Las Vegas, Nevada – SEMA’s decision to take its annual event online this year had a lot of aftermarket manufacturers worried about whether they could deliver the same show on a virtual platform, but for ALLDATA, attendance was never in question.
“Not attending SEMA, live or virtual, is never a consideration for us. The ALLDATA brand and our commitment to our customers, throughout the entire repair industry, whether that be collision or repair, demands that we support the industry during SEMA week. If we didn’t attend SEMA, whether that be live, or on a digital platform, the industry would miss us,” said ALLDATA’s vice president of sales and business development, George Verkamp.
The team at ALLDATA has been busy developing and refining its line of information products in preparation for SEMA360, as well as expanding on existing products, such as the ALLDATA Collision Advantage tool which has been updated to provide near-instantaneous repair information.
“We are showcasing our entire suite of repair and information products. For collision repair shops, a product that we are really proud of and have showcased before at SEMA is our ALLDATA Collision Advantage product. It gives repair providers the ability to match repair lines from any collision estimating system with the associated OE repair procedure. This speeds up the repair process while ensuring that technicians are following the procedures required by the OEMs,” said Verkamp.
ALLDATA’s VP of sales, Robert McBride continued, emphasizing the unique opportunity ALLDATA provides by offering access to the industry’s broadest and most comprehensive repair information database, direct from the OEMs.
“We recently added close to 40 Hyundai makes and models for our collision customers, which we believe is faster than anybody else out there in the market. Our newest platform allows us to publish OEM content pretty much on a daily basis. In addition, we just launched a new shop management system for the mechanical side; targeting those shops that are still hand-writing orders—this is a good product for smaller shops looking for something with essential shop management features. We’re trying to give them something that is extremely simple to use. They could pick it up and start using it without any training, truthfully, so they can start being a professional shop and managing their customer base.”
For such an impressive display of products, Verkamp and McBride said that preparations for ALLDATA’s appearance at SEMA360 came right down to the wire due to the event’s newly-introduced virtual platform.
“We were preparing up until the last minute. We knew that it was certainly going to be a different, perhaps even challenging environment. However, our marketing team does a fantastic job and the brand really speaks for itself.
Despite the uncertainty in the weeks leading up to SEMA360, according to Verkamp and McBride, ALLDATA’s attendance at SEMA, virtual or not, reflects our commitment to our customers.
“ALLDATA went all-in to support the industry’s foremost collision repair event, developing content and online roundtable discussion topics focused on issues that are paramount to shop owners and technicians,” said Verkamp.
McBride continued, “We demo most of our products, some in-person, some of it online. It’s great to be at a show and consolidate—get a group of people there all at one time, but the reality is that George has got about half of his team providing online demonstrations every single day. Even though we’re in a different venue, I think the experience can still be pretty effective.”
ALLDATA also provides customers with a diagnostic hotline, staffed by a team of more than 30 Master Technicians who provide diagnostic support to customers online every day.
“That Tech-Assist team—not only are they certified master techs, most of them actually started out as educators actually training other master techs, as well. Their favourite thing to do is get on a call and not only just help a person fix the car, but actually teach you how to do it for the next time as well.”
Unphased by the new SEMA and likewise by their company’s near future, Verkamp and McBride are optimistic about what the rest of this new decade has to offer, and are ready to face any challenges that come their way.
“For 2021, we are extremely optimistic and in the long-term, we continue to be optimistic. The reality is that ALLDATA continues to be the leader in OEM information. Our ability to take information from the manufacturers and publish it at a rate that is faster than anybody else in the industry, in the quantity that we do so, as well as the completeness that we do so continues to make us extremely viable, regardless of how sophisticated vehicles get. We’re gonna continue to be relied upon to deliver the content with the breadth and coverage that we do today,” said Verkamp.
