The Founder's Story

Many years ago, an auto dealer took me to the LA Auto Auction to buy a car. I found the experience very educational and thus began my automotive career. I applied my limited knowledge to earn money selling cars while I was in college; it beat many other part time jobs. A few years later, I actually left a mortgage finance job to help a family start up in a new independent dealership. We lived the same hard life that you often hear of when I say that we washed, transported, and sold our own cars, financed our own deals, collected our own payments, and operated our own books.

I never fell in love with cars but I really enjoyed the business, including the marketing, financing, customer relations, and day-to-day challenges. We were the first independent dealership in our town that had a computer with a DOS operating system. We became a very high producing store and won many generous prizes in marketing contests offered by lenders and aftermarket product companies.

In our first ten years, we used a basic dealer software, DacEasy accounting, and Lotus 123 to grow the business substantially. As internet via AOL dial up, Windows, MS Word, MS Spread sheet and AutoTrader all appeared in the nineties, my current vision began to form. I researched available DMS packages but was unable to find a software that could offer me everything I needed in one package. I learned that most DMS providers fail to meet my expectations as they are unable to overcome at least one of the following fundamental obstacles. First, many have never owned or operated an auto dealership to appreciate what a dealer has to contend with to earn a buck. Second, they might gain some experience in parts of dealer operations, namely sales, however they cannot change what they have already sold to hundreds of users for thousands of dollars. They fear modifying or making fundamental changes to their product, as well being unsure of the costs involved to make consistently needed updates. Third, many providers have a new platform and are too busy claiming advancement by using various technical acronyms just to gain new accounts, sell and profit , regardless of the flaws in their product’s design or support. I was looking for a company that made programmers learn the car business, not one that would disrupt car dealers’ operations by making them change their ways to fit the new program. My quest was futile since I was in uncharted waters.

ASN Software was formed in 1999 to accomplish three goals:

1. No data duplication. A user will never need to re-enter data.
2. Automation. Users will not need to manually process things that a computer could do for them.
3. Reduce functions to a mouse click or two.

Most dealers will not bother with details if it takes too many clicks to automate their computerized operations. AutoDealer Plus was created and has evolved as a solid dealer management software allowing dealers to run a headache-free dealership. This task proved a challenge, but very rewarding over the long haul. The goal was not just to create a software with a few more tools than the ones already on the market; we were truly seeking complete automation. We were mindful of the fact that the reference to "Independent" dealers comes from independent thinking and habits in each dealership. After months spent on design conception, we identified the areas which we were to include in our software, namely:

• Accounting
• Operations
• Sales
• Marketing/CRM
• Compliance

I was fully aware that we had an ambitious goal and that it would be very costly to execute, but I was not short on my commitment to this plan. Based on the strength of my resume, several companies committed to supporting me in developmental costs of the program if they saw tangible benefits. Our aim was to finance the project ourselves and deliver an advanced software to a network of dealers at little or no cost to them. It made sense for ASN participating vendors to have automation for their processes as well, in order to reduce part, if not all, of their costs in marketing and operational areas. It was and still is a win-win situation since dealers, vendors, ASN Software, as well as the public all have to benefit for this model to work.

It is not surprising to us when a new dealer prospect says, "I already have most of the sales tools that I need". One reason we have not lost any active dealers to another car dealer software is because once you know what you can have, you will not be able to accept less. AutoDealer Plus allows dealers to see a deal’s structure, structural options, profit details, and loan structure all in one screen. Warranty and Gap products are totally integrated so F&I does not need to log into other sites or programs to process contracts and obtain a full report each month, nor does F&I need to worry about the product’s acceptance qualifications and exclusions. Spot delivery for auto insurance can be made in one click. Customer credit, vehicle registration, smog, and history details are all available with one click. We use raw credit data on credit pulls so we can help dealers avoid turn-downs due to oversight in budgeting a customer. We enable dealers to verify customer data while they enter it so they will not face an unwind later due to bad information. Details matter and we pay a lot of attention to details so sales staff can operate smarter.

You can hardly read an article or get a phone call from some company reps without hearing all sorts of fancy acronyms such as SEO, SEM, CRM, etc. As many of you know, there seem to be many self-proclaimed experts in this business, and they all want to help you so long as you pay them. Of course, if things do not work out, it would be your fault for not utilizing their advice properly. You can create a website, but you have to hire several people to manage it for you. You may have lead providers, but you need to increase your work load to use them. There are many legitimate and good marketing providers out there but there is also so much noise that it is hard to decipher the good from the bad. That is why we took it upon ourselves to automate this area as well. As dealers buy and sell cars, their website is updated with no additional workload. We have a lot of internet partners who receive our dealers’ inventories and list them for free. Of these sites, Craigslist maintains the number one most visited site, so we have provided a one-click Craigslist posting tool within our program. If dealers have business accounts with other prominent sites such as AutoTrader or Cars.com, we can feed data to them as well. We offer free email accounts to our dealers so they can use their own domain as an email address and not Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc. It is amazing how often I see ABCAutoSale@Gmail.com even though ABCAutoSale.com does not take you to the dealer’s website. Having your domain name match up with your email address makes it that much easier for customers to find you, and also makes your business appear more professional, not to mention increased traffic to your website. We have a lead management system. All leads can be brought to our dealers within our DealerZone and imported into our Customer Relation Management (CRM) screen. Our dealers can use the CRM to prospect and follow up on sales, thereby increasing total sales. These features only skim the top of our marketing capabilities; we discuss much more with our serious dealer candidates.

New Auto , Used Auto, Pre-Owned Auto, RV, Motorsport, and Motorcycle Dealerships will all become more competitive and profitable by using ASN Software's suite of tools. We strongly believe that if automotive dealers wish to keep pace with all the technological advances that will affect businesses in the years to come, they must have the tools, knowledge, and purchasing power necessary to compete. I hope we get the opportunity to prove our worth as we gain your business, and more importantly, your trust and friendship so that you, too, can become a Valuable Member of the ASN Software dealer network! With us, you will have ‘The ASN Software Advantage!"

Thank You,
Alex A
President, ASN Software