7.4 PENSKE USED TRUCKS
Throughout 2009 and 2010, used trucks grew more appealing to businesses because the economy was in poor shape. Penske Truck Leasing ( which has a steady supply of used trucks coming off leases, realized that it was missing out on revenue by selling those trucks at reduced prices to wholesalers rather than directly to would-be buyers. To sell its used trucks, Penske had relied on a bare-bones Web site used primarily by wholesale buyers, as well as by local Penske used-truck coordinators who visited the site for reference material when assisting wholesalers. Penske needed a high-quality Web site that would generate sales to wholesalers as well as directly to the end customers, such as the owner of a flower store or hardware store who needed a cargo van or box truck. The result, PenskeUsedTrucks ( illustrates how various business units must work together to implement a major electronic commerce project. Penske’s vehicle remarketing group recognized the value of used trucks, and they realized that the company was losing money with its current business model. To remedy this problem, they brought in the company’s marketing staff to evaluate how Penske could employ a new Web site to attract more buyers. The two groups then collaborated with the information technology group to build the Web site. Penske faced several challenges in creating the site. To begin with, the site had to incorporate the correct terminology and keywords to attract the attention of shoppers and search engines. To address this challenge, IT and marketing interviewed customers to obtain feedback concerning effective keywords. They discovered, for example, that Penske calls one type of truck a “cargo van,” whereas some potential customers refer to it as a “high cube” or a “box truck.” Ultimately, the additional keywords and crossreferencing dramatically expanded Penske’s keyword base from roughly 100 vehicle names to more than 2,000. Another problem was collecting and organizing photos. In most cases obtaining images for a Web site is a fairly straightforward process. Unfortunately, in Penske’s case this task was more complicated because the company does not have a centralized truck lot. Rather, its fleet operates out of 2,500 locations nationwide. The solution required Penske to reengineer its fleet management system. In addition, Penske implemented a policy mandating that whenever the company lists a new vehicle for sale on its Web site, five images must come with the vehicle. The resulting Web site resembles CarMax ( more than it does Penske’s previous site: a Web-based catalog. Every type of Penske vehicle, from a standard cargo van to a refrigerated 18-wheel trailer truck, is searchable on the site, and Penske updates the inventory every day. The number of vehicles for sale can vary from 3,500 to 5,000 units. A vehiclecomparison tool enables a buyer to compare up to five trucks side-by-side in terms of price, mileage, weight, horsepower, and other specifications. Maintenance reports display a vehicle’s repair and maintenance history for the previous three years. Finally, buyers can close the sale on a single truck or a fleet of trucks by phone via Penske’s call center. Offering a good product and building a useful Web site are basic strategic necessities in the digital era. Successful companies must do better than this. Attracting customers requires an aggressive search engine optimization (SEO) and social media strategy as well. Search engine optimization is the process of maximizing the number of visitors to a particular Web site by ensuring that the site appears high on the list of results returned by a search engine. The Penske marketing team followed Google’s SEO advice to incorporate keywords that customers use when searching across the Web site. Penske uses Adobe Analytics ( software to obtain information such as which keywords drive visitors to the Web site, where buyers are coming from, how long they stay on the site, and which pages they visit. Google search results also include rich details such as the price and availability of a vehicle. The SEO helped increase Google search traffic for the Penske site by 37 percent. Penske also extended its marketing strategy to include social media and blogging. The marketing team uses a company blog called Move Ahead (blog.gopenske.com) as a content hub where the team posts daily truck specials and directs traffic to the PenskeUsedTrucks.com Web site. The team also tweets about daily truck specials in both the morning and the evening. Furthermore, Penske has active company pages on Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, and Google+. In October 2013, Penske added a mobile version of PenskeUsedTrucks.com. Penske’s Used Trucks has become so successful that in 2014 the operation doubled its commercial truck dealership in North America. The company opened centers in the Dallas, Atlanta, and Toronto areas.
Sources: Compiled from “Penske Used Trucks Doubling Dealerships,” Reading Eagle, January 29, 2015; M. Hernandez, “Dominate SEO with Long Tail Keywords,” Huffington Post, March 17, 2014; J. Martin, “20 SEO Tips, Trends and Predictions for 2014,” CIO, January 16, 2014; “Penske Ranked Fourth on InformationWeek 500 List for Used Truck Website,” PR Newswire, September 10, 2013; S. O’Neill, “Website Drives Used Truck Sales,” InformationWeek, September 9, 2013; S. O’Neill, “What Penske Learned from Rebuilding Its E-Commerce Site,” Information Week, September 5, 2013; accessed January 29, 2015. Questions 1. Describe how disintermediation works in this case. Provide an example to support your answer. 2. Why is it so important for different functional areas in an organization to work together in designing an organizational Web site? 3. Referencing Question 2, discuss the implications of this statement: “Regardless of your major, an understanding of information technology will be of value to you.”
Questions
1. Describe how disintermediation works in this case. Provide an example to support your answer.
2. Why is it so important for different functional areas in an organization to work together in designing an organizational Web site?
3. Referencing Question 2, discuss the implications of this statement: “Regardless of your major, an understanding of information technology will be of value to you.”
Rainer, R. Kelly; Prince, Brad. Introduction to Information Systems, 6th Edition (Page 212). Wiley. Kindle Edition.