Given the recent developments regarding Coronavirus (COVID-19), we at DRIVEN are adapting and reviewing how we can support our dealer network during this tough time. We are committed to working closely with you, to manage what is uncharted territory for us all.

As a result, we will be putting in place a charging holiday for our dealerships on all lead and/or subscription charges from midnight Wednesday 25 March until at least end of April 2020 at which point we will review based on the environment at this date.

Any leads received by dealerships during this time along with any monthly subscription charges for April will be completely free of charge. There is no need to activate this, the charging holiday will be automatically applied to all DRIVEN.co.nz lead generation customers.

Rest assured we will be doing everything we can to support the local automotive industry over the coming months, keeping New Zealanders informed, with access to news and information they can trust.
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If you have any questions, please contact us at support@driven.co.nz and one of our DRIVEN specialists will be in touch to arrange a phone or video meeting to discuss further.

AutoPlay and our friends at Need A Car are pleased to be able to offer free listings on needacar.co.nz from 1st April, 2020 for any dealership currently a customer of AutoPlay.

With dealerships closing for 4 weeks from 25/03/20 due to COVID-19 it's going to be impossible to continue to do business the way that we are all used to.  With no face-to-face contact it's more important than ever to get as many eyeballs on your vehicles as possible.  The general public will shift to searching online to find vehicles in preparation for when the time is right for them to buy - making every electronic lead more valuable than ever.

As part of both AutoPlay and Need A Cars commitment to helping dealers minimise the impact of the COVID shutdown, AutoPlay will export your listings to, and Need A Car will display your listings for free on needacar.co.nz.

• Free Basic Listings package with Need A Car for 12 Months from 1st April 2020 - no term, no commitment - just list your vehicles!
• Your listings can easily be fed from AutoPlay to Need A Car via AutoPlay's Listing API - to sign up just email support@autoplay.co.nz and tell us which yards you want us to export
• Any leads generated from Need A Car will be automatically captured back to AutoPlay Sales Pipeline
• ​Offer is valid until May 2020

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needacar.co.nz is a purpose built vehicle listing website with circa 50,000 unique visitors per month.  Engagement of browsers on the site is great - with each visitor spending an average of 6 minutes browsing the site each session.  AutoPlay will take care of all the on-boarding after we get dealer agreement so it is well worth the effort to list your vehicles on the site.

AutoPlay feels strongly about not sharing your listing data anywhere you don't want it, so we will NOT automatically opt you in to this initiative.  As such please contact our Support team on support@autoplay.co.nz and we'll get it set up for you.

If you have any questions about this initiative please email matt@autoplay.co.nz 

 If you advertise your vehicles on Trade Me you would have recently received communication from them on their new image policies which will take effect from March 9th, 2020.  This will impact the majority of the dealers listing vehicles on Trade Me as you are no longer allowed to include dealership logos watermarked on your images.

Below is a quick guide for how your images should look on Trade Me Motors.  Note - these images and text were supplied by Trade Me Motors and any mention of "we"/"our support"/"contact us" refer to Trade Me Motors and NOT AutoPlay.  AutoPlay are sharing this information as a helpful resource to ensure your listings meet Trade Me policy.

If you export from AutoPlay and your listing photos currently include branding watermarks it is possible that your listing will not appear on Trade Me after 9th March 2020.  As such, as of March 9th, 2020 AutoPlay will remove any dealership logo watermarks that are currently being applied by AutoPlay to your listings.  This will ensure that your listings remain on Trade Me and are not blocked from being returned in Trade Me search results.  Due to the effort involved in this AutoPlay will not individually engage with each dealership - we will automatically remove them from your Trade Me export from 9th March on-wards.

• Trade Me allow an exception for approved branding so AutoPlay will not remove watermarks for Honda Certified, Toyota Signature Class or Toyota Certified, or Audi Approved.  See guidelines HERE.
• AutoPlay will not be able to edit any watermark that is supplied to us already embedded on your listing photos.  If you send photos to AutoPlay via your DMS or another source please check that they do not have watermarks on them or you risk your listing being blocked from Trade Me.
• AutoPlay will not be able to ensure the background signage in your listing images meets Trade Me requirements.  It is the dealerships responsibility to review your images to ensure they meet the new standards.

Kiwis love their cars. In fact, our roads are home to around 4 million of them. New Zealand is also a proudly diverse nation, with hundreds of ethnicities and languages spoken on our streets. It makes sense, then, that consumers be able to find and buy a new vehicle in their own language. ​

AutoPlay are always looking to share good news with our customers and HouGarden represent a opportunity to target a specific audience.  AutoPlay have worked with HouGarden to make this easy for AutoPlay customers as we have a direct connection via an AutoPlay Data API.

