What a difference a year can make.  In the case of Reynolds & Reynolds, that year was well spent re-engineering their website inventory modules to create a product called WebMakerX^© 2.0. 

The process of reviewing car dealer website platforms has started in earnest for the upcoming 2010 ASMA Awards.  The 2010 Awards will be announced at the 9th Digital Dealer Conference and Exposition on Wednesday October 13, 2010.

Today we had a demonstration of Reynolds & Reynolds latest website technology. This blog post is not a full review of their technology.  However. the thought of a candidate for the “Most Improved Website Platform” award came to our mind.  We may create this category this year for the ASMA awards as we see how some of the other major players perform based on last years results.

If you are a Reynold’s client, you may still be on their old platform because according to Joshua Muller, Product Planning Manager, about 25% of their dealer base has been upgraded.  If you have not been upgraded, I would place a sales call immediately. After witnessing the upgrades and enhancement to their platform on today’s webinar, it is clear Reynolds took the 2009 ASMA Report seriously.

Last year, Reynolds website technology lacked a search optimized inventory module that could be customized by dealers for SEO.  Their technology lagged the field and it is clear that the Reynolds Web Solutions team is aiming high this year.

Reynolds Creates A Competitive SEO Framework

Their new inventory module in WebMakerX^© 2.0 had all the right user interface designs and features to completely optimize their inventory pages.  Reynolds has raised the bar this year by being the first vendor I have witnessed who allows dealers to change the SEO Titles, Descriptions and keyword tagging on their dynamic inventory pages.  Normally, changes to SEO tags is limited to static pages and changes to inventory pages require a custom programming ticket to be filed.

In the photo below, you can see that their user interface can change SEO tags on static pages, like most vendor platforms.  The new twist is that the dynamic inventory pages ( called Vehicle Page-Level Tags by Reynolds)  can also be customized which can lead to some serious A/B testing to see which SEO tags work the best.  This is very important for dealers who operate in cities with common names that match other cities in the USA or if other dealers share their business name, like “Classic Chevy”.

Other Improvements

This year Reynolds has added a fully functional WordPress blogging module as a sub-domain of the primary URL.  This is a smart decision because it assists dealers with Google Page One Management.  The blogging module also allows dealers to use popular plug-ins so the SEO functionality of the blog is not weakened.

The page builder tool is very strong editor.  I asked the Reynolds team to test our CarPort App JavaScript  to see if the editor blocked or changed the code, and it didn’t.  The page cleanly displayed a feed of cars which members of the Automotive Advertising Network (AAN) can leverage to advertise their cars on blogs and social media portals.

One very slick feature was that the website menus can have up to 4 nested menu levels.  The menu nesting is a key feature that is needed for car dealers who plan on heavy content development.  Some website platforms limit menus to one level which makes creating dozens or eventually hundreds of content pages messy from a menu standpoint.

More To Come

The full review the new Reynolds WebMakerX^© 2.0 platform and 45 other website platforms will be included in the 2010 ASMA report.  We will keep readers updated on some of the platforms we review along the way to give you some insights into the dramatic changes the industry is undergoing.

If you are considering purchasing a new website platform, you’ll be able to review the results on October 13, 2010 which may help you make a more educated purchasing decision.