#3: Weekly Data-Driven Dealer Insight: The Case for Experimental Features in Dealer Management Systems

Why Your DMS Needs an “Experimental Features” Toggle

Innovation works best when it’s not left to chance. In our industry, we identify valuable product changes by listening to end users’ problems, leveraging domain expertise, and drawing on cross-industry intelligence. While it’s easy to collect good ideas, the real challenge is testing them quickly in real business situations. That’s where automotive software often gets stuck.

Last week, I had an ‘AHA’ moment during an online seminar for a visualization and graphics tool I use every day. I won’t mention the product here to avoid advertising, but still feel free to message me if you’re interested.

One product idea on their roadmap really stood out to me: Experimental Features.

The idea is simple and brilliant: developers release ‘beta’ features that users can enable or disable in the live product. What we know about them:

• There’s no tech support for these features, so you use them at your own risk.
• By trying them out, you provide direct feedback and help shape the future product’s direction.
• You get to try new features right away, instead of waiting for the next big release.

So now, why don’t we do this in the automotive software industry?

I’ve seen many Dealer Management Systems (DMS) and automotive applications for dealers and OEMs. I’ve noticed advanced cloud configurations and impressive user interfaces, but I haven’t seen a ‘Labs’ or ‘Experiments’ tab in a DMS (to date).

Imagine if we could test a new Service Advisor reception workflow by enabling 10% of users to use it, for instance one week. We could immediately measure the impact on Repair Order (RO) processing time.

The primary barrier is no longer technology; it’s culture and a still-conservative approach within the automotive software industry. Modern cloud-based DMS platforms already support the feature “toggling”. With Feature Flags and Remote Configuration Management, the major DMS providers now have the modern technology to do this.

What’s missing is the willingness to try. In my experience, our industry is often so focused on finetuning ‘Business as Usual’ that it doesn’t have time to look and implement new ideas. We focus so much on stability that we forget to do experiments. But in a data-centric world, safe experimentation is the right way to move forward.

Takeaway: Implementing ‘Experimental Features’ in Dealer Management Applications isn’t just about cutting-edge tech; it enables rapid, measurable product improvements in many aspects. It enables product teams to stop guessing and start engaging with user demands in real time.

To take the first step toward implementing this concept, we can identify a low-risk DMS feature for pilot testing. For instance, we could test a simplified reporting service dashboard available to a select group of users. Monitoring the feedback and performance of this feature could yield useful insights and demonstrate its viability for broader adoption of DMS.

What do you think about Experimental Features in modern DMS? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Check back next Monday for the upcoming #4: Data-Driven Dealer Insight.

Recommended Reading

To understand the methodology behind this “test and learn” mindset, I recommend the following foundational books:

• “The Lean Startup” by Eric Ries is the framework for continuous innovation and the “Build-Measure-Learn” feedback loop. I love it!
• “Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love” by Marty Cagan is the definitive guide on how top tech companies discover and deliver technology products.
• “The Four Steps to the Epiphany” by Steve Blank is the classic book that launched the Customer Development revolution.