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Ban On Petrol & Diesel Vehicles: Are Electric cars the future?

How can you use your digital platforms to educate your customers!

Since Elon Musk sparked an electric revolution, Tesla’s market value has surpassed that of Germany’s Volkswagen, one of the biggest car makers by volume. This has caused the car manufacturers of the world to step up and create a real business plan for electric models. Not only have competitors pressurised the market to make dramatic changes in plans but in turn, the public opinion of climate change and various governments planning to achieve ‘net zero’ carbon footprint within the coming decades has also pushed this to the forefront of people’s minds.

The UK Government has recently announced they could BAN the sale of petrol and diesel cars by 2035 or even 2032, subject to consultation. This is a huge shift for the automotive sector. Whatever the future holds the public will have to be educated to a degree on how their new electric vehicle operates, runs, charges etc. For Customers and auto businesses, this is a big change. Purchasing an electric vehicle, they will need some education and reassurance which will undoubtedly mean digital hand-holding .
Hyundai Germany has recently opened its ‘Online Showroom’ which allows its customers to talk to an advisor who has the ability to give the customer a full walkaround of the vehicle using multiple static cameras and a mobile camera to show finer details of the car. The ‘Online Showroom’ has electric models available for walkarounds where agents can show the customer how the car is charged, maintained, and its benefits.

Jürgen Keller, Managing Director of Hyundai Germany explained in an Autohaus article, “This is now an absolute competitive advantage because we can offer customers advice online, even if they are not allowed to enter the salesrooms. We have the feeling that customers now address their questions to us in the online showroom instead of in the physical showroom. The customers are naturally also more at home and sometimes have more time. Our dealers are happy about the new online showroom – some have already linked to our offer. This is a good partnership approach. It’s not direct sales, but we always hand over the customer who is interested in the dealer after the consultation”

An ’Online Showroom’ is a big commitment but you can start your live engagement journey with minimal investment, quickly and easily, and grow as your business demands. Take for example Vee24’s video or text chat: these channels can be highly beneficial with a live agent assisting the customer through the entire vehicle buying journey, they can further enhance this experience by using our co-browse feature. Vee24’s co-browsing allows the agent to navigate the customer’s screen and direct them to the exact page or options they are looking for. The platform also allows agents to push assets like vehicle brochures, videos or pictures.  Our ChatBOTs can help you service customers and generate leads even when your showroom or offices are closed.

With Vee24’s intelligent conversational experience platform, the online car buying journey becomes seamless for the customer. Not only can it be used to provide advice or information, but customers can also choose to shop for cars from the comfort of their own home and receive the same quality of service that they would at the dealership.

This won’t completely replace dealerships but will help you meet your customers where they start their buying journey. Online conversational presence is becoming more important for automotive sales. The current world events of social distancing and lockdowns will only heighten the need for live digital customer engagement in automotive and other markets.

Please don’t hesitate to contact my colleagues for more information on how Vee24 can partner with your company on tailoring your online customer experience.

Thank you for reading my blog!

Stay Safe!

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