Latest Features Help Multi-Store Dealers Improve Inventory Management, Facilitate Trades and Increase Visibility to On-Lot and Off-Lot Activity

IRVINE, Calif., Sept. 18, 2018—Spireon, the vehicle intelligence company, is adding several enhancements to its Kahu connected car solution, designed to provide automotive dealer groups with the tools they need to optimize operations, improve sales results and mitigate risk. New features include streamlined portfolio and inventory management, account transfer for seamless dealer trades, mobile views of inventory age, new test drive analytics, and more.

Kahu turns any vehicle into a connected car, empowering dealers to view and manage vehicles from their desktop, tablet or smartphone. Standard lot management features like real-time location tracking, geofencing and battery management streamline operations and improve sales efficiency. Stolen vehicle recovery mitigates risk for dealers and makes Kahu a profitable add-on when sold through to consumers. Dealers can also utilize mileage data from customer vehicles post-sale to better target them for servicing, lease renewals and trade-ins.

New enhancements to Kahu include:

·Centralized Portfolio Management—Multi-store dealer groups can now view inventory, vehicle location, battery health, test drive data and more, for all stores from a single login.

·Simple Inventory Transfers—Dealers can easily transfer Kahu vehicles between stores, seamlessly executing dealer trades.

·Enhanced Mobile Views—Improved user interface and added detail on individual vehicles boost operational and sales efficiency. iPhone users will also gain updated maps with more accurate satellite views to inform walking directions and easily locate vehicles for test drives.

·In-App Inventory Aging—To help dealers move inventory quickly and optimize inventory turnover, the Kahu Dealer app now identifies vehicle age along with trim details so the sales team knows which vehicles to move first.

·New Analytics Dashboard and Reports—Unique insight into test drives, inventory mix, aging and other vehicle data helps dealers optimize inventory and pricing based on consumer interest. The new dashboard provides flexibility to filter by make, model, color, and trim, while automated reporting provides proactive insights without the need to login to the portal each time.

·Dedicated Recovery Hotline—Kahu helps dealer nationwide to recover vehicles with an average recover time of 26 minutes. With a new dedicated recovery hotline, dealers are further protected from losses and downtime due to theft, recovery and reconditioning costs.

·Expanded DMS Integration – Kahu now supports 80 percent of the franchise dealer market through integration with Reynolds & Reynolds and CDK Dealer Management Systems, simplifying the integration of Kahu into dealer operations and streamlining consumer onboarding to Kahu.

In December of 2017, Kahu was named New Product of the Year in the automotive enterprise category of Business Intelligence Group’s 2017 BIG Awards for Business.  In May of this year, Spireon was named IoT Vehicle Telematics Company of the Year in the 2018 Compass Intelligence awards. In addition to award winning technology, Kahu customers also benefit from Spireon's white glove customer service, which has earned the company four awards in the past 15 months, and a recent Net Promoter Score of 71.

“While U.S. auto sales have remained steady in 2018, the market continues to consolidate as dealer groups seek greater efficiencies and new opportunities to grow profits,” said Sunil Marolia, vice president of product management for Spireon. “And although the latest release of Kahu has been enhanced for dealer groups, independent dealers can also benefit from the streamlined operations, increased sales effectiveness, reduced risk, and increased customer loyalty generated by Kahu. Once dealers have the power of Kahu driving their business, they can’t imagine running it any other way.”

To learn more about Kahu, please visit: https://www.spireon.com/kahu.

Kahu is only available through automotive dealerships. Dealers interested in selling Kahu can inquire here: https://www.spireon.com/kahu#becomedealer.

About Spireon

Spireon, Inc. is North America’s leading connected vehicle intelligence company, providing businesses and consumers with powerful insights to track, manage and protect their most valuable mobile assets. The award-winning Spireon NSpire platform supports nearly 4 million active subscribers across the company’s growing suite of products for new and used car dealers, lenders and financial institutions, rental car agencies, commercial and local fleet operators, and consumers. Learn more at www.spireon.com.

This is a guest blog by Mark Tewart, President of Tewart Enterprises.

Mark is speaking at DSES in a breakout titled, Eliminating Time Vampires that Kill Productivity and Profits.

Can you hear it?

“Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock.”

Time stops for no one. Time keeps elapsing and as the clock moves forward, the question for you is, are you moving forward? You cannot add or delete time, but you can decide to invest in your time or simply spend your time. It’s your choice.

