Carabunga.com Completes Market Tests of Direct Marketing Technology
6 September 2000
Carabunga.com Completes Market Tests of Direct Marketing Technology
SAN DIEGO--Sept. 6, 2000--Carabunga.com Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Newgen Results Corp. (Nasdaq NM: NWGN), announced its completion of initial tests that demonstrate a strong "proof of concept" of the Carabunga.com Web site that launched on June 26, 2000.
Five test dealerships located in different regions of the country were asked to generate a sales, service, or parts promotion using Carabunga.com's Web-based direct marketing technology, after which return on investment (ROI) and response rates were determined. The ROIs ranged from 10:1 to 44:1 -- with response rates as high as 25 percent.
Using traditional direct mail methods, ROI is not easily tracked, and response rates typically range from 1 to 3 percent. Carabunga.com is designed to improve upon traditional direct mail methods by using sophisticated data mining techniques that it can apply to a dealer's database and by enabling auto dealers to easily develop low-cost promotions through use of pre-tested templates. ROI calculation is a unique reporting capability that Carabunga technology provides.
One of the five promotions was conducted by Jack Powell Chrysler Plymouth of Escondido, Calif., who reported a $10 to $1 ROI from a promotion designed to increase new and used vehicle sales over one weekend. Using the resources of Carabunga.com, the dealership completed a direct mailing that advertised a used car raffle to 7,500 targeted customers. Customers who brought the promotion letter to the dealership were registered in the raffle with no charge.
"Our results surpassed all expectations," said Richard Klein, general manager of Jack Powell Chrysler Plymouth. "Two people camped out the night before to make sure they would have a chance to win the car. On the first day of the promotion, we were overrun with customers trying to register for the drawing. As a direct result of the promotion, we sold 19 vehicles -- 13 used and 6 new -- during a traditionally slow summer weekend. After using Carabunga.com just once and seeing the response rate and ROI, we're convinced that its e-PROMOTIONS tool is both easy to use and cost effective."
Established in February 2000 as "The Dealer's One-to-One Marketing tool," Carabunga.com officially launched nationwide on June 26th of this year. Carabunga.com's e-PROMOTIONS is a browser-based tool that enables automotive dealers to craft targeted promotions online for all departments within a dealership and for all aspects of dealership activity, including sales, service and/or after-market products. The key benefits of e-PROMOTIONS are flexibility, ease of use, near real time fulfillment, and the ability to track results.
About Carabunga.com Inc.
Carabunga.com Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Newgen Results Corp. that was established in February 2000. Newgen Results Corp. is a leading provider of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and e-CRM technology for the U.S. retail automotive industry.
Carabunga.com develops Web-based business-to-business e-Promotion solutions that incorporate revolutionary one-to-one marketing techniques. With Carabunga.com, automotive dealers and manufacturers use the Internet to deliver targeted communications via e-mail and direct mail supported by teleservice follow up. Carabunga.com promotions are designed to help the automotive industry effectively use the Internet to increase consumer visits to a specified dealership for sales, parts, service and/or after-market product purchases. For more information, visit www.carabunga.com.
This news release contains certain forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, including statements about the formation and operation of Carabunga.com and the benefits of its current and future products and services. Such statements are only predictions and Newgen's actual results may differ materially from those anticipated in these forward-looking statements. Factors that may cause such differences include, but are not limited to, the benefits to customers using Carabunga.com products and services, the acceptance of the Carabunga.com Web site by Newgen's customers, the introduction of new products by competitors, and Newgen's ability to successfully develop and support the Carabunga.com Web site and associated products and services. These factors and others are more fully discussed under the heading "Risk Factors" and elsewhere in Newgen's most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and its most recently filed quarterly report on Form 10-Q, each as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Additionally, the results achieved by other dealers using Carabunga's e-Promotions product may vary from those achieved in the initial test group so it should not be assumed that all promotions will produce similar results. Pricing of promotions, time of year, geographic location and other factors are all variables that may alter the results for a specific dealer from those of the initial test group.