The rise of the digital showroom: the new frontline for driving car sales

You can picture it. Gleaming polished cars. Gleaming white floors. Gleaming crowned teeth. The car showroom remains a mainstay of popular culture and of our association with the idea of purchasing a vehicle. But how relevant is the physical showroom in today’s increasingly digital-first world?

In the inaugural 2025 South African Automotive Industry Report by Rogerwilco and YOUKNOW Technologies, we highlighted that 92% of local consumers conduct online research before purchasing a car, consulting a range of sources including brand websites, search results, reviews and social media. Legacy manufacturers like Toyota, Suzuki and Volkswagen have leveraged this to great effect, consistently converting online engagement into real-world sales.

It’s not just the giants that are enticing customers digitally. Challenger brands such as Chery, Omoda and Jaecoo have entered the market with distinctly digital-first strategies, utilising influencer marketing and social media to build narratives about pricing and quality. This enables them to build trust and resonate with an increasingly cost-sensitive market.

Putting digital first

The implications are clear: automotive brands can no longer treat digital presence as an add-on or just another marketing tool. Rather, digital has become an essential part of the customer experience – one that begins long before a customer slides into the driver’s seat and hears the satisfying purr of a combustion engine, or the near-silent hum of its electric counterpart. Today’s automotive journey is increasingly digital, immersive, and expectation-driven.

It therefore stands to reason that digital strategies become an intrinsic part of the business strategy, with brands establishing a digital presence that connects seamlessly across all customer touchpoints – connecting search interest with social media and owned platforms.

Unlocking the power of search

The customer journey usually begins here: with a search. However, many brands, especially challenger brands, don’t unlock the full potential of search trends. Automotive WOLF research by Rogerwilco has identified a host of opportunity keywords – high-ranking search terms not yet leveraged by visible brands – highlighting the need for carmakers to integrate search into their marketing strategies to ensure they remain high in search rankings.

The research also shows an 83% correlation between a brand’s share of online search and its market share, making search visibility a powerful predictor of sales. By tracking real-time search and sentiment trends, brands can anticipate shifts in customer demand and adapt their strategies accordingly. This brings us to social media.

Own the conversation

Although social sentiment doesn’t directly drive sales, it serves as an early signal of brand affinity and potential buying intent. Nevertheless, the 2024 decline in car sales was mirrored by a 3% year-on-year drop in automotive mentions and a 4% decline in people discussing car brands online.

However, it’s not enough to monitor what is being said online. Automotive players who actively participate in and shape the conversations about their brands will achieve greater brand affinity, potentially winning customers before they even set foot in the showroom.

The polarised response to Jaguar’s announcement of its new brand identity in November last year illustrates the necessity of active engagement, with the automotive giant failing to create dialogues that could mitigate negative feedback and turn the buzz generated into an opportunity for strengthened brand equity.

Peddling influence

One way to shape the conversation is through influencers. Market challengers Jaecoo, Chery and Omoda in particular have leveraged influencer collaborations to drive visibility and engagement, with the latter’s partnership with Khosi Twala resulting in 8,500 brand mentions between December 2023 and September 2024. Subaru also saw great success with its #LiemaxSubaru campaign, a collaboration with Liyema Pantsi that generated nearly 18,000 mentions in May 2024.

However, our research shows that while such campaigns create tangible spikes in awareness and positive sentiment, they need to be integrated into broader, complementary strategies. By keeping the conversation going through open, active community engagement, brands can turn the short-term visibility gleaned by influencer marketing into long-term loyalty.

The omnichannel effect

The results of our research underscore the importance of digital-first strategies, but even more importantly, ones that follow customers through their engagement with the brand, just as your sales assistant might follow them around the showroom floor.

In today’s automotive landscape, optimising for search, managing digital narratives, and leveraging influencer momentum are no longer optional - they are essential. A cohesive, insight-driven digital strategy not only builds brand loyalty but steers real-world sales. The brands that integrate these touchpoints seamlessly will be the ones leading the pack, long before the customer ever steps foot in a showroom.