Every advantage, proven: what carsales mediahouse showcased at Open House

See how carsales mediahouse is helping OEMs, agencies and dealers reach new car buyers earlier and turn data into decisions.

Australians have more new cars to choose from than ever, and more places to get lost along the way. At Open House ‘27, carsales mediahouse showed how it’s aiming to bring that journey together, from the first spark of interest at home to placing an order.

Hosted by the affable Lizzy Hoo across events in Sydney and Melbourne, this year's theme was Every Advantage. Proven. Last year, carsales mediahouse set out the plan. This year, Open House showed it in action.

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Reaching buyers before they start shopping

With 79 brands now competing for Australian car buyers, and 54 models on sale that didn’t exist a year ago¹, buyers have plenty to weigh up. “Consumers are less loyal than we’ve ever measured,” said Nicholas Bailly, General Manager, Advertising at carsales.

That makes the early moments count. A car purchase rarely starts on a listings page. It often starts at home, with something a person watches, reads or wonders about.

Ben Tyers, Head of Content, showed how the carsales Original Series, including Out There, IDLE Talk and Fuel For Thought, reaches undecided buyers on the biggest screen in the house. Around seven in every ten minutes watched are on a TV,² with viewers relaxed at home and still open to ideas. carsales is aiming to bring more series in the new year and move beyond automotive, to appeal to a younger and more female audience.

The New Car Buyer’s Guide drew more than 450,000 views in its first nine weeks, with the EV guide making up a significant portion of those.³. For the 2027 edition , carsales is looking to add more categories and gives EVs a guide of their own, for buyers still working out which car suits their life.

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Research to order in one place

Australia’s Car Buyer Report 2026 found that the average new car-buying journey takes around six and a half months⁴, with buyers researching, comparing and revisiting decisions along the way. Today, that journey can still break at the point of purchase, forcing someone to start again somewhere else when they’re ready to buy.

Ollie Nugent, Head of Consumer Product, gave the room a first look at carsales’ vision to help fix that. Picture a buyer configuring the car they want, finding matching cars at nearby dealers, then adding finance and their trade-in before placing an order, without leaving carsales.

“It’s about giving consumers choice in how far they want to take the journey on carsales,” said Ollie.

Whether they stop at a test drive or go all the way to an order, the brand they’ve been researching stays with them right up to the moment they decide. With 60 per cent of car intenders on carsales already considering a new vehicle⁵, that’s a lot of decisions. And buyers who walk into a dealership could arrive knowing the car they want and how they’ll pay for it, ready to pick up the conversation where they left off.

Turning data into decisions

Most marketers aren’t short of data. What’s harder to find is a clear answer to a simple question: what’s actually moving buyers?

That’s where Iggy comes in. Iggy starts with the business problem rather than the media product. An established brand can find out who it’s really losing buyers to. A new entrant can see where to win share. A dealer can identify the right inventory strategy before deciding where to invest in media.

Stephen Kyefulumya, General Manager, Media Product and Technology, and Kanella Gougousis, Head of AI Media Product, showed how marketers can ask Iggy questions in plain language. Answers draw on more than 16 million logged-in members⁶, 3 billion automotive shopping signals each quarter⁷ and VIN-level inventory and transaction data.

"The industry doesn't have a data problem, it has a connection problem," said Stephen.

That problem is sharpest in measurement. As signal loss and the evolving privacy landscape reshape how buyers can be understood across platforms, carsales CAPI links activity on carsales with outcomes on an advertiser's own website. When Hyundai put it to the test, connected leads across carsales and Hyundai.com.au were 2.79 times more cost-effective than Hyundai's benchmark⁸. As Stephen put it, "The platforms built it for everyone. We built it for car buyers."

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Help shape what comes next

The Original Series and the 2027 New Car Buyer’s Guide are open for partnerships now. Brands, agencies and dealers are encouraged to book a demo with the team and bring a real business challenge to see what Iggy uncovers using near real-time market intelligence.

Separately, carsales mediahouse is inviting a select number of OEMs to help shape the new retail experience ahead prior to the 15th of December.

Every brand and dealership faces a different challenge, and that’s the best place to start a conversation. Talk to the carsales mediahouse team about what it could look like for your business.
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^{Sources:
1 Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (or "FCAI"), VFACTS Service, September 2026.}

^{2 YouTube Studio Analytics, Audience tabs, lifetime figures, accessed October 2026}

^{3 YouTube Studio Analytics, Audience tabs, lifetime figures, accessed October 2026}

^{4 Australia’s Car Buyer Report 2026, New Car Buyer Edition, carsales, new car sub-sample, n=1,373}

^{5 carsales Consumer Sentiment Survey, August 2026, n=1,662. Q. Are you looking to buy? + Will you also check the new cars available?}

^{6 carsales internal data. 16M+ members = Total Members (including Industry & Leisure brands), June 2026.}

^{7 Google Analytics (1 April 2026–30 June 2026). Behavioural actions refer to interactions on our sites such as views, scroll depth, enquiries and clicks.}

^{8 carsales internal data, comparing total leads against the Hyundai CPL benchmark. Campaign dates: 2 April – 19 May 2026.}

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