Vines Group

Published: May 2024

Find out how Marketing Delivery helped Vines Group:

✔️ Target Aftersales Customers with an Automated Solution

✔️ Achieve an Average Open Rate of 62%

✔️ Part-Exchange an Additional 145 Vehicles Against a New Purchase

The Business

Vines Group, a family-run business since 1980, retails and maintains new and used BMW and MINI cars and motorbikes. With 3 sites located within the Gatwick, Guildford and Redhill areas, the award-winning business strives to deliver outstanding customer service across its sales and aftersales departments.

The Challenge

The industry-wide volatility in sales of new cars and motorcycles over recent years has meant, like many of its peers, the Vines Group faced a reduction in the supply of used vehicle stock to meet the needs and preferences of potential customers. The Group sought new ways to increase access to retail-ready used stock, especially in the more desirable three- to five-year-old age bracket.

Any new strategy had to be considerate of the limited time that sales teams had to manage responses to a new, large-scale marketing programme.

The Solution

Vines Group has been working with Marketing Delivery since 2018 as part of a strategy to automate key elements of its marketing activity and to support the development and activation of digital marketing campaigns.

With its sites already using our VoiceBox Stock Alerts solution to drive sales conversion, Vines Group turned to us for additional expertise and advice to help address its stock shortage. The Group’s dedicated Account Manager suggested that Vines target its aftersales customers with an automated solution, carefully timed to encourage them to change their vehicle or bike.

The activity that followed saw Vines approach relevant aftersales customers with an automated Stock Alerts email before and after their workshop appointment. The email shared details of a car or bike that was similar to the one they already owned but a newer model or one with lower mileage.

Marketing Delivery’s Aftersales Stock Alerts emails can be easily segmented, so Vines was able to specifically target owners of products that were in the in-demand three- to five-year age bracket.

Within each Stock Alerts message, Vines includes a link to a valuation tool so that customers can establish the approximate value of their existing model to give them an idea of their budget, as well as a link to book a test drive, encouraging prospects back into a buying mindset.

The Outcome

In 2023, a total of 96,736 Aftersales Stock Alert emails were sent to 4,376 service customers across the Vines Group. 55,923 were opened, with an average open rate of 62%, exceeding the industry average of 60%*. This new initiative resulted in 145 vehicles being part-exchanged against a new purchase – a healthy conversion rate of 3.3% – and an increased gross profit opportunity of approximately £181,000**.

Will Jennings, head of marketing at Vines Group, said…

“The results speak for themselves; not only are we bolstering our used stock pipeline, but we are also retaining customers for the aftersales department. It just goes to show how the right message at the right time can convert aftersales customers into a buying mindset, delivering against two operational objectives at once.

The Marketing Delivery team and the VoiceBox automated system are faultless. The system is so simple to use, and the automation means that our team can focus on the day job.”

*Source: Email Marketing Benchmarks and Statistics for the Automotive Industry, Marketing Delivery 2024

**Based on an average profit per unit of £1,250