Brunswick adds iboats.com to Dealer Advantage offerings

Boating Industry
Friday June 22, 2007

LAKE FOREST, Ill. – Brunswick Corp., introduced several new benefits this week for members of its Dealer Advantage program, including reduced pricing for Web site, lead management and lead generation services and discounted Internet classified listings and advertising.

“Boat dealers have enough to do without having to be Internet experts,” said Brunswick chairman and CEO Dustan E. McCoy. “By providing them with more affordable access to professional Web site solutions, we are introducing yet another advantage to help their businesses succeed. Combined with the lead management solution, dealers will have powerful tools to generate more leads and to convert more leads into sales.”

“Industry experts approximate that 60 percent of Internet leads currently go completely unanswered,” said Dealer Advantage Director Betsy Lazzara. “If even a small percentage of those leads can be converted to sales it’s a significant source of potential revenue for our dealers.”

And in the press release this morning, Brunswick Corp., reported that is has reached an agreement with iboats.com to offer qualified Dealer Advantage members lead generation capabilities and discounted Internet-based advertising.

“Statistics show that three out of four retail customers are researching their boat purchases via the Internet,” McCoy said in the release. “Our goal is to team up with the best partners in that medium to provide information, while promoting and preserving the dealer-customer relationship.”

The iboats.com site features new boat and engine data for one-stop consumer research. Combined with its new and used boat search capabilities, iboats.com boasts up to four million visitors per month and an online forum community in excess of 90,000 members.

Current iboats.com customers also have the opportunity to take advantage of the reduced monthly Dealer Advantage pricing if they register to participate with iboats.com as Brunswick Dealer Advantage dealers.

Dealer Advantage
Brunswick Dealer Advantage features three levels of participation – silver, gold and platinum – each based on the percentage of the dealership’s retail business dedicated to Brunswick boats and/or Mercury Marine engines. The stronger the partnership with Brunswick, the higher the dealership’s level of eligibility and the more benefits they can access through Dealer Advantage.

All U.S.-based marine dealerships that are in good standing and carry a Brunswick-owned boat line or Mercury Marine engines are eligible at the baseline silver level. There is no cost to participate and dealers may opt to participate in all or some of the benefits depending on their unique business needs.

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