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The most comprehensive reputation data resources in automotive, brought to you by Widewail.
  • Widewail Automotive Reputation Index
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Automotive Index Training: Basic Actions

Sort

  • In the top toolbar, click “Sort”

  • Select a column title in the dropdown menu and sort in ascending or descending order

  • Add multiple sorts for additional layers of ordering

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Automotive Index Training: Basic Actions

Filter

  • In the top toolbar, click “Filter”

  • Focus on certain areas by filtering by categorical fields like "Brand" or "City"

  • Set conditional filters like "all dealers with an average rating greater than 4"

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Get to Know the Reputation Data

This Widewail Automotive Reputation Index dataset consists of:

  • 16,671 new car dealers in the U.S.

  • 1.6M reviews

  • Google reviews only

  • Current Timeframe: February through June of 2023

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What Does This All Mean?

Find definitions of each column header

In the row of column headers, you can hover over the ⓘ symbol next to each label to read the definition of what is being measured in that column and how the data was collected. 

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Where to Find Benchmarks

At the bottom of the table, you'll find aggregated numbers for each column. These are the benchmarks. We've preset the benchmarks in each column for you.

The benchmark data updates as you filter and sort the table, producing thousands of variations, each specific to your market or interests.

 

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Common Use Cases & More

Below the Reputation Index table, you'll find a Common Use Cases section to get you started. Each common use case includes a how-to video.

The Automotive Reputation Index is ever-evolving. Check back regularly for updated data and new use cases. If your dealership is missing and you’d like to add it to the Index, select “Submit a request to add.”

Get Started
June 27, 2024

REV #011: Customer Review Trends, First 7 Days of CDK Shutdown

CDK was hit with a massive cyber security attack on June 19th, 2024. In the following days, CDK shut down systems for nearly half of all US dealers. Here's report #1 on customer review activity following the shutdown.

Welcome to the REV. A briefing that goes deep into the Widewail Automotive Reputation Index data, surfacing the most interesting insights. Every 3 weeks we Rank, Explore & Visualize automotive reputation & sentiment data. 

The Index aggregates over 4.1 million Google reviews from 17k new car dealerships in the U.S. Customize the dataset like it's your own personal spreadsheet. Try it out. It’s free.

Read online. Subscribe.

We’re now nine days post-CDK cyberattack. I’ve partnered with Widewail’s data science team to assess the impact on customer reviews from June 19th to 25th.  

It’s clear: The operational disruptions caused by the cyberattack are impacting customers. Is this reflected in recent reviews? 

The data is limited due to the narrow timeline. We’re limited to analyzing Widewail customer data vs. what we typically report on in these articles or that of the entire market. 

With that said, yes, we are noticing an impact. We plan to update this data as the situation changes.

Negativity Up 35% Over Week Prior

Observing this data over the past 3 years, we’ve identified some common trends. Review negativity in the auto industry normally oscillates between 9-11% depending on the season.

 

Typically, we see negativity spike in the summer and hit a low point in the winter. But “spike” is a strong word here; the trend is like a gentle wave.

The most dramatic movement we’ve seen was in the summer/fall of 2020, a few months into the pandemic, peaking at around 16%.

As I write this on June 27th, 2024, a week into the CDK disruption, review negativity has surpassed 13% (at Widewail, negativity means the percentage of reviews between 1-3 stars).

Negativity is up 35% from its pre-hack level and 162% from its low on March 31st.

The chart below is the 7 day rolling average, smoothing the trendline slightly, reflected in a lower peak.

Screenshot 2024-06-27 at 2.56.54 PM

Weekly Review Volume Off 17.8%

We also saw a decrease in the average weekly review volume during the final weeks of June. 

Screenshot 2024-06-27 at 2.57.00 PM

The sudden drop in review volume is likely also related to the CDK outage, as downed systems prevented dealers from operating at their normal capacities. 

While we’ve seen some sizable fluctuations throughout the year, this is certainly the largest, with a 17.8% drop in volume compared to the previous week. 

We will need to wait until the cyber attack is resolved before we see the full impact that this will have on the industry.

Screenshot 2024-06-27 at 2.57.05 PM

We’ve observed some movement in topic data, specifically in mentions related to the Finance and Parts departments, which rely heavily on CDK to streamline operations.

While our data is statistically significant, we don’t yet feel confident enough in its direct relationship with CDK to report on it here. We will continue to monitor the situation and report back on our findings.

In the meantime, we support the CDK dealer base and hope all systems will return online soon.

We plan to look at this data a few more times as the story evolves. Stay tuned.

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Jake, Marketing @Widewail