A dealer in Almaty advertises a base trim on its website and on Kolesa. The last car in that trim sold yesterday, but the listings keep bringing in calls. Aidos, a sales manager, offers a more expensive version, the buyer argues about the price, and the CRM gets the loss reason "poor-quality lead".
There is nothing to blame the lead for: the person called about the car in the listing, and it had already been sold. Before the next launch, your job is to tie every offer to a car the dealer can actually sell on those terms. The numbers in the example are illustrative. In it, ads, the warehouse and sales all look at one stock record, and a campaign's result is tracked to the handover of the keys.
Availability belongs to a car and its terms
One model can come in different trims, model years, prices and delivery times. "We have that model" does not say whether the version in the listing is available.
The dealer has twelve cars not yet handed over to buyers: four free for sale, two reserved, six in transit. Cars already sold and delivered stay in the history and are not among the twelve.
| Status | Cars | What you can tell the buyer |
|---|---|---|
| Available for sale | 4 | The purchase terms for these exact cars |
| Reserved | 2 | The current reservation and a possible next step |
| In transit | 6 | Order terms and expected delivery |
| Total before handover | 12 | What is on the books, with no promise to hand over all of them today |
The listing opens a car with the same identifier or a clearly defined group of trims. The record holds the status, the price with its terms, the handover location and the time of the last update. The warehouse owns the status, the marketer owns the page and the ads, and Aidos and the other managers own what is promised on the phone.
An ad and the current car record
Ad and listing
One car identifier or a clearly defined trim group
Current record
Status, price and conditions
Collection location and update time
After a sale
Update the ad, website and salesperson’s guidance
Inventory owns status, marketing owns the page and ad, and sales owns promises in conversation.
When a car sells, the record changes everywhere it appears: the Kolesa listing, the website card and the manager's prompt. Agree in advance who takes the offer down and how the team finds out that the data has stopped updating. If a card has not been touched in a while, it cannot back a promise of same-day handover.
The "Unavailable offers" section of the Google Ads misrepresentation policy prohibits promoting an offer that does not exist or is hard to find on the landing page. Other platforms have their own rules; read them before launch too. If the dealer takes orders for future delivery, say exactly that: an order with a wait.
A buyer may take a different path
Not everyone needs a loan, a trade-in and a test drive. A sale without one of those steps is still a sale. So the CRM stores the events and the path the buyer chose, rather than herding everyone into the same funnel.
A test-drive booking and a completed test drive are different events, just like a reservation and a handover. If a visit is rescheduled, the new date links to the original enquiry, and the move does not create a new customer.
A buyer may call first, then message on WhatsApp, then fill in the form on the website as well. The contact history has three records, but there is one unique enquiry, merged by the agreed rule. A matching phone number helps find duplicates, but a manager confirms whether the records belong to one request.
An end-to-end report connects the source, the enquiry and the result. If someone came for one model and drove away in another, the deal keeps both the original interest and the delivered car. Two models in the history are still one sale.
The cost of a form, a visit and a handover
Take a hundred new unique enquiries from one campaign and follow each for 90 days from the first contact. Twenty people booked a test drive, twelve came, three took delivery of a car. In this group all three had a test drive; in others the path may differ.
The campaign spent 300,000 ₸.
| Group result | Calculation | Ad spend per result |
|---|---|---|
| Unique enquiry | 300,000 / 100 | 3,000 ₸ |
| Test-drive booking | 300,000 / 20 | 15,000 ₸ |
| Completed test drive | 300,000 / 12 | 25,000 ₸ |
| Buyer with a delivered car | 300,000 / 3 | 100,000 ₸ |
In a presentation it is easy to take 15,000 ₸ per booking and call it the cost of a visit. Counted on the people who actually came, a visit costs 25,000 ₸. The label under a number changes what it means.
A hundred thousand per buyer is advertising only. Manager time, preparing materials and other acquisition costs will push full CAC higher. And judging the deal also needs contribution after the cost of the car and the costs of selling it.
The 90-day window goes into the label as well. If another handover happens later, the group total updates. This month's sales from old enquiries are not divided by this month's new enquiries: they had different amounts of time to buy.
A loss reason tells you what to fix
The label "poor-quality lead" lumps together a missing car, a price that did not fit and a conversation that never happened. It does not tell you what to do with the ads.
For each enquiry, store the offer version, the trim of interest, availability at the time of contact, when the person wants to buy and the agreed next step. Record the loss reason so the action is clear:
- The requested car is not available: update the offer and check it against the warehouse.
- The price or timing did not fit: keep the stated condition and review who the ads are aimed at.
- A suitable offer exists: set the next step with a manager.
- Could not reach the person: leave the reason for their choice unknown.
The last line tells you nothing about demand. Before drawing a conclusion about the channel, find out why nobody got through. Financial documents and loan application details stay in a protected process; they have no place in ad parameters.
The price in the ad survives the conversation
A car's full price and a monthly finance payment answer different questions. The buyer should see the conditions the calculation and the offer's availability depend on. The marketer cannot promise approval to everyone: the decision follows the financing procedure.
The same goes for trade-in. A preliminary valuation of the buyer's car and the price after inspection may differ. The page explains what has been valued provisionally and what the inspection will settle, and Aidos says the same thing on the phone.
Before launch, walk the buyer's path yourself: from the Kolesa listing to the offer in the showroom. If the price changes because of a mandatory condition the person only hears about in conversation, fix the original offer. A manager should not have to rescue, with explanations, a promise the dealer does not keep.
Service revenue has yet to happen
After handover the customer may come back to the dealer for servicing, or may go to another garage. So future service contribution is not added to the sale as money already received.
For customer base value, use buyers' actual service visits over the same period. Subtract parts, labour, discounts and other related costs from service revenue. Contribution received and the forecast for the coming years go on different lines.
Warranty repairs, paid servicing and add-on offers also go on separate lines. The forecast is built on the behaviour of a comparable group of buyers, with its assumptions written down. Selling a car today gives you no right to credit it with every future service visit.
Exercise: rebuild the dealer's report
Take two campaigns whose enquiries have had the same time to buy, and build a table you can take to the warehouse and the sales team.
0 of 6 done
Campaign A from the example spent 300,000 ₸ and produced a hundred enquiries and three handovers. Campaign B spent the same and produced sixty enquiries and four handovers within 90 days. A's CPL is 3,000 ₸, B's 5,000 ₸. Ad spend per buyer is 100,000 and 75,000 ₸.
On cost per handover B looks better, but the whole difference is one sale: one more handover for A would have given the same 75,000 ₸. Raising the budget needs steadier data, the contribution of the trims sold and a stock of suitable cars. For now these figures only let you put questions to the campaign and the sales team. Promising the dealer 75,000 ₸ for every next handover on these numbers would be wrong.