The COVID-19 pandemic is rapidly reshaping large parts of our daily lives – more quickly than some businesses can adapt. In our industry, dealers, vendors, and OEMs are facing incredible uncertainty and business pressures as consumers stay home and governments shut down operations.
CarGurus is determined to be a supportive partner through this situation. That’s why we wanted to let you know that due to the incredible impact of the virus and the restrictions being put in place across the country, we have decided to make some temporary changes to free and paid CarGurus Listings services, effective 4/1.
Specifically, we’re offering a suspended activity option to our paying customers who choose to cancel their subscriptions with us due to the crisis, whether their states were shut down by official orders or not. Our goal is to give our customers immediate financial relief while maintaining the best possible shopping experience for our car-buying audience, as well as giving our dealers a jump start when they’re ready to get back to business after the situation returns to normal. Here are the details of the suspended activity option:
- Dealers pay nothing, but their inventory stays live on our site.
- Leads are not sent in real time. Instead, shopper interest will go into a queue for later delivery. We’ll make clear to shoppers on VDPs and in confirmation emails that they won’t hear back from dealers immediately.
- When dealers reactivate their accounts, those stored customer inquires will be delivered, giving dealers the chance to follow up with potential customers. Two thirds of car purchases are need-based, and we expect that many shoppers won’t be able to address those needs during the suspension period. Having that shopper contact information will help dealers rebuild their pipeline as they get back to selling cars.
This is a free service. Dealers won’t be charged for the delayed contacts or for the days they were in this suspended status. It’s important to note that paying dealers who want to keep business as usual can still take advantage of our 50% off of April offer and continue getting leads in real time.
We are also temporarily suspending our free Restricted listings program and putting those dealers into the same suspended activity program. When we reinstate the Restricted listings program, those dealers will also receive their queued contacts, although they will receive anonymous contacts, as before. Given the number of dealership closures, we are offering this program to provide a dependable shopping experience for consumers, as we aren’t able to track the status of free dealers using our platform. Instead we’re focusing on our paying customers and our shoppers to make sure their experience is as good as possible during these unusual circumstances.
We hope to return to our normal level of service as quickly as possible once consumer activity returns to normal. And we hope our customers, their families, and their employees are staying as safe as possible. If you have any questions, please reach out to your account manager or call 1-800-CARGURUS. We’re here to help.