Getting your dealership online: five steps from sign-up to live

For years, getting a proper dealer website meant a developer, a long brief and a bill to match. It does not have to. Here are the five steps from signing up to being live, in the order you will do them.

1. Start from a site that is already built

Your account begins with a ready-built website for your kind of dealership, filled with demo stock so you can see how your pages will look. Visitors see a “coming soon” page until you choose to publish, so you can take your time.

2. Make it yours

A short setup checklist walks you through the essentials: your business details, your logo, your colours, your pages and menus, and your legal pages. Type in your main brand colour and a matching colour scheme is built for you.

3. Add your stock

First delete the demo stock from the Stock screen. You can’t add vehicles, connect AutoTrader or publish until you do. Then, if you advertise on AutoTrader, connect it and your stock is copied in. Otherwise, type a number plate and most of a vehicle’s details fill themselves in. Add photos, let MotoVend draft a description for you to edit, and set the vehicle to Active when it is ready to show.

4. Preview, then publish

Look at your site as a buyer will, on desktop and on a phone. When you are happy, publish. Until that moment nothing is public.

5. Move to your own domain

Your site has its own MotoVend address as soon as your account is switched on. To use a domain you own, add it in MotoVend and create one DNS record where you bought the domain. It can take up to a day to take effect, and the secure padlock is set up for you.

Then keep improving

A website is never finished. Add a page, write an article, rearrange your home page. Page edits are saved as you go and only go live when you publish them, so you can work on your site without buyers seeing it half done. See the website builder.