The average life expectancy of a male in the US is just shy of 79 years. That is equal to 948 months, 28,835 days or 692,040 hours. Many of those months, days and hours may have passed. Do not take for granted what is left.

Enjoy each hour as a gift. Most of the trials and tribulations you are going through are miniscule in the scheme of things. What you may consider serious may not be so serious. Be passionate and purposeful. Don’t waste your precious time in ways that do not support you, grow you or make you happy. Live life the way you wish rather than for what others wish for you.

Do not be afraid to take risks or endeavor to live the life you desire. After all, when you consider the time and scheme of your life, how much risk is it really and how much time are you wasting without truly living your life. Live without limits and die without asking for a second chance.

Although not every minute, hour or day will be enjoyable, it is simply part of the journey. Stop beating yourself up about what you have not done and concentrate on what you will do.

Those hours spent not invested wisely are gone. Consider your future like a bank account. You must make deposits today to make a withdrawal tomorrow. If you are not happy with where you are, that is okay and it may provide motivation through pain to move you forward.  However, realize that wherever you are, is not only not bad, it is perfect. It is perfect because it is where you should be in this moment as you move toward where you want to go.

Once again, this is a journey and no two people share the same journey. It is worthless to compare your journey to someone else’s. Your journey is your masterpiece and only you can paint it. Not all the strokes will be perfect and it is the imperfection that makes it perfect.

Don’t whine about where you are now. Invest your time with actions to change the journey. Every day that I drop my son Jake off at school I tell him “Think big, live large and you are in charge.” Don’t let anyone define big for you. Just because others can’t see your vision does not mean you have to be blind. Just because others will not allow the thoughts, actions, habits and success that you will allow does not mean they have the right to take all of those things from you.

Living large for you can be enjoying the small things others don’t take the time to enjoy. You decide what large means to you but it surely does not mean you have to limit your definition of large. Being in charge means you choose your thoughts, actions, habits, goals and life. You are not a victim and things do not simply happen to you but because of you. Everything is based upon your choices in your time and how you spend or invest that time.

I vividly remember my father in his last moments of life saying that he had never bought a new car. At the end of good man’s life, he was focusing if even for a fleeting moment, not on what he had done, but on what he had not. It reminds of a song by a band by the name of The Georgia Satellites called, “Another Chance.” The song has a great line, “I don’t want to die asking for another chance!” The clock is ticking.

“Tick-tock, Tick-tock, Tick-tock.”

I've read multiple posts on DrivingSales about the differences between leadership and management.  A good leader possesses both, and the role in which you hold determines the right mix.  The important thing is that you have a mix.  Let me explain.

Leadership is about disrupting the way things currently are to build a better tomorrow.  It’s chaos and disruption.  Leadership is motivating employees to be better, to strive higher.  Leadership is revising and improving a marketing strategy or process to achieve better results.  It’s messy, and because it requires change, nuance and tact are required.

The litmus test for leadership is simple.  Who will follow you “over the wall”?  Are you at the forefront of the trends in auto or is your store a laggard?

Management, on the other hand, is about creating order in the midst of chaos.  Management maintain processes and protocols.  Without this order, your operations are ad hoc.  Management standardizes reporting and analyzes performance.  It executes that tasks (usually process-driven) that are required for success.

How do you gauge your management effectiveness?  How consistent is your store’s performance?  Are analytics stressed, tracked, and most important, monitored regularly?

You need to possess both leadership skills and management skills. 

Think about it.  If you don’t work on your leadership skills, you won’t grow.  Your employees won’t be motivated to push themselves and your operations will grow stale.

Without management skills you don’t have a process and training doesn’t happen.  The inmates run the asylum.

The challenge is making time to work on both of these skills.  In my experience I’ve found it’s easier to focus on management than leadership.  Most of the day-to-day we go through is executing management tasks.  You need to build in time to focus on leadership. 

What should your mix be?  It depends on the job role.  A lot tech doesn’t need many leadership skills.  But a General Manager had better possess the skills necessary to chart the future strategy and innovate.  Bottom line: it’s up to you to determine your mix and develop your leadership and management skills.

  How are you prioritizing your time to focus on both leadership and management?

I was thinking this morning about the difference between important and urgent.  Dealership life is hectic, and there is never enough time in a day for leadership to get everything done.  It comes down to priorities.  Too often, the important things take a back seat.  What do I mean?

