Community Spotlight: Brady Irvine shares his passion for marketing and it's application to the industry.

The DrivingSales community is primarily comprised of dealer principals, managers, and other decision makers in the dealership.  But of course, those aren’t the only active and contributing members of DrivingSales.com, or the only important people running around a dealership store.  This community spotlight is focused on a relatively new, but active, member of DrivingSales, Brady Irvine. As a salesperson at Ken Sargent GMC Buick in Alberta, Canada, Brady has joined the community to push his own boundaries and better the store. 

DS:  Brady, how do you enjoy working in the dealership?

Brady:  They’ve been good to me here.  I’ve been in the car business going on 8 years with this store.  At first some of the older salesmen felt the need to make it clear that they’d forgotten more about selling cars then I would ever know.  But it made me work hard to learn all I could.  It didn't take long to become the guy they all came to when they had a question. 

DS:   What advice would you give to someone just accepting a similar position to yours at a different dealership? 

Brady:  Take responsibility for yourself and your own success.  You have the choice to either market yourself or stand around and wait for the weather or the economy or your dealer to bring customers to you.  If you choose to stand around and wait that's fine, but understand that's the choice you made so you have to shut up and not complain when things are slow.

DS:  What do you feel is your specialty or strong suit?

Brady:  I’ve developed quite an obsession of (and knack for) marketing.  I happened to come across one of those hideously ugly full-page ads in a magazine with the tiny writing crammed all over the place.  Do you know the ones I’m talking about?  This was for some sort of “Fight Like a Navy Seal/Kick Anybody’s Ass” product.  Normally I would ignore them, but the headline grabbed my attention and I read the whole thing.  By the end I was frantically digging through my wallet to get my credit card out and order the product.  I never actually watched the DVD’s or anything so I probably won’t be kicking anybody’s butt anytime soon, but the fact that I was moved that strongly to take action by an ad that was the exact opposite of what a good ad was “supposed to look like” got me interested in learning more about it.  Since then, I have been an addict.  Seriously, it's like a sickness.

DS:  Interesting, like an infomercial on paper.  But how did you go from seeing an ad to owning advertising as a strong suit?

Brady:   It's funny you should mention that.  An infomercial is the perfect example.  People like to make fun of them, but if you study them closely they follow a strict formula that guides you through the buying process.  And because they are so expensive to create and air, if you see one often enough that it gets annoying, you know it's making money.  As far as how, I have read more books and taken more courses than I can count, and have loved every minute of it.  I started a marketing company and did some freelance copywriting and consulting and things.  It wasn’t until I came across DrivingSales that I realized I could use these marketing skills in the auto industry.   That’s why I like this site so much - it is a gathering of smart people in the car business who are looking to improve the way they run their businesses.  It can be very frustrating to only deal with people interested in maintaining the status quo, or who think they already know everything.  Since coming to DrivingSales, I have been putting together a marketing system specifically for dealers to cover the 3 phases of marketing.  The “before” phase where the qualified leads are generated, the “during” phase where we are following up and trying to make the sale, and the “after” phase where we are keeping the customer satisfied and generating referrals and repeat business.  

DS:  Tell us more about this program.

Brady:  Sure.  Most people try to make their advertising do too much.  The purpose of a headline is to get the customer to read the next line.  You don’t have to sell anything with the first punch.  The purpose of an ad is to get the customer to contact you, not to sell the car itself.  Advertising can be more like sell face-to-face.  I think more dealers need to realize that the process that allows them to sit across the desk from a customer and sell a car, is the same process that they can use to generate tons of qualified floor traffic with their marketing.  They wouldn't attempt to close a customer that was sitting in front of them in the first 30 seconds, (and they would pummel their salespeople for short-cutting the rapport building, investigating, and presenting steps).  But when it comes to their advertising, that's exactly what they do. 

DS:  So you don’t want to sell cars with your advertising?

Brady:  No, of course you do, but because of the length of time it takes to go through the steps to sell a vehicle, we can’t possibly hope to accomplish a sale through the advertising itself.  Too many people create ads to try and sell a vehicle which would be the same as walking up to someone on the lot and sticking a contract under their nose and asking them to sign.  The purpose of the ad is to get qualified (interested) prospects to contact us, not to sell them a vehicle.  Once that first step is taken we move on to the next one.  That doesn't just apply to the “before” phase.  The same principles apply to following up during the sales process, and after the sale to get referrals and repeat business as well.

DS:  There’s definitely reasoning to that logic there.  Where do you want to go with this marketing perspective? 

Brady:  I suppose 5 years from now I’d like to be a go-to guy for marketing and maybe have a vendor company that specializes in direct response marketing.  But in the meantime, I’d like to help the dealers who are frustrated with the way their advertising dollars are pulled in so many untraceable directions.   I’ve learned so much about the car business from working in a dealership and I would like to give back to them in that capacity.

DS:  Thanks, Brady, and good luck to you.  We’ll keep our eye out for you in the years to come and see how this grows.  Thanks for joining DrivingSales and contributing another perspective to the community!

Brady: Thank you for having me; I appreciate what you guys are doing for the industry.