Data mining techniques that help dealers maximise used car sales are being massively under-exploited. That is the view of management systems provider Pinewood, which provides training courses to help sales people make the most of the data available to them.

“Most dealers, perhaps the majority, do not use the data they gather to its maximum potential but used car sales is perhaps the most under-exploited area of all,” says Neville Briggs, Pinewood managing director. He believes the key problem is that sales people fail to match customer car needs to existing vehicles they may already have registered on their database.

“If someone walks into a dealership and says they are looking for a particular three-year-old model, most sales people will immediately look at their own stock lists then their group stock list, and finally at their manufacturer's national stock,” says Briggs. “One area is often overlooked. In the dealership's data should be a record of whether they sold a car matching that description at new. They could then possibly buy that car from its existing owner, thus creating demand for a new model.”