The Cobalt Group Unveils Lead Manager Customer Central

SEATTLE--Jan. 2, 20049, 2004--

Automotive industry's most popular lead management product now even better with powerful new features and dealer-tested, easy-to-use interface

The Cobalt Group, the leading provider of CRM and e-business software and services to the automotive retail market, has unveiled Lead Manager(SM) Customer Central, a key component of Cobalt's complete family of CRM (customer relationship management) solutions. Building on the success of Cobalt's Lead Manager(SM), the automotive industry's most popular lead management product, the new Lead Manager Customer Central offers more powerful lead management tools to help dealerships and automobile manufacturers convert more leads and increase sales and profits.

"Lead Manager Customer Central is an easy-to-use solution that improves lead response times, helps keep sales staff organized, and provides easy access to customer and prospect information," said Mike Martinez, Cobalt's vice president of sales and marketing. "As the industry's most popular lead management product, Lead Manager Customer Central was built to give dealers the tool they need to turn leads into sales, and manufacturers the performance, reliability, and reports they need to successfully manage large-scale Internet lead programs."

For automobile manufacturers (OEMs), Lead Manager Customer Central delivers the essential CRM features that manufacturers need to promote certified automotive manufacturer Internet lead programs. Lead Manager Customer Central is the most reliable, scalable solution on the market today, capable of processing large volumes of leads from OEMs and routing them to dealers within an OEM network. Lead Manager Customer Central ensures that dealers capitalize on valuable leads from their OEM, OEM affiliates, and OEM finance arms. Lead Manager Customer Central also helps OEMs enforce lead handling business rules and response time standards. Enterprise reports allow OEMs to track program performance at the dealer, zone, district, regional and national levels.

For automotive dealers, Lead Manager Customer Central offers simple, intuitive navigation that makes it easy for all of a dealership's staff to use it to effectively manage leads from the sales floor, phone and Internet. Lead Manager Customer Central keeps leads on track and moving forward to a closed sale, keeps dealership customer data in order, and provides dealers with accurate data and tools to help them run more effective direct marketing campaigns.

New features of Lead Manager Customer Central include:

-- Rich text email editor that enables dealers to project a professional brand image by sending emails with dealership and manufacturer logos and vehicle images.

-- Lead folders that can be customized to easily identify and organize prospects and to allow dealers to keep leads moving forward toward a closed sale.

-- Easy-to-use work plan that enables dealers to manage daily follow-up activities, tasks, and appointments, with alarm and escalation features that notify salespeople and management when tasks are overdue.

-- Automatic flagging of duplicate leads to ensure accurate and actionable customer data.

-- Central customer file that can manage multiple leads under a single contact name, enabling dealers to optimize their selling options.

Lead Manager Customer Central is built on the Cobalt Nitra(TM) platform, designed to deliver unprecedented reliability, performance and flexibility to dealers and OEMs, and is backed by Cobalt's industry-leading training and customer support. To sign up or get more information about Cobalt Lead Manager Customer Central, contact Cobalt at 866-439-2258 or e-mail sales@cobaltgroup.com.

About The Cobalt Group

The Cobalt Group ( www.cobaltgroup.com ) works exclusively in the automotive retail market developing integrated e-business programs that help manufacturers and dealers increase their profits and operational efficiencies. Cobalt offers a broad range of products and services, including enterprise software; customer relationship management (CRM) applications; e-commerce applications; the industry's largest OEM parts locating and marketing service; and e-business best practices training and consultation. Cobalt's network includes 12,000 franchised dealers and more than 70 of the 100 largest dealer groups. Cobalt is the only software technology provider ever endorsed by 18 manufacturers and the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA).