Rewarding success in the tyre business

In July, TyreSafe held its first post-lockdown in-person day conference and awards event. More recently the NTDA named the winners at its annual Tyre Industry Awards event. And our sister publication WhatTyre.com has also published names of the winners of its 2022 WhatTyre Tyre of the Year awards. What these three things have in common is that they all aim to give credit where credit is due. They all aim to reward success.

For its part, WhatTyre.com has exceeded all expectations relating to its growth and influence. Online readership figures have been peaking at 150,000 pageviews per month since 2021 and are regularly over 100,000 pageviews per month. With 2022 growth already up more 33 per cent compared with 2021, the latest data highlights the increasing importance of the pre-sale research in the car tyre retail business.

In a bid to bring the benefits of WhatTyre’s success and brand exposure opportunities to the tyre business, Tyre Industry Publications Ltd is now preparing a print supplement to complement the website and other digital syndication options in its portfolio. Prior to the pandemic and its associated lockdowns, 60 to 80 per cent of consumers were using the Internet to research their tyre purchase prior to buying. Now, the figures are higher. And that means getting the right tyres in front of consumers is critical. At the same time, the very fact that consumers are engaging in such high levels of pre-sale research illustrates that motorists – not historically known for high levels of brand awareness and engagement when it comes to what has perennially been described as “a distress purchase” – are now becoming more discerning than ever. Gone are the days when consumers believe the first review they read on the interweb. Now, they are shopping around and looking for objective, independent advice.

The goal is to print 10,000 copies of this Autumn’s WhatTyre buyer’s guide to be distributed both alongside Tyres & Accessories and in other selected locations according to this product’s consumer-facing strategy. That way, WhatTyre will maximise its influence both in the pre-sale research space and physically at the point of sale. Both methods are important, but the combination is unmatched in the market.

Tyre Industry Publications Ltd has been running as a completely independent publication for 76 years. The industry experience acquired over that time combined with its uniquely experienced niche publishing team as well as 300,000 tyre profiles covering a dozen data points means WhatTyre’s system is able to boil complex tyre industry down to a consumer-friendly “out of 10” metascore. WhatTyre, which brands its metascore as “tyrescore”, recently upgraded its tyre score alogorithm in order to further extend its lead in tyre comparison market.

The current version of the WhatTyre tyrescore algorithm (2.1 codenamed Bentley) builds on the foundation established by the first iteration (1.0 – Alfa-Romeo). Alfa-Romeo took the data relating to the European Tyre label all tyres are required to bear and assigned numerical values to normally letter-based rolling resistance and wet grip performance categories. From here, pass-by noise is factored-in and weighted according to the relative importance of that performance characteristic to consumers here in the UK. In other words, fuel consumption and wet grip are prioritised over pass-by noise. These benchmarks were then cross-referenced against our database of several thousand European magazine tyre tests, which has the major advantage that it adds deeper testing depth and a broader selection of tests to bear.

Bentley brings additional data points to the table including original equipment homologations as well as the ESG ratings of each tyre’s manufacturer. Across the whole process, the goal is to identify and acknowledge success rather than cast aspersions. After all there are as many as 700 brands on the market and we know that only the top 10 per cent or less will have the necessary criteria to be successfully evaluated at the top level. With that in mind, it is about giving credit where credit is due, while also empowering consumers to chose on the basis of real performance and value rather than simply price alone – as has too often been the case in the past.

The annual WhatTyre Tyre of the Year awards take all of that a step further. Across each of the awards categories key sizes are selected according to third-party market data. The tyrescores generated are then compared, critically evaluated and put alongside the average tyrescores for each model range. That way, a single high-performing outlier can’t win WhatTyre tyre of the year without the rest of the range also performing really well. What is left is a ranking of illustrating the crème de la crème of tyres in each sub-category and one overall WhatTyre tyre of the year – all working towards the goal of raising the level of conversation about tyres and rewarding success.

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