First, let's define what I mean by important and urgent.  Urgent is easy.  These are the things that come up that have to be dealt with now.  The trade eval, the heater in service, the salesperson that just quit.  Not only are they pressing and immediate, they are the "squeaky wheels" that scream for your attention.

Important items aren't so loud.  They need to to be accomplished for your dealership to grow.  They are less immediate in nature.  You don't feel the repercussions of putting them off another day.  What's the harm?  You can always address important things tomorrow.

The problem is, tomorrow will be as hectic as today, and important items tend to slip through the cracks.  How do you focus on what is important if urgent is always there?

I don't claim to have all the answers, and would welcome feedback from the community, but here are a few suggestions.

First, how many of your urgent items are recurring?  In other words, what do you see happening over and over again?  What would happen if the problem that was causing this urgent issue was resolved?

Next, urgent problems tend to be reactive in nature.  They aren't planned.  Example?  You walk in on a Saturday morning to discover that two of your sales reps have quit.  You have to deal with this, and it wasn't on any schedule.

Important items are proactive in nature.  This is a pro and a con.  On one hand, you can plan for how to address the issue, and a lot of important things potentially solve problems that become urgent in the future.  On the other hand, they aren't screaming in your face.

Consider breaking your important initiatives up into small, bite-sized pieces.  Just like eating an elephant: one bite at a time.  How can you dissect your new hiring process up into small deliverables that can get done and show progress?  This shows improvement and allows your employees to provide feedback to each deliverable.

Also, what can you delegate?  You have a lot of talent in your dealership, and getting your staff involved in creating this new process is a great way to get buy-in.  Dissect your initiative into small deliverables and assign dealership influencers the task of completing that deliverable.  You will need a few revisions, but it's much easier to accomplish important items if you don't have to do it yourself.

There was a blog posted on DrivingSales around the difference between leadership and management.  Dealerships are typically over-managed and under-led.  Important items require leadership to accomplish  Take the time to prioritize important into your day.  Urgency won't go away, but if you don't focus on important, you will be dealing with more and more urgency.

2018 Volvo XC60 becomes eligible for Volvo Employee Pricing for the first time during offer 

SAN DIEGO, May 4, 2018 –The Volvo Special Offer, a nationwide promotion for Costco members, launched this week, May 1, 2018. The offer includes Volvo Employee Pricing, additional incentives and a $250 Costco Cash Card on the purchase or lease of qualifying 2018 models through July 2, 2018. The offer with Volvo Cars was arranged by Affinity Auto Program, which manages Costco Auto Program. 

With the launch of the offer, the award-winning 2018 Volvo XC60 will be available at Volvo Employee Pricing for the first time since the redesigned model was introduced last fall. Among the recent accolades of the XC60 are “World Car of the Year 2018” for automotive excellence on an international scale and “2018 North American Utility of the Year” for segment leadership, innovation, design, safety, handling, driver satisfaction, and value for the dollar. 

“The Volvo Special Offer is a great value,” said Mark DerGarabedian services manager at Costco. “Costco Auto Program’s dedication to provide an exceptional car-buying experience paired with Volvo’s reputation for innovation, safety and reliability is a winning combination for Costco members.” 

Additional exclusive Costco member incentives include $3,000 on 2018 S90, V90 and V90 Cross Country models, and $750 on 2018 XC90 and XC60 models (T8 trim package excluded). This offer also can be combined with additional national Volvo incentives for which the member qualifies to receive greater savings.* 

To receive the benefits of the Volvo Special Offer, Costco members must: 

 Have been a Costco member by May 1, 2018. 

 Register by visiting CostcoAuto.com/Volvo and selecting an eligible vehicle. 

 Receive an email confirmation containing a Volvo PIN. 

 Purchase or lease and take delivery on an eligible new Volvo May 1, through July 2, 2018. 

 Complete a member satisfaction survey to receive the $250 Costco Cash Card. 

Costco Auto Program also offers low, prearranged pricing on certified pre-owned vehicles (CPO), powersports and recreational vehicles. Additionally, Costco members receive a discount on the majority of parts, service, and accessories at participating automotive service centers and powersports dealerships. 

For additional details about Costco Auto Program, news media can contact Honey Mae Kenworthy at (858) 777-6538 or hkenworthy@costcoauto.com. Learn more about Costco Auto Program and the Volvo Special Offer by visiting CostcoAuto.com/VolvoCars or call 1-855-722-6272. 

