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Cars.com, Chicago, IL

How to EnterCompany: Cars.com, Chicago, IL
Company Description: Visited by more than 11 million car shoppers each month, Cars.com is the leading destination for online car shoppers, offering credible and easy-to-understand information from consumers and experts to help buyers formulate opinions on what to buy, where to buy and how much to pay. Cars.com puts buyers in control of their shopping process with the information they need to make confident decisions.
Nomination Category: Customer Service & Call Center Awards Team Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Back-Office Customer Service Team of the Year - All Other Industries

Nomination Title: Cars.com Operations Integration Team

Tell the story about what this nominated team achieved since the beginning of July 2012 (up to 525 words). Focus on specific accomplishments, and relate these accomplishments to past performance or industry norms. Be sure to mention obstacles overcome, innovations or discoveries made, and outcomes:

Prior to 2013, Cars.com had minimal new product launches but as part of the accelerated growth plan, the business planned to launch multiple, back-to-back products, covering both the B2B and B2C space. This puts tremendous pressure on all teams – and Operations is no exception. In January 2013, and under new leadership, Ops Integration was re-branded with a clear charter and framework to ensure everyone understood the role and benefits of this team.

The Operations Integration Team’s (OIT) mission is to support successful product launches and serve as the liaison between Operations (e.g. Customer Care, Dealer Account Management, etc.) and Product Management. In doing so, they flush out all operational requirements (process/technology) for servicing our internal (sales) and external (consumers and dealers) customers. The visibility and empowerment of this team is essential because the OIT Specialist has direct responsibility to influence decisions that impact all operational service level agreements (SLA) and performance.

In April, Cars.com launched a new Sell-it-Yourself (SIY) product which allows consumers to list their vehicles for sale on Cars.com. Because the launch had been planned in 2012 under a different OIT model the product launch had significant operational issues, resulting in an immediate three-fold increase in Customer Support call/email volume. In addition to overtime costs, this caused low confidence in the product and customer experience. Because of the internal uncertainty, morale was very low for the call center front-line.

Operations Integration (OI) worked quickly with the Customer Care team to understand the scope of the issues and to pull Salesforce data in order to classify the types of customer complaints, prioritizing the fixes for Product Management, based on impact/SLA. OI’s strong role as the technical/functional liaison allowed Customer Care to focus on the customer. Between April and August, customer support tickets dropped 50% to a volume lower than pre-launch, while the number of customer orders increased 35% - significantly reducing overall cost per customer.

In June, right on the heels of SIY, Cars.com launched Cars360, a banner advertising product which has been the fastest-selling new product in Cars.com history. Based on experience from the launch of SIY, the team understood the pressure to deliver the best experience right out of the gate; however, based on total-cycle time calculations, the turn-around-time (TAT) for Cars360 was going to be at least four days, even though the TAT for all existing products was two days. This increase was due to required outsourcing of critical-path operational components to a vendor with whom the product team had already signed a contract.

Working with these risks, Ops Integration leveraged existing best practices for enrollment, established a Salesforce workflow and queues for new teams that needed to be part of the process and communicated relentlessly to set expectations -- delivering a “turn-key” enrollment solution. When the product launched, it exceeded the planned volume by 400% but as a result of an intense pre-launch effort, the Operations teams were fully prepared to handle it, with no impact to the SLA and the roll-out was a huge success for everyone across the board.

ATTACHMENTS REDACTED FOR PUBLICATION

Provide a brief (up to 125 words) biography about the leader(s) of the nominated team:

Anne Swanson joined Classified Ventures in 2012 as the Director of Digital Ad Production & Operations Integration for Cars.com. Her experience in business management includes a deep knowledge and passion for business process management, operational performance excellence, systems design, leadership and team-building. Previously, Anne spent 7 years with Nokia and has also worked for Ernst & Young and Continental Airlines. Anne obtained a B.A. degree from Knox College and an M.B.A. from Thunderbird School of Global Management. Anne enjoys spending time with her family, friends and taking advantage of all the culinary and cultural treasures that Chicago has to offer.