Combat part obsolescence in your dealership's online parts counter
As a dealer, keeping your parts inventory current is crucial in maintaining customer satisfaction and maximizing revenue. With car ages growing (the current average car age is over 12 years old) and with many second or third generation vehicle owners opting to buy their own genuine parts, it’s important to understand what your customers are doing: looking for increasingly obsolete and rare parts online.
However, the reality of part obsolescence can pose significant challenges, especially for your online parts counter. In this blog, we’ll outline some ways you can combat this issue.
Keep track of what sells
Whether you are looking for information on how much you sold last month, or which products are most profitable, the SimplePart eCommerce platform has you covered and makes it easy to find and review these important metrics. Our customized reports coupled with our team of experts can help you analyze and improve your online performance.
Here are some reports you may want to consider as you review your site’s eCommerce performance so you can understand how best to serve your customers. Keep in mind, this list is just a starting point.
If you pull the Cart Conversion Rate report in the SimplePart Control Panel, you’ll see the percentage of people who added a product to their cart after landing on your website. The higher the number, the better.
Source of Visitors & Sales is available in the Reports section of the Control Panel. This report is designed for those dealers with packages that include online advertising (SEM) services.
But to truly track the popularity of certain parts and accessories on your parts website, you’ll want to regularly review the reports in the Inventory section on the SimplePart Control Panel. You’ll be able to see exactly how certain parts and accessories perform and be able to keep certain items in stock, whether they're obsolete or not.
Enable the PDC fulfillment option
Depending upon your program, you can use PDC fulfillment for obsolete or rare parts so you don’t have to keep them on hand but still serve your customer base.
This allows customers to request specific parts, giving you time to source them without maintaining unnecessary stock.
Open an eBay store through SimplePart
To move obsolete parts, you can integrate SimplePart’s services with an eBay store. With SimplePart’s easy eBay integration, you can:
To learn more about integrating eBay with the SimplePart platform, contact our CSC team at support@simplepart.com.
Run coupons for obsolete parts
If you have difficulty moving obsolete parts, you can run special coupons on the items to help them sell faster. Offer attractive discounts to move these items quickly, freeing up capital and storage space for newer inventory. Check out the coupons section in the SimplePart Control Panel or our knowledge base article.
Optimize your pricing
Optimizing your website’s pricing is a great way to achieve specific goals around volume, gross profit, conversion, and product mix. Plus, the SimplePart platform makes it easy to change pricing on different products or product groups. Check out our knowledge base article on how to adjust your pricing.
Leverage resources
Set up a coaching session with our Dealer Strategy team. If you’re interested in fine-tuning your pricing or running promotions to help move obsolete parts, it may be helpful to set up a one-on-one coaching session with a member of SimplePart’s Dealer Strategy team. You can reach Dealer Strategy at coaching@simplepart.com. They can help you identify the opportunities and the best strategies to reach your goals for success.
Enhance your online parts catalog
Ensure your online catalog is up-to-date, user-friendly, and provides detailed information about part compatibility, and supersessions. This helps customers make informed decisions and reduces the likelihood of ordering obsolete parts. Providing detailed information about compatibility and benefits will encourage customers to choose current parts. But how can you do that?
Microcat EPC helps grow dealer parts sales, boosts productivity and increases customer satisfaction by making searching for parts faster. After just three months of use, one dealer experienced 12–15% growth in their wholesale parts business. Learn more on Infomedia’s website about how Microcat makes finding and selling parts easy.
Use platform features
Providing online chat support or a dedicated helpline for customers seeking advice on parts, is a great idea but doesn’t match the reality of today’s understaffed parts counter. Combat that with adding the Product Questions module to your SimplePart platform and let your knowledgeable staff guide customers asynchronously towards choosing the right part.
This feature allows you to reach customers at key points in the purchasing process. Customers can submit product questions via the Product Page and you can provide responses via the Control Panel. Providing customers with detailed product information can help reduce cancellations.
Stay informed about industry trends and technological advancements
Keep abreast of automotive technology trends and upcoming model changes. This foresight will help you anticipate which parts may become obsolete and adjust your inventory strategy accordingly.
By implementing these strategies, you can effectively combat part obsolescence at your online parts counter, improving customer satisfaction, reducing waste and optimizing your inventory investment. Remember, staying proactive and adaptable is the key to success in the ever-evolving automotive parts market.
Got questions?
If you’d like to find out more information about Infomedia’s suite of products like SimplePart or Microcat, contact us to find out how you can get started.