About Costco Auto Program 

Costco Auto Program is operated by Affinity Auto Program, which has operated the program since its inception in 1989. Costco Auto Program is recognized as a leading member-focused auto-buying program in the industry. This service offers prearranged pricing and a first-class buying experience on new and select pre-owned vehicles, RVs, motorcycles and powersports products, as well as discounts on 

automobile parts, service, and accessories for U.S. Costco members. In 2017, Costco members purchased more than 520,000 vehicles through the program. Costco Auto Program surveys members who use the program to ensure the service continues to meet their high expectations. More than 96 percent of members who responded to the survey gave the program high marks across three categories – value, service and overall experience. 

About Costco Wholesale Corporation 

Costco Wholesale Corporation (NASDAQ:COST) currently operates 749 warehouses, including 519 in the United States and Puerto Rico, 98 in Canada, 38 in Mexico, 28 in the United Kingdom, 26 in Japan, 14 in Korea, 13 in Taiwan, nine in Australia, two in Spain, one in Iceland and one in France. Costco also operates electronic commerce websites in the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom, Mexico, Korea and Taiwan. 

About Volvo USA 

Volvo has been in operation since 1927. Today, Volvo Cars is one of the most well-known and respected car brands in the world with sales of 534,332 cars in 2016 in about 100 countries. Volvo Cars head office, product development, marketing and administration functions are mainly located in Gothenburg, Sweden. Volvo Car USA, LLC, (www.volvocars.com/us) is a subsidiary of Volvo Car Group. VCUSA provides marketing, sales, parts, service, technology and training support to Volvo automobile retailers in the United States. For more information please refer to the VCUSA media website at: http://www.media.volvocars.com/us. 

*Visit CostcoAuto.com/VolvoCars for full details, terms and conditions. 

I’m just finalizing the working sessions for President’s Club, and one of the sessions I’m moderating is Online Retailing.  I’ve enjoyed the discussions I have been having with the panelists.  Three major factors have emerged from our planning.

Consistency  

The research project we did a few years ago on Customer Experience told us that consumers valued trust in the dealership and trust in the sales rep over other considerations in our global principal component analysis.  Consistency builds trust. If you are going to jump into digital retailing, you need consistency from online to offline.  Customers expect the process to be seamless.

Flexibility

Regardless of the technology you use to approach online retailing, you must engineer a process that is flexible.  Customers need to be able to “jump in and jump out” of the process, shopping at their pace.  Let them decide how much of the process they complete online and when they want to make contact with your dealership.

Structure  

Online retailing is built to make a customer-friendly experience and add efficiencies to the process.  Do these efficiencies mean dealerships will need to restructure their org?  Does an effective online retailing strategy require a BDC to answer questions vs a sales staff to do customer demos?  I’m not saying dealerships need to revamp their showroom floor right now, but we would be remiss if we didn’t analyze the efficiencies on online retailing.

Customers today want a seamless experience.  Your dealership can – and should – take advantage of new technologies available today to streamline your lead handling and improve the shopping process for customers.  These three factors prove that integrating online retailing into your dealership can enhance and augment your sales process, but this is still a “people business”.

Make sure you can address each issue and develop a plan to integrate online retailing into your sales strategy.

If you are a Dealer Principal or General Manager, we will be discussing different approaches to solve these three questions at the upcoming Presidents Club.

BMW Tops Industry Followed By Jeep® Brand and Toyota

NEW YORK — March 29, 2018 — The automotive industry ranked second out of the 15 studied in MBLM’s Brand Intimacy 2018 Report, which is the largest study of brands based on emotions. The industry was dethroned for the first time by media & entertainment, highlighting the trend toward escapism, relaxation and distraction. BMW came in first in the automotive industry followed by the Jeep brand and Toyota. Brand Intimacy is defined as a new paradigm that leverages and strengthens the emotional bonds between a person and a brand. This year’s study again revealed that top intimate brands in the U.S. continued to surpass the top brands in the Fortune 500 and S&P indices in revenue and profit over the past 10 years.

The Top 10 in the automotive industry was rounded out by: Honda, Harley-Davidson, Chevrolet, Ford, Mercedes, Chrysler and GMC.

“While slipping slightly, the automotive industry still performed strongly due to the bonds it creates with consumers,” stated Mario Natarelli, managing partner, MBLM. “The Jeep brand has risen in our 2018 Brand Intimacy Report. We just released an analysis of Jeep and found that its recent marketing efforts have been focusing on powerful emotional themes at the core of its brand, leveraging nostalgia well and utilizing today’s marketing channels to build dialogue and strong bonds.”

