The Hidden Story Behind Your Dealership Leads

Historically, the gold-standard for measuring dealership marketing performance has been lead volume. These metrics are easy to measure, simple to understand, and provide clear insight into your marketing’s direct impact on generating customer contact. 

However, focusing exclusively on lead counts could mean you’re missing the broader picture of customer engagement. There’s substantial buyer activity happening on your website that doesn’t appear in traditional lead reports, and understanding actual user behavior when they visit your site reveals significant opportunities to enhance the effectiveness of your marketing.

Your Advertising Impact Goes Beyond Form Fills 

Form fills provide a solid baseline for measuring marketing performance and demonstrate interest while generating contact information for follow-up communications. The challenge is that many meaningful customer interactions don’t result in form submissions you can easily track. 

Consider this common scenario: A shopper sees your Search ad for a specific vehicle and clicks through to your website. They’re genuinely interested, so they use the Kelley Blue Book trade-in tool on your site to determine their current car’s value, then complete the form (known as an  
i-frame), and submit their information. 
 
In your CRM, this lead is attributed to Kelley Blue Book instead of paid search because the  
i-frame submission doesn’t occur directly on your website. 

This tracking challenge happens with numerous tools embedded on dealer websites—financing calculators, appointment schedulers, trade valuation tools, and service booking systems. These  third-party applications run within your website, and while they provide a better user experience for shoppers, they create significant blind spots in your marketing analytics. 

Our industry research shows that approximately 60% of dealership form submissions happen through these i-frames, which are untrackable by default. Here are some common examples: 

While some i-frames can be customized to allow for proper tracking, this often requires requests to the i-frame providers and dealership approval, and these solutions are subject to breaking or tracking inaccurate data. 

The consequence? You’re missing visibility into where your actual shoppers originate, and while your advertising campaigns are generating results, you can’t measure the complete impact. 

Improve Your Marketing Results with Better Data 

Adpearance sets up form and call tracking in every instance we can—whether through native website forms, i-frames, or third-party tools. However, we know that’s not the complete picture. Some i-frames remain untrackable, and many shoppers never submit a lead online or call at all. Instead, they conduct their research digitally, then show up at the dealership to purchase. 

That’s why we blend the best of both worlds through MarketAI: Combining known user intent signals (like forms and calls) with other intent-based actions to construct a comprehensive picture of buyer behavior. 

MarketAI identifies engagement patterns that indicate genuine purchase intent for your dealership—from traditional lead submissions to vehicle detail page interactions, return visits, and inventory research behavior. It uses this complete dataset to optimize your advertising and attract more high-quality prospects. 

This strategy improves targeting precision by focusing your marketing efforts on shoppers who exhibit authentic buying signals across multiple touchpoints, rather than casting a wide net and hoping for leads. The outcome is higher quality traffic, improved conversion rates, and better attribution of your actual sales impact. 

Tracking User Behavior on Your VDPs 

Most car buyers don’t complete a form during their initial visit to your website, instead they browse inventory, compare vehicles, and research options. They often visit multiple times before filling out a form or visiting your dealership. 

We look for these 3 behaviors to identify engaged shoppers: 

1. Engaged VDP views: A user invests significant time on a VDP (vehicle detail page), scrolling through photos, reading descriptions, and examining features and pricing. This represents focused attention—typically 20 seconds or more of concentrated engagement. 
2. Multiple VDP sessions: This is common comparison-shopping behavior, where a user might examine three or four similar vehicles during the same visit, evaluating their options and narrowing their preferences. 
3. Returning VDP visits: The strongest indicator of purchase intent, showcasing a user advancing through the buying process. They might be sharing it with a spouse, researching additional details, or building confidence in their purchasing decision. 

Many shoppers who demonstrate these behaviors ultimately make purchases without ever submitting an online form. They conduct their research on your website, then contact you directly or visit the dealership in person. Traditional tracking systems miss this connection, but Adpearance’s integrated approach identifies these high-value behavioral patterns. 

By combining user-level tracking, inventory intelligence, and real-time market data, we can correlate website engagement with actual vehicle sales—giving you visibility into the complete customer journey from first click to final purchase. 

How Complete Data Improves Campaign Performance 

Understanding customer behavior beyond form submissions directly improves your advertising performance. 

Consider these three different customer journeys: 

• Person 1: Submits a form and purchases a vehicle 
• Person 2: Calls the dealership and purchases a vehicle 
• Person 3: Views a specific VDP 6 times over 2 days, then visits the dealership and purchases—without ever filling out a form or calling 

Without engaged VDP metrics being sent as signals back to our performance algorithms, Google would assume that only 2 out of 3 visitors to your site were quality prospects. This means Google’s algorithm would avoid targeting users similar to Person 3 in the future even though they represent genuine buyers. 

This is where our comprehensive tracking approach becomes critical. Good data in equals great performance out. By giving Google the most complete dataset possible—including form submissions, calls, and engaged VDP behavior—we help it identify and target all types of serious car shoppers, not just the ones who happen to submit forms online. 

The result? Your campaigns reach more qualified prospects, generate higher-quality traffic, and ultimately drive more sales from your marketing investment. 

Find Out What Your Lead Counts Aren’t Telling You 

The hidden story behind your dealership leads isn’t just about the forms that get submitted or the calls that come in. It’s about the complete customer journey—the research sessions, the vehicle comparisons, the return visits, and the engaged browsing that happens before someone ever contacts you. 

Most dealers are making marketing decisions based on incomplete data, seeing lead counts and website traffic but missing the customer behavior patterns that actually predict sales outcomes. Without this complete picture, you’re potentially training your advertising algorithms to avoid your best prospects. 

MarketAI reveals this complete narrative behind your marketing performance, connecting the dots between website engagement and actual vehicle sales. It shows you which advertising channels drive the most engaged visitors, which inventory generates genuine customer interest, and how specific behaviors correlate with sales outcomes. 

Ready to see these insights in action? Schedule a demo to see our comprehensive data sets at work in your market. Our team will show you the complete picture of your customer behavior, from initial click to final purchase, and reveal opportunities your current reporting is missing.