Does your sales and business development team create valid reasons for the customer to do business “now?” Do you ever wonder how you can move the needle with growing business? The answer is really simple when considering what we have been taught over the years. To be successful in any business, sales professionals need to be aggressive by asking the right questions at the right time. As a dealer consultant and BDC director, I am always listening to outgoing calls as well as incoming calls. I notice that many calls do not show a sense of urgency. I hear a lot of calls where customer questions are being answered, but there is never a question that comes back to the customer to regain control of the call. I see this on the showroom floor as well when I walk by and listen to sales consultants work deals. As our industry see...

As I look at my history in the automotive industry and I look at the valuable lessons that I learned for success I start to realize how many industries are failing to do the right thing.When I say "do the right thing", I am talking about customer relations practices.  I am also talking about how businesses and employees market themselves.  These days, "word of mouth" advertising is more powerful then ever.  "Word of mouth" today can be a review of a business or something as simple as a video on YouTube.



I have been expanding my services and the business that I conduct for many reasons.  I spent so many years working long hours in automotive retail and learning a very solid business.  It is because of my experience in the automotive industry that I have taken some valuable lessons that I feel all businesses need to apply.  I learned as an automotive sales professional that a fast response to an internet lead is a

http://www.dealeretraining.com View my profile on LinkedIn View me on Naymz Follow me on Twitter   A few days ago on a group on Facebook called, "Carbucks" someone had posted a discussion on prospecting. The discussion was about a dealer charging the sales staff for prospecting (that is how I understood it).   It made me think about when I was selling cars a few years ago before I had gotten into management.  I remember in my first automotive sales job, my manager had created a poster with a sales event special.  He sent two people out for three hours to go to local stores and restaurants and give them out to management so that they can present it to their employees (my friend and I jumped on board to take advantage of this).  We knew that every customer that comes in on that will go directly to us which would automatically knock the other 15 sales consultants out.  I do remember selling three cars out of it. ...

http://www.dealeretraining.com http://www.linkedin.com/in/stansher83 http://dealeretraining.tumblr.com/   Why do I love the car business?   Why do I never stop being the best that I can be?   Why do I go through the ups and downs of the industry?   Why do I try so hard?   One answer in a few parts...   1.  The Experience.  The Experience.  The Experience. Part A: I am talking about 8 solid years of dealership sales, sales management, and more recently consultung experience.  I have met some interesting people from all walks of life.  There have been great influences and not so great influences.  There have been people that went from green pea sales people to top notch consultants (myself included lol).  There have been sales people that gave up and left the industry.  I seen people leave the industry (or try to leave) and end up coming back.  It is like a disease (good or bad).&...

http://www.dealeretraining.com http://www.linkedin.com/in/stansher83   What an event!!! Incredible!!! I just got back last night from spending a long week in the San Francisco Bay Area.  I always like to recap these events when I get a chance.  Here we go: I started my trip to San Francisco on February 1, 2011 where I was fortunate to bypass the bad weather and flight cancellations in Philadelphia.  It was unfortunate that I was unable to spend time in NAPA with Digital Marketing Strategies conferences as I was visiting my family.  I heard a lot of great things and look forward to being a part of the next one.  This week was special because I was able to accomplish a lot not only in my business life but also my personal life.  I met my beautiful 18 month old niece and visited family that I have not seen in years.  I was also able to spend time with very old friends that I have not seen in years. Once Friday 2/4/11 came around, I ...

http://www.dealeretraining.com http://dealeretraining.tumblr.com I am amazed at the lack of creativity out there. I wonder if automotive professionals do not think of ideas or maybe they are being lazy. I mean we all know how that goes without saying in the business. The idea here is to figure out more effective methods of reaching prospects, internet, phone, and previous walk in. Follow up scenario: An internet lead comes in. The internet or BDC representative and/or manager have made numerous phone calls and emails to the prospect only to get no response. They think they have done everything to engage the customer and start to blame the customer, the internet, the dealership, and everything else that comes to mind. They fail to take a look in the mirror and think of what went wrong. These people start making excuses and stop looking for other methods. Now, they did all of their follow up and they are done. They go on facebook, twitter, youtube, or any other popular social...

