HomeNet Digital LOT Mobile App Video Tutorial with CarData

Video Tutorial DigitalLot CarData
Video Tutorial DigitalLot CarData

Video Tutorial DigitalLot CarData

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Here is the full transcription of the Tutorial video:

Wayne Balroop: 00:09 Hi, my name is Wayne. I’m the regional manager of South Florida for CarData. CarData is an automotive photography company, pretty much the best one that you can get out there. What I want to do today is take some time to talk about an app that we use, pretty much, it is our main app we use for everything, our platform.

Wayne Balroop: 00:27 It is an app called DigitalLot, and it’s created by a company called HomeNet. Again, it’s the platform that we use for everything that we do. I want to break down step by step how we use this app, and why we use this app. So, one of the first things you want to do before you leave home, and I say before you leave home, because it’s best done on wifi, your home wifi, there’s not a lot of people that’s going to be on your home wifi, so you want to do it there is, you want to download the inventory, the current days inventory for the dealerships that you’re going to visit that day.

Wayne Balroop: 00:59 In order to do that, on your app while you have your app open, on the top left hand side of the screen, you’ll notice three lines. If you click on those three lines, there’s a menu. On this menu about middle way down, you’ll see an option for dealership management. If you click on dealership management, that’s going to give you a long list of dealerships depending on how many you have assigned to you. In my case, I have quite a few, so I’m going to choose the first two.

Wayne Balroop: 01:30 Now the first two, Acura of Pembroke Pines, and Al Hendrickson Toyota, two of our current customers. On the right hand side you’ll notice a toggle switch. This toggle switch is on, and off. On the left hand side there’s a circle. If the toggle switch is off, the circle will have an NA. If the toggle switch is on, the circle will either be blue, red, or green.

Wayne Balroop: 01:54 If you’re turning it on for the first time, the circle will probably be red, indicating that the inventory has not yet been downloaded, so you want to turn that toggle switch on. Once you turn the toggle switch on, the circle to your left will then turn blue, that indicates you’re now ready to download. So, you want to turn the toggle switch on for all the dealers you’re going to do for that day, and I have, I’ve done two of them.

Wayne Balroop: 02:21 So, on the top right hand corner now, you’ll notice two arrows making a circle. That’s your sync button. So, you want to click on that sync button. Once you click on the sync button, you’ll see that the circles on the left hand side of the dealerships will start moving.

Wayne Balroop: 02:37 Once that starts moving, it’s indicating that your inventory is now downloading. You want to wait until those circles turn green with a check mark. Once it has turned green with a check mark, that’s indicating that your inventory is now downloaded successfully, and you’re ready to go. So, after your inventory has downloaded successfully, meaning each dealership you’re going to visit that day, the green circle to the left of it has the check mark, now you want to go back to where you can switch between your rooftops.

Wayne Balroop: 03:08 So on the top left hand corner, there’s an arrow pointing to your left. Click on that arrow. That’s going to take you back to your main screen. This main screen is where you can toggle, or switch, or go to in between your dealerships. So for example, I’m going to select my first one right now, it says Acura of Pembroke Pines.

Wayne Balroop: 03:28 If I click on that dealership’s name, you’ll see another list of dealerships, same list of dealership that was in your dealership management. So now, the dealership that I’m currently going to visit is Al Hendrickson Toyota, so I’m going to select that dealership, then it’s going to take you back to your main screen. Once you’re back to your main screen, you’re going to notice some options.

Wayne Balroop: 03:50 First option: View vehicles. Second: Synching. Third: Your Vin scanner, and your fourth is your VIN keyboard. Let’s take a moment to go through each option. So first, we’re going to go to view vehicles. Once you select that, one of the things I want you to notice is right on top, you’ll have the dealership’s name, it will say last downloaded, it’ll have the current day’s date, it will have a time. To the right side of that, you’ll notice a green circle which has two numbers, first number slash second number.

