The Hidden Story Behind Your Dealership Leads

Historically, the gold-standard for measuring dealership marketing performance has been lead volume. These metrics are easy to measure, simple to understand, and provide clear insight into your marketing's direct impact on generating customer contact. 

However, focusing exclusively on lead counts could mean you’re missing the broader picture of customer engagement. There's substantial buyer activity happening on your website that doesn't appear in traditional lead reports, and understanding actual user behavior when they visit your site reveals significant opportunities to enhance the effectiveness of your marketing. 

Your Advertising Impact Goes Beyond Form Fills 

Form fills provide a solid baseline for measuring marketing performance and demonstrate interest while generating contact information for follow-up communications.  

The challenge: Many meaningful customer interactions don't result in form submissions you can easily track. 

Consider this common scenario: A shopper sees your Search ad for a specific vehicle and clicks through to your website. They're genuinely interested, so they use the Kelley Blue Book trade-in tool on your site to determine their current car's value, then complete the form (known as an  i-frame), and submit their information. 
 
In your CRM, this lead is attributed to Kelley Blue Book instead of paid search because the i-frame submission doesn’t occur directly on your website. 

This tracking challenge happens with numerous tools embedded on dealer websites—financing calculators, appointment schedulers, trade valuation tools, and service booking systems. These third-party applications run within your website, and while they provide a better user experience for shoppers, they create significant blind spots in your marketing analytics. 

Our industry research shows that approximately 60% of dealership form submissions happen through these i-frames, which are not trackable by default. Here are some common examples: 

While some i-frames can be customized to allow for proper tracking, this often requires requests to the i-frame providers and dealership approval, and these solutions are subject to breaking or tracking inaccurate data. 

The consequence? You're missing visibility into where your actual shoppers originate, and while your advertising campaigns are generating results, you can't measure the complete impact. 

Improve Your Marketing Results with Better Data 

Catalyst IQ sets up form and call tracking in every instance we can—whether through native website forms, i-frames, or third-party tools. However, we know that's not the complete picture. Some i-frames remain untrackable, and many shoppers never submit a lead online or call at all. Instead, they conduct their research digitally, then show up at the dealership to purchase. 

That’s why we blend the best of both worlds through MarketAI® and Engage—uniting real‑time behavioral intelligence with first‑party lead capture to give your dealership visibility into shoppers who submit traditional leads and those who never fill out a form. 

MarketAI combines known user intent signals (like forms and calls) with deeper intent‑based actions to construct a comprehensive picture of buyer behavior. It identifies engagement patterns that indicate genuine purchase intent—from traditional lead submissions to vehicle detail page interactions, return visits, and inventory research behavior—and uses this complete dataset to optimize your advertising and attract more high‑quality prospects. 

Engage works alongside MarketAI by capturing and nurturing the high‑intent shoppers revealed through these behavioral patterns. Even when a user doesn’t submit a form, Engage can identify them, deliver personalized follow‑ups, and convert them into verified leads—ensuring that none of your most valuable shoppers slip through the cracks. 

Together, MarketAI and Engage improve targeting precision by focusing your marketing efforts on shoppers who exhibit authentic buying signals across multiple touchpoints, rather than casting a wide net and hoping for leads.  

Tracking User Behavior on Your VDPs

Most car buyers don't complete a form during their initial visit to your website, instead they browse inventory, compare vehicles, and research options. They often visit multiple times before filling out a form or visiting your dealership. 

We look for these 3 behaviors to identify engaged shoppers: 

1. Engaged VDP views: A user invests significant time on a VDP (vehicle detail page), scrolling through photos, reading descriptions, and examining features and pricing. This represents focused attention—typically 20 seconds or more of concentrated engagement. 
2. Multiple VDP sessions: This is common comparison-shopping behavior, where a user might examine three or four similar vehicles during the same visit, evaluating their options and narrowing their preferences. 
3. Returning VDP visits: The strongest indicator of purchase intent, showcasing a user advancing through the buying process. They might be sharing it with a spouse, researching additional details, or building confidence in their purchasing decision. 

Many shoppers who demonstrate these behaviors ultimately make purchases without ever submitting an online form. They conduct their research on your website, then contact you directly or visit the dealership in person.  

Traditional tracking systems miss this connection, but Catalyst IQ’s MarketAI—combined with Engage’s ability to identify and re‑engage anonymous visitors—helps reveal these high‑value behavioral patterns.  

This unified approach connects VDP behavior, market dynamics, and first‑party lead capture, giving you visibility into your entire buyer journey—not just the parts that appear in your CRM. 

How Complete Data Improves Campaign Performance 

Understanding customer behavior beyond form submissions directly improves your advertising performance. 

Consider these three different customer journeys: 

• Person 1: Submits a form and purchases a vehicle 
• Person 2: Calls the dealership and purchases a vehicle 
• Person 3: Views a specific VDP 6 times over 2 days, then visits the dealership and purchases—without ever filling out a form or calling 

Without engaged VDP metrics being sent as signals back to our performance algorithms, Google would assume that only 2 out of 3 visitors to your site were quality prospects. This means Google's algorithm would avoid targeting users similar to Person 3 in the future even though they represent genuine buyers. 

This is where our comprehensive tracking approach becomes critical. Good data in equals great performance out. By giving Google the most complete dataset possible—including form submissions, calls, and engaged VDP behavior—we help it identify and target all types of serious car shoppers, not just the ones who happen to submit forms online. 

The result? Your campaigns reach more qualified prospects, generate higher-quality traffic, and ultimately drive more sales from your marketing investment. 

Find Out What Your Lead Counts Aren't Telling You

The hidden story behind your dealership leads isn't just about the forms that get submitted or the calls that come in. It's about the complete customer journey—the research sessions, the vehicle comparisons, the return visits, and the engaged browsing that happens before someone ever contacts you. 

Most dealers are making marketing decisions based on incomplete data, seeing lead counts and website traffic but missing the customer behavior patterns that actually predict sales outcomes.  

MarketAI reveals this complete narrative, and Engage turns those insights into action—capturing and nurturing the shoppers who are already demonstrating intent. 

Together, they give you the clarity and control needed to understand who’s ready to buy and why. 

Ready to see these insights in action? Request a demo to see how MarketAI and Engage give you a complete, real‑time view of actual buyer behavior—and turn more of your website traffic into verified sales opportunities. 

About Catalyst IQ

Catalyst IQ is an integrated automotive marketing platform that helps dealerships make smarter decisions and sell more cars using real-time data, AI-powered insights, and expert human support. From digital advertising and web presence to SEO/AEO and engagement, every solution works together to drive measurable growth.