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Economic factors are driving strong interest in CPO vehicles, and CPO Sales are reaching new heights. Get the research behind it, and find out the Top 10 Most-Viewed CPO Vehicles on AutoTrader.com in March 2012.

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The AutoTrader.com Dealer Sourcing Studies reveal how New Car Buyers make first contact with the dealership and what influences them to choose specific dealerships. AutoTrader.com commissioned KS&R, an independent market research firm based in Syracuse, New York, to conduct the studies among New Car Buyers of AutoTrader.com dealer customers. 72,617 New Car Buyers who purchased between March 2010 and March 2012 were surveyed.

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Your vehicle descriptions should influence shoppers to come in and take a test drive, and custom comments give you the opportunity to tell each car’s story. This article provides helpful information for writing great custom comments.

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The "Price Markdown" feature on AutoTrader.com enables dealers to systematically subtract the amount of special offers from the price of their vehicles. With this tool, dealers are able to more easily highlight the affordability of their new cars and entice shoppers who may be undecided between a new and used vehicle. This quick reference guide shows you how to apply price markdowns on the back-end tool at dealers.autotrader.com.

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ATLANTA – February 12, 2012 – In the February edition of the Shopper Insights Report, AutoTrader.com experts recommend Leading Luxury Vehicles and Hidden Gems, based on insights from the 2012 New Luxury Vehicle Loyalty Study. Among other things, the study revealed the top reasons luxury buyers stayed loyal to their brand when they purchased another new luxury vehicle. Utilizing the top five reasons that these buyers stayed loyal—Brand Affinity, Quality/Reliability, Driving Performance, Price/Finance/Value and Styling/Design—the experts at AutoTrader.com selected 10 luxury vehicles for the list, with the Cadillac CTS sedan and Volvo S60 being chosen as the best overall picks.

 “With the economy beginning to show signs of resurgence, we believe that even more shoppers will turn their attention to luxury vehicles, making now an ideal time to share the insights we have regarding this important segment,” said Rick Wainschel, vice president of automotive insights at AutoTrader.com. “By bridging information gained from our extensive research with the vast automotive knowledge within AutoTrader.com, we aim to facilitate deeper connections between buyers and sellers.”

The 2012 New Luxury Vehicle Loyalty Study was conducted by Polk and AutoTrader.com with a total of 1,485 U.S. luxury buyers to gain a deeper understanding of the reasons why these buyers stay with, leave or move to a luxury brand. Loyalty is defined as a buyer who buys a luxury vehicle from the same make as the one owned previously.

Beyond the top five reasons luxury buyers remained loyal, the study also revealed that the primary drivers of loyalty differed by brand. For example, the main reason Cadillac buyers stayed loyal is not the same as the reason BMW buyers stayed loyal.

• Brand affinity was selected by a significantly higher percentage of Cadillac loyalists than any other luxury brand.
  
  
• Quality/reliability was cited more often by Mercedes-Benz and Acura loyalists as a reason for returning to that brand.
  
  
• BMW loyalists were more apt to identify driving performance as a reason for their return purchase than other luxury owners.
  
  
• Price ranked much higher as a reason for Acura owner loyalty compared to the other luxury brands in the study.
  
  
• Audi loyalists rank styling and design significantly higher than other brand loyalists as a reason to stay.
  
  

 AutoTrader.com experts leveraged these insights to select two vehicles that were good on all five criteria for their overall picks. Then, they chose two vehicles—one vehicle from the brand that was rated highest by its loyalists in each category and one hidden gem shoppers should consider—for each of the following four categories: Brand Affinity, Driving Performance, Price/Value and Styling/Design. Since quality and reliability are considered to be the cost of entry for vehicles in the luxury market, experts did not choose vehicles based on those factors independently.

The full report, brought to you by the AutoTrader.com Trend Engine, provides in-depth analysis of these vehicles—from the reasons experts selected the vehicles to the level of interest consumers have shown these vehicles while shopping on AutoTrader.com.

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