Manager, Consumer & Market Insights

Overview

The Manager, Consumer & Market Insights, leads automotive market intelligence, consumer feedback, and reputation insights to improve marketing effectiveness and the customer experience across all locations. This role turns sentiment, competitive signals, and market trends into clear actions that increase sales conversion, service retention, and brand trust. This role also owns the  program end-to-end, ensuring strong adoption, reporting, and operational follow-through at every rooftop/location.

You will partner closely with Marketing, Store Leadership (GMs), Customer Experience, Analytics/BI, and Communications to prioritize what matters most to shoppers and owners—and drive measurable improvement.

• Automotive Market Research & Competitive Intelligence
• Lead market research to understand shopper demand and decision drivers, including:
• Purchase intent, affordability, and financing/lease sensitivity
• New vs. used demand shifts, trade-in expectations, and pricing transparency concerns
• Maintain competitive benchmarking by market (reputation, experience differentiators, key themes, share of attention).
• Partner with Analytics/BI to monitor digital demand signals (search trends, site behavior, lead quality).
• Deliver “why we’re winning/losing” insights tied to consumer drivers and local competition.
• Plan and run research studies (as needed), including brand health, journey/shopper insights, message testing, segmentation, and CX driver analysis (NPS/CSAT).
• Manage research vendors and budgets; ensure research quality and usable outputs.
• Present insights and recommendations to senior leadership and cross-functional partners.
• Consumer Outlook (Forward-Looking Trends)
• Publish monthly/quarterly outlook reporting on macro and seasonal factors impacting auto retail (e.g., model-year changeover, tax season, holidays).
• Translate outlook into practical actions for Marketing and Operations (messaging, staffing, training, and process focus).
• Program Ownership (Primary Accountability)
• Own  strategy, configuration, integrations, governance, and adoption across all locations.
• Manage dashboards/scorecards for:
• Star rating, review volume, response rate/time, sentiment trends, top topics
• Competitive benchmarking by market
• Exception alerts and escalation triggers
• Train and enable GMs, Sales/Service leaders, and Advisors to drive consistent execution.
• Partner with Legal/Compliance and PR/Comms on escalations, sensitive issues, and resolution protocols.
• Monitor sentiment across reviews, surveys, social, and support channels; summarize key themes and actions.
• Produce & Execute Sentiment Performance improvement plans for low performing stores
• Produce Sentiment Performance Reporting to Regional & Marketing Strategy teams to improve customer experience and marketing messaging
• Turn sentiment insights into clear recommendations that improve experience and performance.
• Leadership & Management
• Oversee day-to-day management of team associates
• Ensure they are proficient and roles & responsibilities
• Ensure they are in continuous status of professional growth & development

• Reputation:
  Higher Rep score/average rating, increased review volume, faster responses, fewer recurring negative themes.
• Marketing impact:
  Stronger go-to-market decisions, more efficient spend, improved cost per outcome (e.g., CPO).
• Customer outcomes:
  Improved NPS/CSAT and/or OEM CSI/SSI (where applicable), improved service retention.

• Bachelor’s degree (Marketing, Business, Analytics, Research, or related), or equivalent experience.
• 5+ years in consumer insights, market research, VoC/CX analytics, or reputation management (auto retail or multi-location preferred).
• Strong analytical + storytelling skills (turn quant + qual into priorities and actions).
• Proficiency in Excel and BI tools (Power BI/Tableau); comfort with operational metrics and large datasets.
• Strong communication and project management skills; ability to influence cross-functional and field teams.

• Familiarity with OEM survey programs and dealership operating rhythms.
• Experience with CX strategy, and/or AI-driven sentiment tools.
• SQL or Python for…