A dealer spends money advertising equipment online. At the end of the month someone asks, “How many leads did we get?” That is important—but it is not enough to diagnose marketplace performance.
Metric 1: Search impressions
Was the machine being presented to potential buyers? If impressions are weak, investigate taxonomy, geography, buyer demand and distribution.
Metric 2: Listing views
A view means the buyer chose your machine from the results. Impressions without views can point toward photo, title, price or relevance issues.
Metric 3: Saves and favorites
A save is a middle-funnel signal. The buyer may not be ready to contact the dealer, but the machine earned enough interest to preserve.
Metric 4: Buyer actions
Messages, video requests, offers, phone actions and financing actions can indicate stronger intent than a page view.
Metric 5: Qualified conversations
Not all leads are equal. Track whether contacts are real, match the machine, have a realistic timeline and progress into an actual sales conversation.
Metric 6: Sales attribution
A buyer may discover a unit on a marketplace, visit the dealer website, then call directly later. Sales teams need a consistent method for recording how the buyer first found the dealership or machine.
Do not compare marketplaces using raw lead totals alone
Platform A sends 30 contacts. Platform B sends 10. Which was better? You do not know until you measure qualified inquiries, sales opportunities, cost and attributable gross profit.
Cost per qualified inquiry = marketplace cost ÷ qualified inquiries. Cost per sales opportunity = marketplace cost ÷ real opportunities.
Transparency builds dealer trust
A better marketplace promise is not “we guarantee 100 leads.” It is “we will show you what happened to your inventory.”
The takeaway
Dealers should be able to answer: Was my machine seen? Did buyers open it? Did they show intent? Did they contact me? Did the opportunity progress?
