Here's the stat every dealer leans on: over 80% of car buyers start their shopping journey on a third-party site like Cars.com, AutoTrader, or CarGurus. It's true. But it raises two questions almost nobody asks. First: what about the other 20%? And second — the one that really matters — what does a buyer's research look like after they leave those portals? Because the answer to that second question is where sales are actually won, and it has very little to do with the portals at all.
First, the 20% nobody talks about
Let's start with the buyers who don't begin on a third-party site. That's nearly 1 in 5 shoppers — a significant chunk of your market — who start somewhere else entirely. Where do they go? Overwhelmingly, they start on Google. They type in things like "best used luxury SUV under 40k," "most reliable midsize sedan 2026," or "[your brand] dealer near me."
If your dealership isn't showing up for those searches, you've already lost that 20% before the journey even begins. They never see you. They're not comparing you on a portal and choosing someone else — you simply don't exist in their world. The portals can't help you capture this group, because this group hasn't gone to the portals yet. Only your search presence can.
That alone is a meaningful slice of buyers. But the bigger opportunity is what happens with the other 80%.
What research looks like after the portal
Here's what most dealers get wrong: they think the portal is the end of the journey. The shopper finds a car on Cars.com, fills out a form, and that's that. In reality, the portal is the middle of the journey — and what happens after the shopper leaves it is what decides who gets the sale.
Industry research shows car buyers spend an average of 14+ hours researching before they purchase. They don't spend all 14 hours on one portal. The journey looks more like this:
They discover — broad research, often starting on Google.
They compare — lining up specific vehicles across dealers on the portals.
They vet — and this is the critical part. Once a shopper has a vehicle and a dealer in mind, they leave the portal and Google the dealership by name. They read your reviews. They visit your actual website. They decide whether you look trustworthy, professional, and worth the drive. Recent research found that 41% of shoppers go directly to a dealer or manufacturer website after their initial research.
They decide — and contact the one dealership that earned their confidence.
The portal got them into the comparison set. But the vetting phase — the part that happens on Google and on your own website after they leave the portal — is what turns "one of several options" into "the dealership they actually drive to."
The stat that should change how you think
Here's the number that ties it all together: the average buyer today visits only about 1.4 dealerships before purchasing. A decade ago, it was 4.5.
Buyers used to physically shop four or five stores. Now they show up at barely more than one — because all the shopping happens online first. By the time a customer walks onto your lot or calls you, they've already decided. The comparison and the vetting are done. They've chosen you (or chosen your competitor) based on what they found online after leaving the portal.
So the real question isn't "do buyers start on Cars.com?" It's: when a buyer finishes comparing and Googles to make their final decision, do you show up ahead of your competitors — or behind them?
Why showing up ahead of your competitors matters so much
When that buyer runs their post-portal research, a few searches decide everything:
- "[Your dealership] reviews" — if your reputation and Google Business Profile are strong and recent, you win trust. If they're thin or stale, you lose it.
- "[Brand] dealer near me" — if you rank in Google's local map pack, you're in front of ready-to-buy local shoppers at the peak moment of intent. If you don't, your competitor is.
- Your actual website — when they click through, a fast, professional, easy-to-contact site closes the decision. A slow, clunky, or neglected one sends them back to a competitor whose site felt trustworthy.
On a portal, you're a commodity — one listing next to a dozen near-identical ones, sorted by price. Your only lever is being cheaper. In Google search and on your own website, you control the entire impression: your reputation, your story, your differentiation, your professionalism. That's where you stop competing on price and start competing on being the obvious choice.
The economics make the case by themselves
There's a hard financial argument too. Portal leads are expensive, and you pay for each one, every time, forever. The customers who find you through Google search and your own presence cost a fraction of that — and they convert at higher rates, because they sought you out specifically instead of clicking the cheapest option in a list.
This isn't an argument to abandon the portals. They do real work in the comparison phase. It's an argument about balance. Most dealerships are 70-80% dependent on portal leads and have made almost no investment in the channels they own — their search visibility, their website, their reputation. That's fragile and expensive. Shifting even part of that dependency toward channels you own lowers your blended cost per lead and protects you from portal price hikes.
The shift making this even more urgent
One more thing is changing fast. A 2025 Cars.com study found that 44% of consumers now use AI tools like ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews during car shopping. These tools answer questions that used to send shoppers to websites directly — and they build their answers by pulling from well-structured, authoritative web content.
Dealerships with strong online content have a chance of being surfaced and cited in those AI answers. Dealerships relying purely on portal listings will be invisible in the AI layer entirely. The discovery phase is shifting toward AI and search — and both reward an owned online presence, not portal dependency.
What this means for your dealership
When someone says "buyers go to Cars.com, not Google," the honest answer is: they go to both, at different stages — and the stages that decide the sale are the ones you can own. Here's where to focus:
- Capture the 20% who start on Google. Rank for the broad research searches and local "near me" queries so you exist for the buyers who never touch a portal first.
- Win your branded search. When a buyer Googles your dealership to vet you, everything they find should reinforce trust — your site, your reviews, your Google Business Profile.
- Dominate local search. Rank in the local map pack for "[brand] dealer near me" to capture high-intent local buyers at the moment of decision.
- Make your website convert. Fast, mobile-friendly, easy to contact. It's your digital showroom — and for most buyers, the only one they'll see before deciding.
- Protect your reputation. Reviews are the deciding factor in the vetting phase. A steady flow of recent, positive reviews is one of the highest-ROI investments a dealership can make.
The bottom line
Yes, 80% of buyers start on a third-party site. But the 20% who don't are searching Google right now — and the 80% who do will leave the portal and search Google to make their final decision. Either way, the moment that decides the sale happens on search and on your own website, not on the portal. With the average buyer visiting just 1.4 dealerships before purchasing, showing up ahead of your competitors in those searches isn't a nice-to-have. It's the difference between being found and being forgotten.
Not sure how your dealership shows up when buyers search after leaving the portals? That's exactly what a website audit reveals — how you rank for your own name, how you perform in local search, and whether your site wins the decision phase. Request a free audit and we'll show you where you're ahead of your competitors and where you're handing them customers. Or see how we help dealerships turn search and their own website into a lead source that competes with the portals.