone who could answer it.
What should the first reply to a vehicle lead say?
The first reply should confirm the vehicle is still available, answer the shopper's question in one line, and offer a clear next step such as a test drive time or a call.
Shoppers often ask one thing first: is it still available, can it be financed, will you take a trade. Answer that exact question before anything else. A reply that ignores it and pastes a sales script tells the shopper nobody read their message.
Use the shopper's name and the vehicle's name. Offer two test drive times rather than asking when suits them, because a choice between two is easier to answer than an open question.