Online car search engine Carsnip is appealing for 500 ‘Founder Dealers’ to help test drive its products as the new search and analytics platform was officially launched this week.

Founders Alastair Campbell and Stuart Noad are looking for at least 500 dealers to register for its analytics product, which aims to disrupt the dominance of the classified ad sites, as they launched the new analytics tools after six months of software testing.

Its search functionality delivers personalised car results for buyers based on the real search terms they use, allowing dealers to make more informed sales decisions.

Blue Bell, Jim Reid Vehicle Sales, Knights BMW, Mrs MINI and Specialist Cars of Stoke are among the retailers which have already signed up.

Carsnip chief executive Alastair Campbell said: “The momentum behind Carsnip is building day by day. Paying for your stock to be listed is outdated and paying for leads instead of intelligent, targeted clicks to your website is a thing of the past.

“A year ago I promised dealers that Carsnip would list every dealer's stock for free and build a better experience for the consumer. We’re now delivering on that promise. We’ve got more stock than any other website, have partnerships with big UK brands to drive targeted traffic and have more big-name partnerships to announce over the coming weeks.”

Early adopters who sign up for Carsnip’s new analytics product will be represented by a dealer panel to help developers keep improving its software for the benefit of dealers.

They will also be guaranteed to get 25% off all future Carsnip products and services.

Stuart Noad, Carsnip co-founder, said: “We had great feedback to our new analytics platforms, proving there’s real appetite among dealers and consumers for better data to support their decision making. With well over half a million cars now listed on our site, the numbers are there to back this up.”

Carsnip is backed by investors at Google and Microsoft, as well as the early backers of Pinterest.

The business is now on track to raise further investment by the end of June, ahead of its launch with at least two well-known UK High Street brands.