The Evolution of the Smart Dealer Suite: Lessons in Product Development

The Founder’s Dilemma: Balancing Vision, Execution, and Distractions

When I started building technology products, I didn’t even know what a Chief Product Officer (CPO) was. I was the founder, CEO, product lead, and the guy taking out the garbage—like most startup founders. The challenge wasn’t just building the product but managing the business, sales, marketing, and everything in between.

One of the hardest lessons I learned was the danger of building for yourself instead of your customers. Founders often chase shiny objects—custom requests, quick revenue wins, and distractions that pull them off their product roadmap.

I’ve made my share of mistakes over the last 20 years, but I’ve also learned this:
✅ A well-defined product roadmap keeps you focused and efficient.
✅ Listening to customers is critical, but not all feedback should shape your product.
✅ Every pivot should be aligned with long-term strategy, not short-term revenue.

This is the journey of how I built the Smart Dealer Suite, a series of products that evolved from one problem to the next—ultimately shaping a platform that transformed how car dealerships operated online.

It Started with a Problem: CarLoansCanada.com

Before I built my first product, I built a solution to a sales problem.

I was running a small used car dealership and struggling with lead generation. To solve this, I launched CarLoansCanada.com, a website designed to attract and convert car buyers. It worked—too well.

The site started generating thousands of leads each year, but that created a new problem:
❌ No system to manage leads efficiently.
❌ Missed sales opportunities due to slow follow-ups.
❌ No way to distribute leads to other dealers.

This led to my first real product: Smart Dealer.

Smart Dealer: The Foundation of a Product Ecosystem

Later renamed to PowerUp, Smart Dealer, this was built as a CRM (Customer Relationship Manager) and ILM (Internet Lead Manager).

Problem:

✅ Dealerships had no system for managing inbound leads efficiently.
✅ Sales teams were manually tracking inquiries, leading to missed opportunities.
✅ No way to sell and distribute leads to other dealerships.

Solution:

💡 Smart Dealer automated the lead management process, tracking customer interactions and enabling dealerships to convert more leads into sales.

It worked so well that I sold the dealership and launched eDealer.ca, a company focused on helping other dealers implement Smart Dealer.

As adoption grew, I realized another problem:
🚗 Most dealers didn’t have websites that generated leads effectively.
Solution? Smart Inventory.

Smart Inventory: Powering Dealership Websites & Lead Generation

Problem:

• Dealers needed a way to showcase inventory online and generate leads from specific vehicles.

• Managing new inventory was inefficient—dealers relied on manual data entry to update their websites or didn’t have any inventory on their website at all.

Solution:

🔹 Smart Inventory allowed dealers to:
✅ List vehicles online automatically (pulling data from their dealership management system).
✅ Generate leads from specific vehicles, not just generic contact forms.
✅ Integrate with third-party platforms (eBay, AutoTrader, etc.).
✅ Optimize inventory listings for SEO.

With lead management (Smart Dealer) and inventory management (Smart Inventory) in place, dealerships became more efficient and profitable.

But then the market shifted.

Smart Book: Adapting to the Rise of Subprime Auto Lending

By 2007, the subprime auto market was booming. Consumers with less-than-perfect credit often owed more on their vehicles than they were worth (negative equity), making traditional financing difficult.

Problem:

❌ Dealers struggled to match customers with finance-approved vehicles.
❌ No system to factor in lender requirements + customer needs + inventory availability.
❌ Negative equity was a nightmare to structure into financing offers.

Solution:

💡 Smart Book automated vehicle financing by:
✅ Matching lender approval requirements to available inventory.
✅ Ensuring vehicle selection met financial constraints (e.g., rolling negative equity into the deal).
✅ Integrating directly with lending portals to pull in real-time financing details.

This streamlined subprime vehicle financing for dealers, allowing them to sell more vehicles while staying compliant with lender rules.

But one missing piece remained—what if a dealer didn’t have the right inventory for a customer?

Smart Trade: Connecting Dealers to Solve Inventory Gaps

Problem:

❌ Dealers had excess inventory they wanted to wholesale.
❌ Other dealers had buyers but not the right vehicle match.
❌ Auctions were inefficient, and searching for inventory was manual and slow.

Solution:

💡 Smart Trade created an inventory-sharing network that allowed dealers to:
✅ List wholesale vehicles with VINs, photos, and full details.
✅ Search across dealerships to match available vehicles to financing-approved buyers.
✅ Integrate with auction house run lists, giving dealers access to external inventory.

With Smart Dealer, Smart Inventory, Smart Book, and Smart Trade, we had built a full ecosystem that:
✔ Managed inbound leads
✔ Powered dealership websites
✔ Streamlined subprime auto financing
✔ Connected dealerships to trade inventory

Lessons Learned from Scaling a Product Suite

Over the years, I learned firsthand the challenges of product-market fit, scalability, and maintaining a clear roadmap. Some of my biggest takeaways:

🚀 Every great product starts by solving a real problem.
🛑 Customer feedback is valuable, but not all requests should shape your roadmap.
⚖ Balancing short-term revenue vs. long-term strategy is critical.
🔄 Successful products evolve, but they need a strong foundation to scale.

These experiences shaped the way I approach product strategy today—and they’re lessons I bring to every founder and startup I work with.

What’s Next?

This was just the beginning. Over time, I’ve continued refining my approach to product strategy, go-to-market execution, and scaling technology businesses.

If you’re a startup founder navigating product challenges, let’s connect.