AutoShowroom.ng — Video-First Marketplace & Dealer Operating System
A high-performance automotive ecosystem built from the ground up: cross-platform Flutter mobile applications for buyers, adaptive vertical video walkarounds, and an enterprise Web-based Dealer Lot OS connecting dealerships across Nigeria.
Underserved automotive commerce & low trust funnels
Nigeria's used vehicle marketplace has traditionally struggled with information asymmetry. Buyers lack transparency about vehicle conditions, leading to wasted time on physical inspections and susceptibility to fraud.
Existing platforms lacked the tooling to connect regional car dealership lots with buyers, relying on static images that failed to capture actual vehicle engine sounds, visual defects, or physical presence. Dealerships operated on fragmented spreadsheet lists and paper ledgers, causing severe inventory drift and sluggish lead conversions.
Building a unified three-sided digital pipeline
Emicraft architected and implemented a high-performance system consisting of:
- A native-feel **Flutter Mobile App** built with custom video pipelines allowing buyers to view vertical, short-form HD vehicle walkarounds.
- An enterprise-grade **Dealer Lot OS** enabling multi-branch dealership owners to manage listings, respond to live buyer chats, track incoming lead status, and schedule test drives.
- An internal **Staff Console** allowing platform operators to manage user verification, review pending listing videos, and monitor fraud compliance audits.
Architecture Spec Stack
The Buyer App: Immersive Video Search & Booking
We engineered a fast, fluid mobile app in Flutter focused on vertical video walkaround previews and a streamlined path to vehicle inspection bookings.
Full-screen vertical video loop showing actual engine start-ups and body conditions.
Quick filtering by pricing thresholds, body shapes, and verification badges.
Integrated visual check badges verifying physical presence and dealer credentials.
Smooth schedule picker mapping local time slots directly to dealer consoles.
Real-time push triggers, SMS confirmations, and deep-linked calendar reminders.
Dealer Lot OS: Sales, Inventory & CRM Hub
Dealers run their business on our customized web application dashboard. We designed high-productivity operational pages supporting quick updates, lead pipeline management, and real-time messaging.
Action-Item Ledger & Funnel Metrics
Shows real-time funnel performance (Leads → Contacted → Inspections) alongside actionable warnings (“9 leads awaiting contact”, “2 vehicles stale”) preventing loss of revenue from slow responder times.
Visual CRM & Kanban Pipelines
Dealers transition leads across custom-built pipeline cards. Each card embeds actions to directly contact the buyer via SMS or WhatsApp, keeping friction minimal and operations structured.
Live Buyer Chat Integration
WebSocket-driven live chat client allowing dealers to send walkaround clips, share direct prices, and offer scheduled times in one conversational window.
Inspections Booking Agenda
Consolidated bookings agenda displaying upcoming client checkins, pending confirmations, and historical completion data.
The Staff Console: Compliance & Moderation
To support compliance, trust, and safety, we built a comprehensive staff operations portal to review video streams and verify dealer registrations.
Admins review uploaded video streams on a central dashboard, confirming vehicle accuracy and lot existence before publishing listings live.
Custom web players support review logs and quick triggers to instantly publish or reject/hide walkarounds from the public buyer feed.
Comprehensive directory to audit dealership verification details, verify corporate identification documents, and manage platform restrictions.
Deep Technical Challenges & Solutions
1. Massive HD Video Upload Transcoding Over Fragile Mobile Networks
Uploading raw 4K/1080p dealership walkaround video clips from regional lots in Nigeria was slow and often timed out due to cellular network instability.
We implemented client-side chunked video encoding and localized compression in the Flutter app. Once received on AWS S3, a serverless Lambda + MediaConvert pipeline instantly transcodes the video into low-bitrate, multi-resolution HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) formats served globally via CloudFront CDN.
2. Real-Time Multi-Branch Inventory Syncing & Data Drift Prevention
Dealerships listing cars on multiple channels would occasionally double-book or show outdated prices, leading to customer frustration.
We engineered a WebSocket-driven sync layer that broadcasts atomic updates across all open clients. If a car's reservation status changes or is sold, the change propagates within 200ms to all buyer devices, backed by pessimistic locks at the PostgreSQL layer and Redis session stores.
3. Inspection Scheduler Dispatch Lock & Concurrency Management
During high-traffic slots, multiple buyers could book overlapping inspection times with a dealer's restricted team, causing double-bookings.
We designed a booking queue leveraging a Redis lock block. When a buyer initiates booking, the system temporarily blocks the specific slot. Database constraints ensure no race conditions can bypass validation, instantly sending confirmation webhooks to the dealer's lot console.
Deliverables & Real-World Impact
“The video-first approach transformed buyer trust. Our dealership partners experienced a 3x increase in serious inspection inquiries within 90 days of launch.”
Looking to architect a custom platform?
We specialize in custom Flutter applications, Next.js dashboard engines, real-time messaging sync systems, and secure transaction workflows.