Frequently Asked Questions

Over 75% of auto shoppers say that online video has influenced their shopping habits or purchases. The most successful dealerships understand that their customers are driven to know as much as they can about a vehicle before they visit a dealership, and video is the best possible way to share that information. By taking and promoting high-quality videos of vehicles as quickly as possible, dealerships are able to promote their inventory to potential buyers and drive higher sales faster than ever before.

Redline video is a software tool that allows anyone to capture high-quality multi-clip inventory videos. Collecting inventory videos improves the amount of time potential customers spend on a dealership’s website, as well as providing a powerful boost to a dealership’s SEO, or search engine optimization. High-quality video of vehicles in a dealer’s inventory can be one of the most powerful marketing tools available to drive traffic and sales.

SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of improving your website in specific ways, driving better visibility in search results on platforms such as Google, Bing, etc. when someone searches for the products or services you provide. Video is an important element of SEO – through the promotion of quality vehicle videos both on your site and on platforms like Youtube, your website will show up higher in search engine results, which means more traffic both to your site and to your lot. 

Customers of every kind want to know as much as they can about a product before they buy. This absolutely applies to vehicle shoppers, and the most successful dealers provide as much information about their inventory as possible on the web. High-quality vehicle videos remain a powerful tool for dealerships to provide this information and promote the vehicles in their inventory to potential buyers. In short, vehicle videos help your customers see and learn more about the cars you have available, which drives more traffic to your site and to your dealership.

SMS Lead Generation is the process of generating leads from potential customers by using vanity text words by promoting them on a dealer’s lot (often on vehicle stickers, printed materials, etc.), on the web, and on third-party sites to drive engagement. These vanity keywords are usually a combination of letters and numbers (e.g. “car123”). 

When a customer sees these codes on any kind of marketing material, they send a text message to the appropriate number (usually the last 8 digits of a vehicle’s VIN). They’ll then receive an immediate response that provides details and information about that vehicle directly on their mobile device. 

This helps keep them engaged with your dealership and your inventory, while also allowing you to follow up with them as you see fit to help drive a sale. Since Redline’s SMS Lead Generation service is tied directly to your CRM, you’re able to collect the prospective customer’s name, cell phone number, the vehicle they’re interested in, and often additional information like their age, address, and even gender.

A vanity textword is a unique, static text code used in marketing to provide potential customers easy access to information on vehicles and dealerships alike, and the client easy access to customer information which facilitates lead generation.

SMS Lead Generation extends the capacity of a dealership’s digital and traditional marketing efforts, including the opportunity to generate leads from a window sticker on a vehicle. Using vanity textwords, which allow a potential customer to receive details about a particular vehicle right on their mobile device, dealerships can seamlessly collect their contact information to help drive higher sales. 

SMS Lead Generation allows for leads to be generated via inventory photos, social media, third-party aggregators (such as cars.com, etc.), on your website, and even through traditional media like hangtags, posters, placards and more.

Not at all! In fact, SMS leads tend to be significantly below-average cost per lead for dealerships (our research has found anywhere between and $4-6 cost per lead, which is much cheaper than most other marketing channels).

In almost every case, yes – in fact, it’s a requirement for Redline’s SMS Lead Generation to do what it does best. This is because when a customer sends a text message through, your CRM will be fed the customer’s contact information (as well as some demographic information, where applicable). Your team can then follow up with them in a number of different ways to help drive them toward a vehicle sale.

Redline Digital Backgrounds is a service that accomplishes the same goal as a traditional photo studio for a dealership – namely, to provide consistent backgrounds for all the vehicles you take photos of. The difference is that a virtual photo studio requires none of the real estate and upfront cost of a traditional studio. Digital backgrounds are expertly applied to your vehicle photos to keep the look and feel consistent, but without drawing the viewer’s eyes to the background needlessly (which can happen when backgrounds are done poorly).

The main difference between a traditional photo studio and a digital background is the physical space that is occupied. Both provide consistent backgrounds, however a physical photo booth also requires significant real estate within a dealership – which also means less space to actually sell cars to potential customers. Unlike a traditional photo studio, Redline Digital Backgrounds can easily change backgrounds with unlimited options, and the cost to get started is significantly lower than a traditional photo booth.

The cost of a dealership photo booth can be significant! In many cases, a dealership could be looking at an investment of $40,000 or more to establish a booth within their lot. Traditional photo booths also require regular cleaning and periodic maintenance – so the costs can add up over time. 

There are several benefits to using Redline Digital Backgrounds rather than a traditional photo booth. The first and most obvious is the reduced cost – traditional photo booth setups can cost $40,000 or more, and that’s before adding in upkeep and maintenance. With a digital background solution, your cost is $2-3 per photo, depending on editing and added effects. No other upfront costs are needed. 

Additionally, a traditional studio setup requires a good amount of space in your dealership, which means less room for inventory to sell. A digital background solution doesn’t require any more space than you already use. Another benefit to a virtual photo studio is flexibility, as you can quickly and easily change out backgrounds to suit your needs (and even seasonality). Doing that with a traditional studio could add tens of thousands of dollars to your operating cost. 

Redline Inventory is a fully-integrated dealership service platform that allows dealers to get their vehicle inventory online quickly and seamlessly. The platform is also proprietary to Redline, meaning all of our automotive merchandising services are directly integrated, from video and SMS lead-generation to our Virtual Photo Studio, and everything in between. The Redline Inventory platform allows us to provide top-tier customer support and several other new features such as digital missing photo reports, digital invoices, and more.

Yes! The Redline Inventory platform allows dealerships with multiple locations (also known as “rooftops”) to manage all of them in one place, simply by selecting the location from the main menu. This eliminates the need to navigate through several steps just to manage day-to-day tasks for multiple locations.

Yes! Because the Redline Inventory platform is proprietary to Redline, all of our other services – from Redline Video to Redline SMS Lead Generation – are seamlessly integrated. This makes the workflow for any dealership that much easier and more efficient.

Because Redline also provides physical lot services, inventory photography, and vehicle data collection, we holistically support both data capture and data distribution. This means we have a better understanding of both than most vendors who cater to one side or the other – that’s the benefit of working with an automotive merchandising expert with over 15 years of experience working directly with dealerships. Our customer support team is dedicated to providing the highest-level of service and support to our customers, ensuring quick response times and issue resolution.

The term “OEM verified inventory data” refers to VIN-specific options, packages, colors, and features listed for each vehicle on your lot. This information is critical for customers to see as they are comparing options and shopping for a new or pre-owned vehicle. Redline Inventory uses OEM verified inventory data to ensure your vehicles are listed properly on your site, and as many features as possible are photographed.