“We are very pleased with the Jeep brand’s improved performance in the 2018 Brand Intimacy Study,” stated Olivier Francois, Chief Marketing Officer, FCA US. “I am most proud of what we were able to do on behalf of all of our brands last year. We continued to focus on our brands’ unique identities, what differentiates them from other brands. Storytelling is a critical part of marketing and being successful hinges on the ability to make it resonate emotionally outside the walls of your company.”

Other notable automotive findings in MBLM’s Brand Intimacy 2018 Report include:

·The Jeep brand ranked first among women

·BMW ranked first among men

·The industry had a Brand Intimacy Quotient score of 44.9, which is higher than the average of 27.1

·Two automotive brands were in the top 10 overall, BMW ranked third and Jeep brand ranked fourth

·Harley-Davidson made the biggest drop, falling from the fourth overall brand in 2017 to 18th and from first in the automotive industry to fifth in 2018

·The Jeep brand moved up from 15th overall in 2017 to fourth in 2018

This year’s report contains the most comprehensive rankings of brands based on emotion, analyzing the responses of 6,000 consumers and 54,000 brand evaluations across 15 industries in the U.S., Mexico and UAE. MBLM’s reports and interactive Brand Ranking Tool showcase the performance of almost 400 brands, revealing the characteristics and intensity of the consumer bonds.

To view the automotive industry rankings, visit: https://hubs.ly/H0btKxS0. And to view MBLM’s detailed look into the Jeep brand, visit: https://hubs.ly/H0bvmXT0.

 To download the full Brand Intimacy 2018 Report or explore the Ranking Tool please visit: http://mblm.com/lab/brandintimacy-study/.

 Methodology

During 2017, MBLM with Praxis Research Partners conducted an online quantitative survey among 6,000 consumers in the United States (3,000), Mexico (2,000), and the United Arab Emirates (1,000). Participants were respondents who were screened for age (i.e. 18 to 64 years of age) and annual household income ($35,000 or more) in the U.S. and socioeconomic levels in Mexico and the UAE (A,

B, and C socioeconomic levels). Quotas were established to ensure that the sample mirrored census data for age, gender, income/socioeconomic level, and region. The survey was designed primarily to understand the extent to which consumers have relationships with brands and the strength of those relationships, from fairly detached to highly intimate. It is important to note that this study provides more than a mere ranking of brand performance and was specifically designed to provide prescriptive guidance to marketers. We modeled data from a total of 54,000 brand evaluations to quantify the mechanisms that drive intimacy. Through factor analysis, structural equation modeling, and other sophisticated analytic techniques, the research allows marketers to better understand which levers need to be pulled to build intimacy between brands and consumers.

# # #

About MBLM: MBLM is the Brand Intimacy Agency, delivering expertise and offerings across three areas of focus: Agency, Lab and Platform. With offices in seven countries, our multidisciplinary teams help clients build stronger bonds and deliver optimized marketing outcomes and returns for the long term. To learn more about how we can help you create and sustain ultimate brand relationships, visit mblm.com.

Rashid Ismail joins vehicle intelligence executive team to enhance customer success

IRVINE, Calif., March 28, 2018 — Spireon, the vehicle intelligence company, has appointed Rashid Ismail as senior vice president of customer success, joining the company’s executive leadership team. Tapping into an extensive background in operations and customer experience, Ismail will be responsible for customer lifecycle management, bringing even greater strength to Spireon’s award-winning customer service program.

“Rashid has a proven track record of aligning operations, technology, business needs and customer requirements to drive customer success, operational efficiency and revenue growth,” said Kevin Weiss, CEO at Spireon. “With a deep understanding of the importance of customer experience and satisfaction, he will be an integral part in making sure we deliver higher expertise that helps our clients improve how they run their businesses.”

Ismail joins Spireon with nearly 20 years of experience, most recently at CoreLogic, a leading provider of property data and analytics, where he served as senior vice president of operations with a focus on improving customer retention, productivity and processes and achieved significant results. Prior to that, he was a vice president, head of broker dealer and retail customer experience, at MetLife insurance.

“I’m delighted to join Spireon, a company that already has an extraordinary commitment to customer focus, as evidenced by multiple service awards and outstanding Net Promoter Scores across the business,” said Ismail. “I look forward to expanding upon the work that has been done to successfully launch and support more than 20,000 existing customers with refined processes and approaches that will nurture customer relationships for years to come.”

