Special Finance Lead Provider
The Special Finance Lead Provider category should probably win a survival award because the providers in this category endured the subprime meltdown.
Special Finance Lead Provider
After a fourth-place finish last year, DealerLink leaped to the front of the pack to take the Diamond Award this year, the company’s best showing since winning the Diamond Award in the Dealers’ Choice Awards’ inaugural year of 2005. “When your clients/customers acknowledge your hard work and sincere best efforts to provide a quality product at a fair price, it doesn’t get any better than that … Even including the inaugural Diamond Dealers’ Choice Award and the others we have been fortunate to win over the years, I must say I personally find this the most rewarding given what we, as well as our dealer partners, have gone through over recent years,” said Tim Parker, president of DealerLink. “The great news is I am seeing positive outlooks and attitudes from dealers all over the country … I would like to say a huge thank-you to all our dealer friends who were kind enough to vote for us.”
Only a tenth of a point behind DealerLink was Auto Credit Express, a previous Gold Award winner from 2010, making it back to the top three this year with the Platinum Award.
CarsDirect.com claimed a spot in the top three with the Gold Award. “Quality of traffic and a large media presence are the two key items we prioritize over everything else and that we remained committed to over the past couple of years,” said Todd Dearborn, vice president of dealer relations and automotive sales at CarsDirect. “We are always refining our traffic sources in our constant pursuit of the best quality.”
Car.com (Autobytel) and Cars.com both received above-average scores and finished fourth and fifth, respectively.
Company | Award | Score |
DealerLink | Diamond | 100.5 |
Auto Credit Express | Platinum | 100.4 |
CarsDirect.com | Gold | 95.4 |
Car.com (Autobytel) | 94.2 | |
Cars.com | 92.6 | |
Group Average | 91.6 |
Vol. 9, Issue 4
More Dealer Ops

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