How to choose a dealer website builder: 12 questions to ask

Whether you sell cars, motorcycles, caravans, motorhomes, vans or trucks, your website provider is a choice you live with for years. Moving later costs time, search rankings and enquiries. These twelve questions show whether a dealer website builder suits the way you sell, before you commit.

1. Is the website on your own domain, and is it yours?

Your website should live on a domain you own, such as www.yourdealership.co.uk, with the padlock (SSL) set up for you. Ask what happens to the domain and the content if you leave. Your name and your pages are part of your business.

2. Can you change pages yourself?

Opening hours change, offers end and new stock arrives. If every change means sending an email and waiting, the website falls behind. Ask to see the editor. Can you add a page, move a section or change a picture yourself, and see it on a phone before it goes live?

3. Is it built for your kind of stock?

A car form does not suit every dealer. Caravan buyers filter by layout and berths, motorhome buyers by berths and base vehicle, van buyers by payload, wheelbase and VAT status, and truck buyers by type, axles and body. A trailer has no mileage or engine at all. Check that the stock form and the search filters speak your buyers’ language.

4. How does stock get on to the website?

Ask how long it takes to add a vehicle. Number-plate lookup fills in most of the details for registered vehicles. Bulk photo upload from a phone saves time on the forecourt. If you would be typing the same vehicle into two systems, that is time you pay for every week.

5. Does it work with AutoTrader the way you do?

Some dealers manage stock in AutoTrader and want their website to follow it. Others want one home for their stock that publishes out to AutoTrader. Ask which directions are supported, and how quickly a change in one place shows in the other.

6. How much control do you get over SEO?

The groundwork (a sitemap, clean addresses, redirects when a page is renamed, and structured data) should be done for you. Beyond that, ask whether you can set the titles and descriptions buyers see in Google, and build pages for the searches your buyers make, such as automatic cars under £10,000 or two-berth caravans. Our guide to dealer SEO in plain English explains why these matter.

7. Is there a blog?

Articles that answer buyers’ questions are one of the steadiest ways for an independent dealer to be found. A blog should be part of the website, not a separate system, so posts sit on your domain and can show your stock.

8. Does it work properly on a phone?

Most buyers will see your website on a phone first. Open a demo site on yours. Is it quick? Can you search stock, swipe photos and call or enquire without pinching and zooming?

9. What happens to an enquiry?

A website’s job is to bring you enquiries. Ask where they go, who is told, and how you keep track of follow-ups. Part-exchange and “sell your vehicle” forms are worth having too: they bring in stock as well as buyers.

10. What will it really cost as you grow?

Look past the headline price. Ask about setup fees, contract length, and what happens to the price when your stock grows or shrinks with the seasons. Ask what is included and what is extra: the stock feeds, number-plate lookup, the blog, extra users or a second location. Our guide to what a dealer website costs goes into this.

11. Can you get your data out?

Your stock, your enquiries and your figures belong to you. Ask what you can download, in what form, and what happens to your data if you leave.

12. Who helps you, and how?

Software is only part of it. Ask who sets you up, whether someone will look over your site before it goes live, and how you reach a person when you need one. If you are moving from another website, ask how your old addresses will be pointed at your new pages, so links and search rankings are not lost.

Try before you decide

Reviews and demos help, but nothing beats using the software with your own stock. A free trial lets you add a few vehicles, change a page and see the result on your phone before you spend anything.

How MotoVend handles it

MotoVend is a dealer website builder and management system for UK independent dealers. Your site runs on your own domain with automatic SSL, and you build and change it yourself with a page builder, previewing on a phone before you publish. It has a stock form for each of six vehicle types, number-plate lookup for cars, motorcycles, vans and trucks, and AutoTrader in either direction. You also get SEO tools you control, a blog, and data downloads. It is one plan, priced by your stock, with no setup fee, a welcome call for each new account and a design and SEO review before you go live. You can try it free for 14 days. See the website builder.