Wayne Balroop: 04:25 You want to make sure that both of those numbers match. If both of those numbers do not match, you want to go back to step one. In my case, my numbers do not match, so what I’m going to do is I’m going to clear my inventory for that dealership, and I’m going to re-download. Sometimes there are certain circumstances that happen when you’re downloading, or the connection is cut off, or whatever really, but your inventory did not download properly, so you want to clear your inventory, re-download. We’re going to do that now.

Wayne Balroop: 04:56 So again, top left hand side, you’ll notice the three lines. You’re going to click that. Middle way down, you’re going to go into your dealership management. This is where we were before. Now, my dealership that I have an issue with right now, Al Hendrickson Toyota, on the left hand side, I already have a green circle with a check mark indicating that the inventory downloaded properly, however, I can clearly see that it did not, so I’m going to touch that green circle with the check mark.

Wayne Balroop: 05:28 Your screen is going to change. Now in your top right hand corner, you’re going to have the word clear. You’re going to click that clear button. It’s going to ask you if you’re sure you where you want to clear the inventory. It’s going to delete everything that’s currently in there, you’re going to click yes. Now, you’re going to wait.

Wayne Balroop: 05:47 That once green circle with the check mark is now going to turn blue. Once it turns blue, it indicated that all the vehicle, all the data, everything is now deleted, you’re clear to re- download. So now in the top right hand corner, the two arrows that make the circle, your sync button, or download button, you’re going to click that again.

Wayne Balroop: 06:09 Now you’re going to wait. You’re going to wait for the inventory to continue downloading. Once it’s successfully downloaded, you’ll get the green circle with the check mark again. Once that’s done, now we’re going to go see if our inventory downloaded properly by viewing the vehicle count to see if they match. So mine is still downloading, I could tell, because the blue circle currently has a line that’s going around it clockwise, and it tells me that it’s still in progress, so we’re just going to wait.

Wayne Balroop: 06:42 So now, my inventory is downloaded. I could tell, because my green circle has a check mark. So, top left hand corner, that arrow pointing to the left, we’re going to select that. Now, we’re back to the vehicle inventory. If I look at my vehicle count on the top right hand corner with the green circle, both numbers match. This is perfect. That means that you’ve successfully downloaded all the information. So now, I want to focus on the filter button.

Wayne Balroop: 07:08 So, on the top right hand corner there’s something that looks like a filter, click on that. Once you click on that, you’ll see the first thing that comes up is condition. So condition, if you click on that dropdown menu will list four options: All, New, Used, or Other. Depending on the inventory that you’re going to do, or you’re doing right now, I would suggest filtering it.

Wayne Balroop: 07:35 So, we’re going to work on new cars. Go ahead, and select new, and I would like to print a no photo list. So, the no photo list right under new, the word new, you’ll see photos, to the right hand side of that is zero, two, and there’s a number. So, you want to delete the number that’s in there, right now I have it on 256. I’m going to delete that, put it on zero, click done, and then click apply.

Wayne Balroop: 08:03 Now, this number just changed. I have 334 vehicles without photos. Just now, the number was 1880, so I want to be able to print this list. So, from the top right hand corner you’ll notice a line made by three dots, click on that line. You’ll see a pop up that says generate report, click on that, and here you can rename it if you’d like to your report title.

Wayne Balroop: 08:29 So, I can put in here Al Hendrickson, Toyota, no photo list, new cars. Let’s do that, and then click generate report. Here’s your report. So from here, top right hand corner, you have a bunch of different options you could do. You could save it, you could send it, you can print it, you can download it. I want to print it, so I’m just going to click on print, and print this report. Once you have this report printed, now you can go back to your screen.

Wayne Balroop: 09:03 I highly recommend after you’re done printing this report to go back to your filter, and instead of having zero, to zero, change it back to zero, to 256, why? So you can have the entire inventory listed in front of you. So, just in case there is a vehicle that already has photos, and you’re not sure, you can always double check, and see if that vehicle does have photos. So now I have my keys, because I went to the key machine with my list, got my keys.

