FAQ’s About Automotive Product Consultants

Automotive Product Consultants (APC) is an industry leader in vehicle dealership marketing. Our team works with dealerships across the country, and we’ve received many questions over the years from potential partners. With over 24 years of experience in the field, we are well-equipped to help you with more than dealership marketing. These are some of the common questions potential clients ask us.

Data Security

Is my data secure with Automotive Product Consultants?

Yes, dealers can trust APC with their data. APC only uses authorized DMS connectivity, and our team is certified with Autosoft, CDK and Reynolds. APC can only access data that is pushed to our system from your dealership DMS. It’s sent to us in a one-way data push and is in an encrypted format that is completely secure. Once APC receives the data, it stays in our data warehouse under banking level security.
It is the dealership’s data and not used for any other purpose. This is the dealership’s program under their name and brand. APC simply powers the program for the dealership.

Is it compliant to give APC my data?

Absolutely. Automotive Product Consultants complies with all consumer privacy, insurance, and telemarketing regulations. APC is the only company in the industry that provides full compliance with all facilities under one roof, including data management, direct mail, printing, contract fulfillment, customer service, and sales center with licensed agents.

What if I don’t want someone in my DMS pulling data?

The good news is that APC doesn’t pull data. The DMS provider sends us limited, non-sensitive customer information. Our company can’t pull or view any data beyond what the DMS sends us. We do not have access to any financial or sensitive personal information. You can learn more about this by reading the Dealer Agreement and viewing the bold and underlined sections.

Marketing Communications

How often does Automotive Product Consultants contact customers?

APC’s goal is not to bombard customers with continuous mail. We use a lifecycle marketing approach that targets different customer types at key moments during the lifecycle of their vehicle ownership when they are most likely to buy. For a new vehicle which has the longest lifecycle, we typically market at five key intervals. Customers who don’t respond receive a follow-up 30-45 days later. If there is still no response, the customer data is placed “on the shelf” until the next key lifecycle interval.
We use both mail and email to maximize program performance, employing various letter and email styles to capture attention. Variable messaging driven by data intelligence ensures the right message reaches the right customer at the right time. If a customer doesn’t want to receive additional mail or emails, they can easily opt out.

Does APC cold call my customers?

No, we receive inbound calls thanks to mail and email communication. Our sales and customers service teams only generate outbound calls if a customer requests a callback or follow-up to a quote. We staff our call center with licensed sales agents with extensive training in sales and products. We also record all calls for training and quality assurance purposes.

Experience and Service

Why can’t my dealership do this program ourselves?

APC’s leaders have over 24 years of post-sale marketing experience and comply with all consumer privacy, insurance, and telemarketing regulations. We are SOC 2, Type II certified to ensure we offer the best in data security. We market to the dealership’s customers at strategically timed intervals using the dealership’s name and logo, delivering the right message to the right customer at the right time.

Dealerships often lack the marketing infrastructure to handle creating these timed communications via mail and email. Dealers can also enhance our services with Conquest Marketing to target consumers in your community that you aren’t doing business with. We offer a 0% payment plan option with payment terms up to 36 months and handle all customer service to maintain high CSI scores for your dealership.

Most importantly, our program runs at no cost to the dealership. Costs associated with setup, postage, and data acquisition are all covered by Automotive Product Consultants.

Pricing and Strategy

What is your pricing and strategy?

APC doesn’t compete with the Finance & Insurance (F&I) department. By the time APC covers all program costs, including marketing, DMS fees, postage, sales costs, payment plans, and dealer commissions, the call center pricing is higher than the dealership’s pricing. F&I is always happy to hear we are not selling a service contract for less than them. Our sales agents are trained to sell top-down and never compete with F&I pricing.
If a sales agent learns that a customer already has a price from the dealer, they will suggest that the customer call or return to the store to make their purchase. From the start, we remind agents and F&I that this is a partnership to drive additional sales to the dealership. The call center is not meant to compete with them and will not cancel anything they sell. In return, we ask F&I not to encourage customers to cancel call center sales since those sales pay for the program.

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