Digital Air Strike review: Horrible Product All Around 1

My name is Tony White and I am the Internet Sales Manager at Tom Denchel's. I have been selling cars for over 12 years. I have been the BDC Manager for most of those 12 years, consulted other dealerships, worked for AutoTrader.com, KBB.com, Microsoft, and many other companies. I have tried just about every product there is out there and I have to say that Digital Air Strike has to be the worst product I have used.

We use VIN Solutions as our CRM. We were told it would integrate with them. (No it does not! The product works inconsistantly through out the process. Sometimes they go into the CRM to let you know that a price quote is available. Then at other times it does not. They say the auto quotes will go out in 20 minutes or less (if you have it set up to do this which we do). So we wait for 20 minutes and most of the time they do not go out. (((PS DAS: This should be fixed as well as response times are KEY to any internet lead. You should have it where we can choose to send it out ASAP without it having to AUTOFIRE)))

We had to open up a GoDaddy email account so our BDC department can open and check that email to see what was sent to the customers. (Doubling or trippling our work). Then we have to copy and paste the URL of the price quote sent into the CRM NOTES so who ever reads the HISTORY including oursleves, knows what was sent to the customer and have an intellegent converstaion when we call them.)

They do not send out price quotes to vehicles that are older than the year 2000 (As of this email). Nor do they send 'Smart Follow' emails to your used car customers. """By they way, this was not told to us before we signed up"""". With used car sales being over 70% of a dealers business, you would think this would be their primary forcus, but it is not. They only offer Smart Follow on NEW CAR's. So, you have to create TWO completely different follow up processes in your CRM. One for new structured around their follow up process. Then one around USED...

We sent emails to our contact and they forward the emails onto support. To never have support contact you, or not in a timely manner anyway! And still, the issues are not resolved, just excusses.

We asked why some leads were not being sent and they said they had server issues and then sent out price quotes that were stored in there systems after we have all ready contacted the customers because it wasnt working to begin with. Then a few days later, same issue, and they blame it on the server. I sent forward the email to them from the days before with the same excuse and stated, Still?... No one ever responded.

As for auto applying the new car incentives, the default program they have from who ever they get their information from only posts one incentive. You have to go in there and manually apply the incentives each time they change from the OEM. (((COSTING YOUR STAFF TIME - Time = MONEY))). It takes me less time to just take a new vehicle, manually subtract the incentives on a calculator and type it in the email and send it... PRE D.A.S.. You also can not edit the pricing before you send out the email, only the text fields. Not a good situation!

I say if you are a dealer wanting to increase your ROI, this is not the product you should consider EVER! I have no idea about their SEO product. But I can fairly state that if they run their product and service like this for their email marketing, I am sure their SEO products will be the same.

NOTE TO D.A.S.: If you are going to sell your product to dealerships, you should learn how to work in one. You need to help dealers market all their inventory. In the dealer world, if 60% of your inventory is parked in a garage, how are you going to sell it and stay in business? That is what you have here. You have a product that should still be in BETA. This should not be on the market as a solution to dealers yet.

Take the time, money, and effort to make this a complete product before you try and sell it to us. I was exctitted to see your product presentation and to see it all work within our dealership. Only to find out we were not told everything it wouldnt do which happens to be something we NEED IT TO DO! So far, I think you are just running on pure luck! Sooner or later you luck will run out. If you are into Social Media, you know how word of mouth can hurt.

You can respond if you want. But when and if you do. Please do not respond with a cover up of all the issues. These are real issues that need to be addressed. Here are the questions you can answer. 1) Is your product scalable to market all year, make and models? (as of today?) 2) Can we use your product to market all new and used? (As of today?) 3) Can we edit our pricing? 4) Can you pull EVERY offer and incenitive to market on NEW? 5) Can you PROVE to US (OUR DEALERSHIP?) 6) Why doesnt your Customer Support Ever Contact Us? 7) Can we market our used inventory through your Smart Flow? 8)

I could write a lot more. I am sorry to post this D.A.S. but I have to do other dealers justice here. We have a business to run and your product as it is today is not ready to be in dealership. Dealers, feel free to contact me at [protected]@fordcountry.com. I am not affraid to put my name out on this complaint. Once these issues are taken care of, I will be more than happy to come in here and update this complaint.