Hyundai Motor Company has introduced an “untact” online sales platform called “Click to Buy” to the U.S., which is Hyundai’s biggest market, and India. Its plan is to carry out an all-out war in order to recover its sales that have suffered since the COVID-19 pandemic.
Although some automotive manufacturers partnered up with Amazon in the past and attempted online sales and Tesla has been selling its cars only online since its establishment, Hyundai Motor Company is the first major automotive manufacturer to establish an exclusive online sales platform in the U.S. and India.
Since 2017, Hyundai Motor Company has tested its Click to Buy platform in certain countries such as the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia. Its platform has been mostly for specific dealers from these countries that are considered as minor markets.
This is the first time when Hyundai Motor Company has expanded its online sales in the U.S., where offline dealers are leading car sales and is Hyundai’s biggest market, and India. It will be interesting whether people begin to purchase luxury cars online when consumers generally purchase luxury cars in person after looking at actual cars.
Hyundai Motor America has introduced Click to Buy platform in the U.S. since the beginning of this month in order to accelerate recover process of its sales that have been halved since the COVID-19 pandemic. It sold 27,238 cars in April when it sold 57,025 cars in April of last year. This year’s April sales is its lowest April sales. It is the first time it sold less than 30,000 cars in single month since November of 2009 (28,045).
“In order to deal with this pandemic, we opened our Click to Buy platform so that customers can safely and conveniently purchase cars online.” said Hyundai Motor Company. “Every Hyundai dealer in the U.S. is participating in our platform.”
It is rare that every dealer of a motor brand participates in online sales in the U.S. Although offline dealers in the U.S. have been in exclusive charge of sales traditionally, Hyundai had no choice to adjust its business strategy due to COVID-19.
Prior to introducing Click to Buy platform to the U.S., India introduced the platform to India. Hyundai is the first one to introduce an online sales platform to India. During the first week of this month, Hyundai Motor India received more than 1,500 orders through the platform. Although it did not have any sale in April, it will start delivering cars based on online preorders starting from this month.
Through Click to Buy platform, customers can compare real-time car prices suggested by all dealers and purchase a car from a preferred dealer. Dealers can deliver cars that are preordered to the front of customers’ houses and carry out a complete “untact” transaction.
In addition to sale, Hyundai Motor Company is also working on reinforcing its online maintenance reservation service. When a customer makes a reservation for maintenance online, a dealer will pick up a car and deliver it back after a repair.
Hyundai Motor Company has also drastically expanded its promotions within the U.S. Hyundai Motor America will pay installments for 6 months for people who have been unemployed since COVID-19. New buyers will be given benefits such as interest-free installment and 90 days payment extension. Customers who have their warranties expired between March and June will have their warranties extended until the end of June.
It will also launch a new car since the COVID-19 pandemic. It introduced specifications and the price of its new Sonata Hybrid to customers in the U.S. on this day and announced that it would start selling the new Sonata starting from next month. It is also planning to launch new Avante and Santa Fe models sometime during this year.
“Consumers within the market have been highly interested in online sales channels since the COVID-19 pandemic.” said a representative for Hyundai Motor Company. “We expect that Click to Buy platform will be our new sales channel within major global markets.”
Staff Reporter Jung, Chiyeon | chiyeon@etnews.com