Worst Practices | Case Studies | Marketing | Advertising
I’m considering a new car and have been poking around the various automaker websites in the past few weeks. It’s been frustrating!
Automaker marketers seem addicted to cookies and at the same time, they assume that everybody visiting the site is ready to “build a vehicle".
Yes, I know that there are ways to disable cookies or go incognito. However, even using these strategies, content is difficult to find, and sites are so feature heavy that they are tough to use.
An example: Toyota
Choosing a specific vehicle on the Toyota website brings up a page that’s slow to load because the first thing you see is a video. I’ve got a very fast and robust internet connection, but it still lags.
The next thing you see when scrolling down is the “Build Now” tool which I had wanted to avoid because I was just researching vehicles at this stage. However, using the build tool appears to be the only way to find availability and pricing of optional equipment.
When I came back to the site a few hours later, cookies led me back to “finish my build”.
The Toyota Cookies policy page is quite extensive providing 1,500 words detailing web tracking use. “By visiting the Toyota websites, whether as a registered user or otherwise, you acknowledge, and agree that you are giving us your consent to track your activities and your use of the services and functionalities through the technologies described above, as well as similar technologies developed in the future.”
It’s not just Toyota. Other auto manufacturer websites are similar.
Kicking the virtual tires
A quirk of the auto business - the dealer network - makes the problem much worse.
The central auto manufacturer website is designed to deliver basic information to buyers. But automaker sites are also configured to push potential customers to a local dealer to test drive and buy.
The concept of a central automaker site which also serves as the local website for each dealer adds further complexity. These ponderous automaker websites means buyers go elsewhere to research vehicles.
After giving automaker sites a go and facing difficulty, I did most of my vehicle research at sites like Car and Driver, Hagerty, Edmunds and Reddit. I checked out reviews on YouTube.
I may end up buying a Toyota despite the website.