Wayne Balroop: 09:31 I have my camera, I have my phone, I’m ready to roll, and I’m at my first car. Here’s my first car. Now, you could see this long list of vehicles, right? You’re not going search through this entire list to find this one vehicle. So on the top of the screen, you’ll notice a search icon. Click on that search icon, it kind of looks like a magnifying glass.

Wayne Balroop: 09:52 Once you click on that, you can type in the last five digits of the VIN. I highly recommend not using the stock number, because stock numbers are made by humans, and humans make errors. The VIN numbers, however, are made from the manufacturer. They’re pretty much always correct. So, use the last five of the VIN, type that in. I’m going to type in 62442, and my first vehicle came up.

Wayne Balroop: 10:16 Okay, so now I have that vehicle pulled up. There’s just very little information you need to verify. So, once the vehicle is pulled up, you’re automatically in your first tab, which is your general tab. This general tab is very crucial to how things show up on dealership’s websites, because we’re verifying the information. First, you’ll notice the location, which is the dealerships rooftop. Second, you’ll see style, style slash trim, just about the same thing.

Wayne Balroop: 10:42 So, you want to make sure that this is the correct style. This vehicle is listed as a 2020 Corolla L. On the back of the vehicle, I noticed it’s an LE, so I need to change that, so I’m going to click on that drop down where it says L, and I’m going to change it to LE. The next tab down is your stock number. Stock number, you don’t always need to verify, so we’re going to pass that, you’ll have your year, your make, and your model. Next, you’ll have your trim.

Wayne Balroop: 11:12 Once you change the style, the trim will automatically change by itself. Next, you have your mileage type. It is a new car, so there’s nothing I need to change there. Certified, no, because it’s a new car. There’s no certified new cars. Status, which is live. This vehicle, it’s ready to be sold, and ready to be advertised. Sold, it’s obviously not sold, because we’re now doing it, and days in stock.

Wayne Balroop: 11:38 The next thing I want to verify is your color. This says that it’s a classic silver. I can clearly look at the vehicle, and see what the color is. If the vehicle color is incorrect, then you want to click on that drop down menu, change it to the correct color. Next, interior color. Make sure that’s correct, then move down to transmission.

Wayne Balroop: 11:59 Transmission, you can look at the vehicle, see if it’s automatic, or manual, click on that drop down, and make any necessary changes. Next, we’re going to go all the way over, there’s several tabs. I’ll call them out as I’m going over to the tab that we need, right now for new cars. You have your pricing tab, your equipment tab, your options tab, your photo tab, stickers, which is your window labels, and services. Services is where you would charge for the vehicle to add it to your invoice.

Wayne Balroop: 12:32 So in this case, we’re just shooting pictures, I’m going to click for a new vehicle, and now you’re ready to take photos. You’ve just verified all the information on the app, and now you can put the phone away, and you could start to take photos. Okay, so now we’ve completed all of our new cars, we’re ready to move to used. Used is a little more in-depth. Uses is where the dealerships make their bread, and butter. Used is the reason that we probably got the agreement to do the photos for the dealership in the first place, because they need photos on used cars.

Wayne Balroop: 13:09 Think about it, if you’re going to buy a used car, someone else had it. You want to see more detailed photos compared to a new car. New car coming out of the manufacturer, you don’t care if you get 15, 20 pictures, you’re good. Used cars, you want 30, 35, 40 pictures, because you want to see what that vehicle is about. If there’s anything broken, how is everything working, what do the knobs look like? Are they worn out? How’s the tires look? How’s the engine compartment look? How’s the trunk look?

