Porsche Centre Melbourne

Porsche Centre Melbourne is a purpose built centre, incorporating sales, parts & service (including motorsport department), financial services, selection boutique and even a cafe.

Step inside and look around. You will certainly find your favourite car. Apart from the latest models in the market we also have a number of used Porsche 911, used Porsche Boxster, used Porsche Cayenne and used Porsche Cayman.

Background

Thomas Heberling – Managing Director of Porsche Centre Melbourne is always on the hunt for new and improved methods of connecting with existing and potential customers. Porsche being such an elegant and premium brand, it is critical to be at the forefront of technology to ensure you employ every tool at your disposal to create an inclusive and engaging channel of communication with your customer base.

Apps are not only storming onto more and more handsets and devices they are continuing to evolve as phone and tablet hardware and software evolve. With the rise of GPS and other location-positioning technology, some interesting developments are already available involving location-based services.

There are new apps available that not only enable groups of friends to find each other when out and about (useful), allow real time review and dating hook up’s to be established, but are also giving commercial businesses an opportunity to make themselves more visible on smartphones and engage mobile users with discounts or rewards for loyalty. Even a basic Google Search done on a GPS-enabled smartphone offers localised search results.

With over 600,000 apps currently available in the Apple App Store alone, it is no wonder the mobile app space is seen as a must have marketing and sales stream. Thomas and his team at Porsche Centre Melbourne knew this was the next logical step for them to market the centre, and the products and services available.

It was with this goal in mind that Porsche Centre Melbourne and Newpath WEB met and began creating a roadmap for the app that is now available for free download in the Apple App Store.

Solution

Newpath WEB worked with Thomas and the team at Porsche centre Melbourne to create a staged roadmap for the design and development of the app. With the initial feature listin including:

* Contact Details integrated with Google Maps
* Live Pre-Owned and Demonstrator Vehicle Listings (fed directly from the PCM website)
* Function to Email Details of a vehicle for sale to a Friend
* Book a Test Drive
* Make/book a Service Enquiry
* Direct Contact to Porsche Roadside Assist

The project included the design and development of an iPhone and iPad application for Porsche Centre Melbourne. The app allows existing owners to connect with Porsche Centre Melbourne to contact after sales support, book a service enquiry, connect with roadside assist and many other features. Whilst prospective buyers can view the range of pre-owned Porsche vehicles available for sale, which is fed to the app via a real time live feed from the Porsche Centre Melbourne website. These users can book a test drive, tell a friend and view the photo gallery of each vehicle. Directions to the Centre are made easy via integration of Google maps.

Personalisation of the app is the next phase of the app, to enhance it to a point where it can provide vehicle/owner specific information that can be shared between PCM and the owner. Such information that could be shared is service intervals, specific vehicle information, event information, and finance data. This is part of the roadmap for development of the app.

The Result

The app has been a huge success, with 600 downloads since being released. Users have embraced the app to connect with PCM, book service enquiries and enquire about pre-owned vehicle listings.

Thomas Heberling says “The launch of the app has been met with plenty of success and delight at Porsche Centre Melbourne. We have received very positive and encouraging feedback from our clients, which is an excellent outcome. The team at Newpath WEB were slick and professional throughout the project, making the entire process an easy and straight forward one for us. I look forward to working on future enhancements to the app and delivering greater customer engagement and communication.”

- Nathan Sinnott is the founder and CEO of Newpath WEB

This entry was posted on Friday, July 6th, 2012 at 4:45 am and is filed under News & Case Studies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.