Buying Cars Online

from the an-experiment dept

Thu, Jun 8th 2000 1:56pm — Mike Masnick

A columnist in Boston tried to buy cars online using two different names and two very different approaches. One guy made it clear he was a cheapskate, and another just wanted a car, quickly. Some of the results are interesting. Most interesting was that most of the dealers insisted on calling the guy back, rather than emailing.

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2 Comments

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Other Ryan, 8 Jun 2000 @ 5:20pm

Misleading article
The writer needs to learn how to write a story from the facts available. The free-spender got 3 replies, the tightwad got 2, both saying "you can't have this car". Almost all of them wanted to do business over the phone, when they can smooth-talk and pressure him. How does any of this change my perception of car salesmen? The writer says things like "the results were not as predictable as you'd guess" throughout the story, but when it comes down to cases the results were exactly what I'd guess.
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- Mike (profile), 8 Jun 2000 @ 5:43pm
  
  Re: Misleading article
  Actually, that's a great point. I knew something was bothering me through reading the article and that was exactly it. When I read "the results may surprise you" or something like that I meant to go back and see if they really did, but I forgot. Thansk for pointing that out!
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