Wayne Balroop: 13:35 Well, did it have a water leak? But you get my drift. So, here’s what we’re going to do. I’m going to dive into the app. We’re going to go in to the filter tab. I’m going to filter to mine to used, and click apply. Now, mine shows 830 used cars in stock, just a beast of a dealership, but anyways, I have my keys, I made my list already, I’m ready to rock, and roll. I’m at my first car. Here’s what I’m going to do. Go into the search menu again, or search the search option, the magnifying glass icon, type in the last five of the VIN, and your vehicle pops up.

Wayne Balroop: 14:12 Here’s my first vehicle, it’s a 2019 Chevy Camaro LT. Well, I’m at this vehicle right now, so I can visually verify all the information. This is crucial to what we do with used cars, because all the information you’re going to confirm, and verify on this app is going to print on your window label. In addition to that, all that information is going to get exported to the dealerships websites, and all the third party vendors they advertise with, for example, Autotrader, Cars.com, Carfax, Cargurus, and et cetera.

Wayne Balroop: 14:43 So, we’re going to verify the style again, just as we did before. So, the style, this says it’s a one LT, two door convertible. First thing, I can verify it’s an LT. Is it a one LT? I have no idea. I’m going to have to trust, and rely on the VIN decoding provided by HomeNet on this app.

Wayne Balroop: 15:02 Now, I can see on the back of the car it does say LT, so I’ve confirmed that. I can see by looking at the car that it is a convertible, I’ve confirmed that. Now, I’m going to go down to verify my trim. My trim says one LT, it matches what the style is, that’s perfect. Let’s move down to mileage. You want to verify mileage for sure.

Wayne Balroop: 15:25 I’ve seen instances where the mileage was completely off, so please take my advice, verify the mileage. This says it’s 14811. I can look inside the car right now, and I can see it says 16811, human error by the dealership, or by someone who put this information in, so here’s what we’re going to do: We’re going to click on the mileage, we’re going to delete the old one, we’re going to put in the correct one.

Wayne Balroop: 15:52 You just saved a big mistake by verifying what you’re supposed to verify. Next, underneath mileage is your type, which is new, used. This tab says used right now, it is a used car, so I’m going to leave it. We’re going to go down to where it says certified. Now, certified is very important. This is a Chevy Camaro, I’m at a Toyota dealership. They would never certify a Chevy car.

Wayne Balroop: 16:19 A Toyota dealership could only certify a Toyota car, same thing for Chevy, same for all the brands, very important to learn, and remember, Chevy could only certify Chevy, and so forth for every brand that you go to. So, certified would never be checked off. So, you just want to verify is it certified? Yes. No. It’s a Chevy car at a Toyota dealership. No, it’s not certified. Next is status, and sold. It’s a car that you’re shooting right now, so it should always be live, and sold should always be no, because you’re now shooting photos for it.

Wayne Balroop: 16:55 Days in stock is important for a couple of different reasons. Days in stock, you want to see if the vehicle that you’re shooting, I do this just for self knowledge. The vehicle you’re shooting, has it been in stock for how many days? If it’s a been in stock for two, three weeks, and you’re now shooting photos, this could be a potential hazard to the dealership. They have not had this car advertised for that amount of time.

Wayne Balroop: 17:16 So, maybe you want to bring this up to the manager’s attention, but this is just outside of the app. Let’s get back to the app. You want to continue verifying your color. So, your first is your exterior color. This says black. I could see the car is black. The interior color says jet black. I could see it’s black. Do I know it’s jet black?

Wayne Balroop: 17:35 No, but it VIN decoded as jet black. I’m going to leave it, because it does say black. The next thing you’re going to do is verify your transmission. The transmission says automatic. I can verify that it’s automatic, because I’m visually looking at it. Now, you’re ready to go to the next step. The next tab is pricing. At this dealership, we put pricing on window labels, so here’s what I want to make sure, that when I click on the pricing tab, the first option has a price on it, and I do see a price.

Wayne Balroop: 18:04 There’s several different options in here. There’s MSRP, selling, invoice, internet price, and miscellaneous one, two, and three. We use just about all of them. It’s dealer specific, so get with your manager, so you can find out which tab needs to have a price for it to print on the window sticker. In this case, there’s only one tab that we’re using, the price is there, I know we’re good.

