Recently, Autoscout launched a feature that allows you as an advertiser – in this case me – to see more of the customer journey than just name, phone number and email address. You can now see for example the following:

From the overview above you can extract the following information: this customer has been searching for six weeks, has submitted more than 40 leads and saved seven favorites. They have also contacted private sellers (so it is not a certainty-seeker) and want to communicate via phone and email. Interesting information that you receive for every lead that Autoscout knows about. Some customers have blockers enabled, use incognito browsers or other methods. So the information is nice, but does it improve your lead/sales conversion? I doubt it.

Back in 2014 we already had this at Nieuweautokopen.nl. We enriched leads with all available customer information by first calling the customer and only then forwarding it to the dealer.

So we have quite some experience in adding information. Autoscout24 was not the first, by the way, ViaBOVAG with enriched leads came before that.

This information is shown in the dashboard and is not sent via email leads as Autoscout24 does. The information provided is richer, see an example below:

All information is visible in the lead overview and you can immediately see that not everyone has a profile. Out of six leads, two have a profile build-up. This does not mean the others are not important or of lower quality. That is also my concern: that when less information is shown, salespeople may think the lead is not valuable.

In the lead overview you have different tabs with customer information. Above you see “what the customer searched for”. There are also tabs with information about:

• Who the customer is
• What the customer wants to trade in
• What the customer is interested in
• Which ads the customer views
• Which price range

This information is quite useful. Especially because the example shows that the consumer is not searching for one specific vehicle, but a hybrid under 10,000 euros. The brand does not matter in this case.

Who is this information for?

From a sales perspective, I prefer to provide as little information as possible to the salesperson. Only a name, phone number and the car of interest. That is all a salesperson needs. Knowing what the customer searched for or that they submitted 43 other leads limits rather than helps. Of course, a very good salesperson can use the information without becoming “Big Brother” and subtly guide the customer. For example, if you see the customer is looking for certainty, you can emphasize warranty options without revealing what you know.

But if in 2026 we still struggle to follow up leads in a consistent way, then I see this as impossible for more than 90% of salespeople. Let’s just focus on the basics first.

Who benefits from this?

A few groups do. Account managers from both portals find this data very useful when speaking to marketing managers. The data can be used in Power BI, AI dashboards and provides interesting insights for marketing: stock mix, colors, pricing levels customers search for. Even if not used daily, it is a strong sales argument for dealer groups.

Is it allowed?

That is the question, and the answer is probably yes. Websites use cookie consent banners and users give permission. But as a customer, if a salesperson calls me and tells me everything I searched for and how many leads I submitted, it might feel intrusive, even if I technically agreed.

Does all this information improve sales conversion? No. Is it useful to convince dealers to join the platform? Yes. Can it potentially backfire? Possibly.

But both portals will have thought this through carefully and as always: the market will decide and discipline. Time will tell.