Anytime, Anywhere
​​The HouGarden Motors platform has been designed to work optimally on both desktop and mobile, while smart new iOS and Android apps meet the demand of today’s on-the-go users. 

Elite Customer Base
During HouGarden's eight years of running New Zealand’s largest property portal for the Chinese market, HouGarden has dealt with thousands of elite professionals, including real estate agents, lawyers,bankers and developers. These same people are potential clients for your own business.  

Affluent, Highly-Motivated Audience
The New Zealand property market is very attractive to Chinese buyers who have a lot of disposable income. HouGarden Motors enables you to put your listings in front of an audience that’s very motivated to buy.

NZ-Based Support Team
The HouGarden team combines our Chinese backgrounds with local knowledge to develop online products for a New Zealand-based Chinese-speaking market. Their head office is located in Central Auckland.

How Do I Get Started?
Keen to improve your marketing results bylisting your vehicles on HouGarden Motors for FREE*? 
Visit https://nz.hougarden.com/motors 
Contact the HouGarden team on +64 9 377 5666 
or support@hougarden.com for  more information.
 
You can start to take the above benefits with HouGarden Motors by just signing a form (Dealership Data API Access Authorization) and send back to our email support@hougarden.com

In 2019 AutoPlay are phasing out of website work.  Building sites has always been something we have done as a value add for customers using our Data Management or Sales Pipeline services, and is not our core focus.

As such we've made the decision that we will focus on continuing to develop our core products, and will not be taking on any new website work (though we will continue to support our existing websites).  

Working in this space it's inevitable that we will be asked by our customers to build sites.  That's why we are pleased to be able to recommend Adtorque Edge for all your website needs.  Adtorque Edge have a proven track record in Australia and the GM for NZ is Todd Fuller - who will be well known to many in the industry through his time with Driven.

EV Sales recently launched in NZ to give dealers and buyers alike a dedicated place for all things Electric Vehicles.

As an AutoPlay customer we've made it easy to advertise on EVSales.nz directly via the AutoPlay Studio.  Once you are signed up your Electric vehicles will automatically be sent to EV Sales via our API - simply load your listings as per normal and your EV listings will appear on the site.
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EV Sales were recently an exhibitor at EV World South and report that they experienced overwhelmingly positive feedback from the public, saying how great the idea was and confirming the need for a central place for buying EVs.

Interest, site traffic, and listings are growing, and its the place you want to be!

Once you have signed up to list on The Dealership Network they will contact AutoPlay to enable access to your listings.  The Dealership Network (TDN) have hooked up to AutoPlay’s listing API so the moment you load a listing, it will be live on www.thedealershipnetwork.co.nz – with no need to manually select listings for export.

The Dealership Network introduces a completely new concept to help users find their next vehicle. With their Feature Finder they provide an alternative to the standard make, model, year search criteria, allowing their users to search by, feature, function, technology and other criteria to find all the makes and models from around the country that suit what they want from their next vehicle all from one simple search enquiry.
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The Dealership Network is proud to only work with dealership listings, to give their users the trust and confidence when looking at any listing on their website. By integrating with AutoPlay they enable their users to "Book a test drive" or "Request a call back" that feeds straight into your lead API, connecting their users with your dealership and stock. The Feature finder search function incorporates the needs based selling approach onto an online platform. Allowing users to search from a combination of requirements and being able to recommend the specific makes and models that suit their needs. The refinement feature then makes it even easier to narrow these results for the user to find exactly what they are looking for

Last week we launched a refresh of the AutoPlay website.  The new site does a better job of showcasing the full range of products and features that AutoPlay can offer.  In addition there are now separate versions of the site for New Zealand and Australia that include customised content for each country, that more closely reflects our product offerings in each respective market.

Feel free to take a look via the links below.  We'd love to hear your feedback.

For New Zealand customers - https://www.autoplay.co.nz/ 
For Australian customers - https://www.autoplay.com.au/​

It is now possible to add  'Sale', 'New' and 'Under Offer' banners to your AutoPlay Vehicle Display Pages.  As pictured below, these small banners appear on the Search Page on your AutoPlay Vehicle Display Page.

The banners are also displayed on the RHS of the image when you view the Detail page for an individual vehicle.  These are positioned in the top corner of your image to avoid any clashes with any watermarks/logos that might be getting applied to your listings.

Adding the banner is easy.  Just find the vehicle you want to add the banner to in your AutoPlay Studio account.  Under the 'OPTIONS' header you'll find a range of check boxes available.

• To add the 'NEW' banner click on the 'New' check box (note this signifies a new vehicle and has an effect on your ORC display)
  
• To add the 'SALE' banner click on the 'Specials' check box
• To add the 'UNDER OFFER' banner click on the 'Under Offer' check box

Please note you will first need to have this feature enabled on your AutoPlay account.  To request set up please email support@autoplay.co.nz to request.