Lauren was recently in the market for a car and she spent about four months in total researching before she made the purchase. Lauren started by conducting thorough research on several different sites like Kelley Blue Book and Cars.com. She ultimately decided she wanted to buy an Acura.

It wasn't until close to the end of her online research phase that she finally visited her local Acura dealership's website to see what colors and fabric choices were available for the model she wanted. At that time, Lauren submitted a web form to request information from the local Acura dealer. The dealer sent an email reply with information about the the color combinations she had requested.

The next day, Lauren went to Carsense, went on a test drive, and bought a pre-owned Acura.

From the local Acura dealership's point of view, Lauren had made just one inquiry with no strong signal of true intent. Perhaps they could have guessed that she cared enough to be looking at color options because she was at the decision stage of her buying journey, but, with the limited information from only their first party site, that is not so obvious.