GlobalData’s motor finance writer Athena Chrysanthou
The introduction of smartphones and computers has given birth to the age of enablement – with people able to do just about anything with a click of a button. In most cases, this is a positive thing – speeding up typically mundane tasks. But in some cases it presents certain challenges, like in the car remarketing sector. GlobalData’s motor finance writer Athena Chrysanthou looks at the issues with the rise in online car sales.
Chrysanthou says: “A key challenge is how to ensure the digital space is working cohesively for buyers and vendors in a physical space as well.
“Philip Nothard, customer insight and strategy director at Cox Automotive UK, says the current challenge in the industry is ensuring there is a balance between the online and offline world, although he predicts a rise in online car sales.”
Nothard tells GlobalData: “I think it’s a case of getting that blend between digital and physical cohesive so it’s allowing buyers, vendors to operate in the digital space using technology as well as being able to use it in a physical space that it works cohesively together and they are not two separate streams.
“We understand and we know that vendors and the sellers of a vehicle are moving further upstream so in terms of the people wanting to go direct to the end user there’s a lot of that taking place, both the buyers and the sellers want faster decisions and a more efficient process.
“We as a business forecast that there will be an increase in volume of vehicles being sold online as opposed to physical. The online experience will dominate more in the future and therefore the technology has to be better to present products.
“The way you image products, the information you hold in the digital space needs to be better so we are working very much for that at the minute. We are supporting that and we understand that technology in the remarketing world will become ever more agnostic and data will become ever more transparent.
“We can’t as a business and as an industry say we are there now, because digital technology is moving quicker than everything else, so we are constantly looking at where it is heading rather than where it is today. We need to look at the future at all times.”
