Magazine for the professional car and truck rental industry.
Issue link: https://autorentalnews.epubxp.com/i/90712
M A RK E T ING thing we want to do is have so many Groupon customers coming through the door that we can't properly service our loyal customers," he says. So how do you calculate the number of deals that should be sold? Groupon re- ports that most deals are cashed in during the fi rst and last months of the offer, with about 20% coming in the fi rst month. For ACE's parking deal, if 20% of the 1,500 people used the deal in the fi rst month, ACE's team needed to fi gure out if Easy Airport Parking could supply enough spaces. "We looked at what our parking capacity each month was and our utilization — and we went back and forth for a while," Stutz says, but eventually calculated that 1,500 spaces were doable. DAILY DEALS IN A DAILY MARKET ACE is still narrowing in on how a deal could be successful for daily car rental, Stutz says, because as an affi liate compa- ny the logistics gets complicated. To do a Groupon deal, for example, the offer must be a fi xed price. "The problem with the car rental market is that pricing fl uctuates so wildly," he says. For Hernandez at MPG, being an inde- pendent car rental company offering elec- tric vehicles and hybrids helped in selling his deal. He says it's important to use any unique points about your company in the deal's description. "When you really explain your busi- ness and what you're about, you will have a higher repeat customer percentage and the type of clientele you really want," Hernandez says. Yelp is also a favorite of MPG, and because it is a review site, the company is more likely to get a review out of it. "We get so much business through Yelp just because of our good reviews," he says. Major car rental companies have offered deals for regular car rentals, including Avis, which has offered three Groupons, according to Avis spokesper- son Alice Pereira. In its campaigns, Avis has offered deals during the off-peak periods before and after summer. Groupon buyers could purchase a $20 certifi cate that got them $40 toward an Avis rental. The certifi cates were valid on rentals of two or more days but could be used on any car class at all corporate and licensee locations in the U.S. and Canada — except for Alaska. "We are very pleased with the results of the Avis deal on Groupon," Pereira says. Using the deals to help keep utiliza- 18 November/December 2012 As seen in this screenshot of an archived deal on Groupon, deals offer at least 50% off services and products. MPG Car Rental offered the standard 50%. tion high is also a strategy for Safady. He says that while you're getting less for that car, it's still additional revenue compared to cars sitting on the lot. However, Safady says it's important to be very specifi c in the wording of the deal and to be sure to "set aside" vehicles when running a daily deal promotion because you do not want to interrupt your regular fl ow of customers. For example, the fi rst deal Imagine Lifestyles offered gave customers the option to drive a Fer- rari or Aston Martin for one hour with a driving instructor. He says that at one point, every Groupon customer seemed to want to drive the Ferrari and became upset if it wasn't available. But worse was when a regular, full- priced customer came in looking to rent a Ferrari. "When I only have three Ferraris and all three are out because of Groupon and then someone comes in for full price, it will hurt your business," Safady says. "You have to have cars specifi c for what you're doing — you can't intertwine. And if you intertwine, you have to do it carefully." DEALING CREATIVELY Similar to Imagine Lifestyles, Charlie Matarieh of Global Exotic Car Rental in Chicago and Phoenix also offers deal "experiences." Matarieh's company books a three- day event when offering Groupon deals, in which users buy tickets for the event where they will drive various exotic ve- hicles. This means, though, that the event location is also part of the deal schedul- ing, which is also partially dictated by Groupon, giving Matarieh little discretion on when the deal is offered. But, he says, it makes fl eet planning a much easier task when he is able to service 200-300 people in a day without having to integrate the deal into regular service. AUTO RENTAL NEWS These types of experience deals are also encouraged by daily deal sites. "We've only done the regular car rental promotion once, and at this time we don't plan to do it again," Matarieh says, adding that Global Exotic has so far done four Groupon deals. In another creative look at offer- ing daily deals, nonprofi t car sharing company Grand River CarShare, based in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada, has offered multiple deals. Matthew Piggott, Grand River CarShare member services coordina- tor, says that Grand River's deals are more successful each time. The membership-based car sharing or- ganization has learned to not only offer a discount on the membership, but to give a few free additional hours of driving time. Getting people into the car and using the service has resulted in more driving by these customers and subsequent member- ship renewals, according to Piggott. "Anyone offering a membership service has it made because once the person buys it you've got them in," Pig- gott says. "But the additional challenge for the membership system is to get them to actually keep on using the car share." He says that Grand River's deals also offer various rate plans. Another plus for Grand River is that it doesn't have to worry too much about a deal cap. This is because as a nonprofi t, Grand River has partnerships with various businesses and organizations throughout its operating area, giving it immediate ac- cess to extra parking. Piggott says that it's those fi xed parking costs that would be the most diffi cult to plan in accommodat- ing a quick surge in membership. MARKETING AND TRACKING THE DEAL You have to do some work to make the deal successful. For example, Grand River