Wayne Balroop: 18:29 Next, you have the equipment tab. All this is going to be VIN decoded. There’s nothing you need to do here. Next is your option tab. Again, all VIN decoded provided by HomeNet, there’s nothing you need to do there. Next is your photos. You’re now taking photos of this car. It may not have any photos. In this case, I don’t see any. If it’s a dealership where you do notice photos on here, that’s a dealership that we do pretty detailed photos for. Get with your manager, he’ll explain that for you.

Wayne Balroop: 19:00 Next is very, very crucial. This is your window sticker, and your buyers guide. So, the first is the window sticker, or [inaudible 00:19:11] as we call it in CarData. Once you click on that dropdown menu, you’ll notice either one, two, or many different options of window label we have. In this case, we have two.

Wayne Balroop: 19:22 We have a Al Hendrickson Toyota certified [inaudible 00:19:25] , and we have a Al Hendrickson Toyota. These are very specific for the two different types of inventory we shoot for this dealership. You have questions towards that, get with your manager, he, or she will explain it for you. So in this case, this is a non-certified vehicle I’m shooting, why? If you remember, it’s a Chevy being shot at a Toyota dealership, so the vehicle won’t be certified at all.

Wayne Balroop: 19:51 So, we’re going to choose the Al Hendrickson Toyota vail, not the certified. Then you’re going to click add to print queue. You have two different options there. You have generate PDF, and that’s important if you want to see what that window sticker is going to look like before you print it. So you can click on that. Once you do, you’ll see view PDF now highlighted, which tells you you can click on view PDF, you’ll be able to see the window sticker.

Wayne Balroop: 20:18 Right under that, add to print queue, that’s where we’re going to do add to print queue. Next we’re going to move to buyers guide. Buyer’s guide is probably the most important thing. It’s the warranty of the vehicle. If you put the wrong warranty of the vehicle, the dealership’s going to have a vehicle advertised with the wrong warranty. That could cause a problem not only for the dealership, but also for us as a vendor.

Wayne Balroop: 20:40 So, once you click on that dropdown, you have either one, two, three, you could have a slew of different options. You’ll be trained by our trainer, or during our training process, or you can get with your managers if you have questions about this. Take a moment to explain this, you’ll have different manufacturers with different warranties, that takes a little while to learn.

Wayne Balroop: 21:05 There’s also a cheat sheet that we have that will provide to you that you can keep with you at all times. For example, you have Toyota, and Honda that have their basic warranty. This again, this is basic warranties. It’s three years, 36,000 miles, right? You have other manufacturers that have four years, 50,000 miles, four years, or five years, 60,000 miles. So, you’re going to need to learn your manufacturers, and what their basic warranties are.

Wayne Balroop: 21:34 So in this case, what I have is a 2019 Chevy Camaro with 16,000 miles. Chevy’s basic warranty is three years, 36,000 miles. So, that tells me this vehicle is within basic warranty, which means it still has balance of factory, or manufacturer’s warranty still applies. So in this case, I’m going to choose balance of factory warranty. Next, I’m going to add that to my print queue. So now, you have successfully verified all the vehicle data, which is on your general tab, your first tab.

Wayne Balroop: 22:12 You have verified that your price is there, because we print pricing on window stickers here. You’ve chosen the right window sticker, you’ve added that to your print queue, and you’ve chosen your right buyer’s guide, and added that to your print queue. Last thing we need to do is move to our services tab, which is our last tab, and we’re going to select used car vehicle photos.

Wayne Balroop: 22:35 Now, close your phone, and you’re ready to take photos of the car. You’re done with the app. Thank you so much for your time today. I’m sure questions are going to come up. If you do have a question, or issues arise, please comment below, and we’ll be sure to get back to you. Thank you so much.