Data and Finance: Can automotive be sexy?
Episode 29 of the Autotrader podcast Women in the driving seat, hosted by Editorial Director, award-winning motoring journalist Erin Baker is released today. The series aims to rip up the rule book on the female-empowerment narrative by sharing personal as well as professional experiences, examining the space where both collide, and the challenges, fears and successes happen.
This episode focused on the variety of ways AI can stimulate sales and growth throughout the automotive industry, emphasising that AI is pointless without data. We also explore different routes to accounting and finance outside the traditional route of university.
All episodes in the series feature a Podcast Pit Stop – a quick fire round covering the professional and personal including; calculator or spreadsheet? Slippers or stilettos? B2B or B2C? OEM or Retailer?
Join Erin as she puts two innovators in the driving seat.
Podcast preview
Harvey:
“Keyloop has an automotive retail platform that runs everything from buying and owning a car, servicing it, parts distribution – all the software that end consumers don’t really know exists in the background.”
“The automotive industry to me is very data rich and information poor.”
“Autotrader does a great job of mining data and serving it up to the industry, but I think retailers and OEMs are sitting on a goldmine of information that they can’t seem to get their fingers on.”
“It’s disheartening to see the lack of data usage or access to data in this industry.”
“People are trying to jump on the AI bandwagon, but if you don’t have centralised data to feed into an LLM, you can’t actually utilise it.”
“It’s an interesting thing, because everyone keeps talking about AI supplanting all these jobs and people will have to find something else. I don’t see that, I see it allowing us to do more with our current staffing – how many more leads could your sales team contact and get through if actually they were put in front of them in the right time, right place?”
“When there is doubt, there is no doubt. You know the answer, just do it.”
Farzana Kosar:
“A lot of my role isn’t just about crunching numbers, it’s about bringing to life the commercial reality of the concepts that people are designing around data products and different products that are going to be serving our customers.”
“You could be one day talking about how you commercialise a product and how you can price it and take it to market, and then another day you could be talking about the long-term plan for Autotrader and how we’re going to continue to grow revenue.”
“Sometimes it isn’t always about the quickest way to make money. Sometimes it’s about the longer-term gain that you’re going to get.”
“I find that you have to spin a lot of plates and wear a lot of hats, but if you understand the business really well, you’ll be able to contribute really valuably.”
“The role of accounting has changed so much over the years. It’s so much more embedded into the business, in the operations; like a true business partner really helping people to understand either the consequences of making a decision or the opportunity around making a decision isn’t just about black or white numbers on a spreadsheet.”
“Anyone that says it’s [accountancy] not cool and sexy obviously hasn’t met the Autotrader finance team!”
“The traditional route was probably getting a degree then going to do your accounting qualification. Now there’s lots of different routes; you can do an AAT qualification straight after school or you can get a degree apprenticeship.”
“You can never stop learning, never think you know everything.”
Notes to editors
ABOUT ERIN BAKER
Erin Baker is an award-winning motoring journalist and Editorial Director of Auto Trader. She writes a monthly driving column for Vogue, is a World Car of the Year judge, consults for Goodwood and hosts She's Electric, a national roadshow bringing women and electric cars together. Erin is passionate about narrowing the gender gap, both in the automotive industry itself and between car brands and female consumers, through more targeted language, marketing and experiences. She is a single mother of two boys.
ABOUT AUTOTRADER
Autotrader Group plc is the UK’s largest automotive platform. It listed on the London Stock Exchange in March 2015 and is a member of the FTSE 100 Index.
Autotrader’s purpose is Driving Change Together. Responsibly. Autotrader is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive culture, it aims to build stronger partnerships with its customers and use its voice and influence to drive more environmentally friendly vehicle choices.
With the largest number of car buyers and the largest choice of trusted stock, Autotrader’s marketplace sits at the heart of the UK car buying process. That marketplace is built on an industry-leading technology and data platform, which is increasingly used across the automotive industry. Autotrader is continuing to bring more of the car buying journey online, creating an improved buying experience, whilst enabling all its retailer partners to sell vehicles online.
Autotrader publishes a monthly used car Retail Price Index which is based on pricing analysis of circa 800,000 unique vehicles. The same data that powers the Index is used by the Office for National Statistics to make the UK’s official measures of inflation more robust, as well as the Bank of England to feed the broader UK economic indicators.
For more information, please visit: plc.autotrader.co.uk
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