http;//www.dealeretraining.com http://dealeretraining.tumblr.com   As I mystery shop automotive dealers on a weekly basis, I am amazed at the lack of follow up phone skills that are still out there.  Even more, I am amazed at the lack of follow up attempts that most Internet and BDC departments have.  This is either lack of training, lack of motivation, or simply way too many leads coming in to effectively handle the proper procedure.  After all of that we wonder why we are not getting the ROI that we are looking for.   I submitted a lead to a Toyota dealership (name will not be disclosed).  This dealership is huge selling around 500 units per month.  I was very impressed with the follow up process when using the phone.  I did not answer calls on purpose just so I can listen to the voice mails and see how many times they will call.  I was impressed because they called me between 2 and 3 times per day every day. The calls came fro...

http://www.dealeretraining.com http://dealeretraining.tumblr.com/   I have been working in the automotive industry for over 8 years as of this month.  The one thing that I felt I could always do better was build value in my presentations.  When I say presentations, I am not just talking about performing a powerful walk around.  I am talking about the things that a professional says to a customer when they are on the phone trying to give them a reason to come in.  I am also talking about what a professional does with the customer when they go to discuss numbers with management.  As a huge advocate of building a "digital rapport" I wrote a successful article about this in the past but would like to take this further.   Some value building techniques: - The BDC/Internet Department remembers to make customers aware of the dealership's strong online reputation.   -The BDC/Internet Department informs the consumer of the ...

As I am back to working in a car dealership again in my career I have started to go back to basics and refine myself as an internet director from all aspects.  I put my social networking skills to great use.  I put my car sales knowledge to great use as well.  These skills are all great.  However, I started to see what is great and what is not great from the aspects of handling phone ups.  Being in a 3 month old dealership with a fresh staff that is still growing and learning on a daily basis I find challenges of what I can teach to improve them and skills that are needed to develop.

We use scripts and we drill everyday.  My owner/GM has instilled in me the importance of daily meetings and training everyday.  I started doing this a month ago and have seen great success.  These meetings run 20 minutes long every morning.  We drill our phone script two to three times per person.  In addition to that we add new rebuttals and lines to help my reps be smoother and more efficie...

 
Everyone knows me as a professional person that likes and appreciates everyone. I am known as someone who can speak his mind and go overboard too. That is how I am constructed and sometimes it is a way to get a point across. However, I made a social networking mistake on facebook and it almost cost me a possibility of landing a job.

I am sure that anyone of us who worked in a dealership has at one point had a manager that despised us because we achieved a lot more in a much shorter time than they did. I know that was the case at my last dealership. I had a 36 year old general sales manager who made as much as me, the bdc manager. He was divorced because he cheated on his wife. He works out and is on steroids big time because he likes to go out to clubs and hit on 19 year old's. We butted heads a lot at work and even got close to getting into a fight. He did pick on me and take a lot of shots and criticize my performance and how I dressed. Meanwhile, I had my own new car, gre...

Qualify Your Vendors

It is very common to work in a dealership environment where different vendors and consultants make frequent visits to sell a product or service which promises to increase business. In fact, many of the people that are reading this experience this on a weekly basis.

This is because we are living in a world of buyers and sellers which makes everyone
want a piece of the pie. How do we handle each consultant? What improvements does
my dealership need? Why is this person out trying to sell me instead of working in a
dealership? Do we really need to spend more money? These are just a few of the
questions that a dealer principle or general manager have when talking to a consultant.

The reality is that the automotive business is changing almost as fast as the speed of light every day. The business
has become so dynamic that everyone has a bright idea and thinks that they have a solution to increase business,
including people that have never been out on the f...

 

As times are getting tougher and dealers are talking about cutting expenses they start to lose sight of what they are giving up. The main focus becomes to stay old fashioned and not spend a dollar until they start seeing profits again. The problem is that dealers forget that they need their vendors to help them keeping selling cars and producing revenue. This becomes a bigger problem as dealerships start to lose even more profits. As the frustration increases there becomes more tension in the showroom.

Thankfully the internet came to the rescue at the right time. While some blame the internet for destroying business others are saying that it made business better. The consumer enjoys the internet because it made car shopping easier. The problem is that they still have a bad taste in their mouth about car buying. The internet has made it easy for consumers to control other consumers buying decisions and offer each other advice. It is unfortunate that the auto industry still ...