The opportunity to rent apartments and cars is becoming an urgent request not only among residents of large cities. In the current economic situation, renting a car is more profitable than buying one, especially if the car is rarely used. Let’s find out how the car rental site works and what kind of audience you should count on.
Car sharing or rental
The main difference between a carsharing service and a car rental is that the rental implies use for long periods, sometimes even months. While carsharing is a short-term rental. This is the per-minute use of the car, usually for short trips within the same city.
Car rental assumes that you need to contact certain offices to issue a car. And you can leave the car not in any place for parking, but at the rental office.
The carsharing infrastructure is wider; the car can be picked up or left at any place allowed for parking.
Car sharing involves making a trip entirely through a mobile application. You download the application, select an available car on the map and fill in the required fields in the order form.
Not all rental services can offer mobile design.
Who uses car rental services?
The volume of the Russian carsharing market has increased, and by the end of 2021, is 68 billion rubles. The largest projects are still concentrated in the central cities: of Moscow and St. Petersburg, but the popularity and coverage of cities are gradually growing.
What motivates people to use car rental services?
Cheaper than your car. Undoubtedly, the main incentive is the price. If buying your car is expensive, renting a car for short trips is an alternative to public transport. In addition, many companies use carsharing services to serve their customers.
Development of domestic tourism. Until the time of Covid, it was common for many to rent a car and explore a foreign country. Such an active way of travelling made it possible to independently plan a trip and visit the most interesting places that could not be reached by public transport. The borders closed, and the habit remained. Only some people can travel from Moscow to the Far East in their car.
An opportunity to try something new. The Car Tracker fleet can be very diverse, and this is an occasion to test a certain brand before buying, use the services of a “smart” car, or find special vehicles for special occasions: weddings, photo shoots, etc.
According to the Russian Academy of Transport, car rental services are most often used by men aged 25-34, residents of megacities, with driving experience. Most have their car.
- Every tenth driver uses carsharing services once a week. Most activity of trips on carsharing falls on the weekend.
- If we segment the target audience in detail, we will get several groups of potential customers:
- Middle-class residents use cars for short trips as an alternative to taxis or their transport;
- tourists, for independent travel planning – rent for several days and the ability to take and leave a car in different places;
- corporate clients, companies, and taxi services that need their fleet of vehicles for employees;
- young people from 25 to 35 looking for an exclusive for a short time, diversity and uniqueness are important to them.
- Pros and cons of car rental service
The undoubted advantages of a car rental business are:
The demand for services continues to grow. In small towns, there is no competition at all. And even in megacities, each operator has its drawbacks, which can become your competitive advantage.
Affiliate network instead of buying cars. To start a business, purchasing a fleet of cars is unnecessary to provide a service. You can follow the path of foreign companies by developing a partner network and expanding the coverage geography.
Investments from the state. According to statistics, one carsharing car can replace 10 personal cars, which means less traffic and traffic jams. Therefore, the authorities are interested and develop programs of benefits, subsidies, etc.
Taxi competition. As the users of carsharing cars themselves note, during peak hours, it is much faster to use car rental services; moreover, you always know the exact price.
Among the shortcomings can be noted:
- Volume investments in case of purchase of cars. If you buy cars for service, remember the cost of repairs, maintenance, and washing.
- Low awareness of the service. This is especially true for small towns. The risks of weak consumer culture follow the lack of awareness: vandalism, accidents, hijacking, and hacking of work applications.
- Examples of car booking sites
- Consider what popular services for booking and car rental offer.
Rental cars
Aggregator Rentalcars, which brings together large car rental companies. A wide coverage network includes about 6,000 cities worldwide, with various rental points: airports, railway stations, and city centres.
For customers, there is technical support in 40 languages for partner companies – the ability to independently set rental rules. For example, one vendor may offer rental without a deposit; another may require additional documents, and a third may establish mandatory conditions for insurance.
Website structure on the example of ComfortCar rental service
The ComfortCar car rental service has grown into a business in 12 years with a fleet of more than 500 cars in 8 cities in Poland. We have worked out the site’s structure, main sections and features to provide a full-fledged rental service.
We united all cities on one CS-Cart Multi-Vendor site, developed the booking functionality from scratch, and, as a result, received a full-fledged online rental service.
The main blocks of the rental service:
Navigation menu
The main task of the main menu is to reflect and make all the important information available for the client on the main page.
It represents:
Selecting a branch for rent. Here are the cities where you can rent a car. One of the important advantages is that ComfortCar does not limit the route to one city. You can rent a car in one place and rent it in another, or even go abroad.
The choice of cars by category. Depending on the segment of the target audience, 8 categories of cars are available for selection, from economy options to luxury brands.
Helpful information. It contains all the necessary information about the rental conditions, promotions and discounts, useful tips and, of course, information about the company.