 About Spireon

Spireon, Inc. is North America’s leading connected vehicle intelligence company, providing businesses and consumers with powerful insights to track, manage and protect their most valuable mobile assets. The award-winning Spireon NSpire platform supports nearly 4 million active subscribers across the company’s growing suite of products for new and used car dealers, lenders and financial institutions, rental car agencies, commercial and local fleet operators, and consumers. Learn more at www.spireon.com.  

###

For more information, contact

Emily Lynn Ashley
Havas Formula for Spireon

Spireon@HavasFormula.com 
619-234-034

In a Modern Dealership article from November 2017, David Mondragon wrote that the automotive industry was preparing for a big change that would bring far-reaching structural and economic implications for both dealers and the workforce.

“On the surface, key economic drivers remain well positioned for growth,” he said. “Market indicators that should be high are high, and indicators that should be low are low. Consumer confidence is at a seven-year high, the stock market is at an all-time high, and housing starts are up from prior year … a leading indicator for truck sales.”

In other words, the signs of a healthy industry and strong economy are all there.

But, according to him, two upcoming trends will challenge the automotive industry: segmentation shifts and long-term financing.

Segmentation Shifts

Between 2009 and 2017 YTD, the U.S. car segment dropped 17 points, with car sales only making up 36 percent of the retail industry.

Supported by lower gas prices and an “aging population” seeking the confidence and functionality of their vehicles, trucks and SUVs saw strong growth over the same period of time.

Once upon a time, cars acted as the “gateway” vehicle to automotive brands; first-time buyers would purchase a car, and gradually “move up” the brand ladder as time went by.

“Over time, high-cost entry associated with SUVs and trucks will challenge certain brands and their ability to attract and retain highly coveted first-time buyers with fewer low-cost car entries in market,” Mondragon said.

Long-Term Financing

According to Edmunds, the average retail contract length in 2016 was 69 months, the highest on record. Incentives were also at record highs, and vehicle pricing is growing as new models, trucks and SUVs, and electric vehicles come to market.

Household income, however, is not growing at the same rate, which means new forms of financing and longer-term financing models are “imperative” to support higher industry volumes.

Additional Challenges

The world - and the automotive industry - is in flux.

Analog has quickly given way to a digital era, and consumers use lots of data to drive their decisions.

Now, they can (and do) track all aspects of life online; according to Digital Commerce 360, researchers predict that e-commerce will account for 17 percent of all U.S. retail sales by 2022.

Ride-sharing services (e.g. Uber and Lyft) and new subscription-based models (e.g. Clutch) will challenge conventional purchase models.

Other pay-as-you-go platforms will likely rise as Millennials choose from the new, emerging options that fit both their lifestyles and their budgets.

Love ‘em or hate ‘em, Millennials and Generation Z will “shift the stage” for a new retail environment. “Today, millennials represent only 30 percent of car sales,” said Mondragon. “According to Automotive News, these consumers will represent 40 percent by 2020, with a tipping point of 50 percent coming soon after.”

Add on the development of electric and autonomous vehicles and you’ve got a horizon brimming with up-and-coming changes to the industry.

The Future

While change is coming and adaptation is required, it’s not all happening overnight.

According to the NADA Dealership of Tomorrow study released last January, “the majority of vehicles will continue to be transacted at or by a dealership through 2025.”

EY published a study on the future of automotive retail, emphasizing the shift from transactional to a more customer-centric approach, including data and advice on managing consumer trust to ensure consumer loyalty, adapting to changing mobility options, creating an engaging digital experience, and more.

“Dealers who see these shifts not as threats, but as opportunities, will prevail,” Mondragon said. “The U.S. franchise model is the envy of the world, and dealers, brands, and manufacturers who stay ahead of the curve and adapt quickly will not only survive, but thrive.”

In the 2016 DrivingSales Executive Summit, John Boudreau introduced a concept called "separate the work".  He defines this as identifying the parts of a job role that can see increased performance from training.  Let me explain.

Think of a receptionist.  For our example, let's assume that one of the tasks of this role entering customers into the CRM.  This needs to be done properly, with good spelling and grammar, and it needs to be done in a timely fashion.  But there isn't much more to it than that.  The difference between a poor receptionist and a good receptionist wouldn't be drastic here.

Another function of this receptionist's role is greeting customers on the phone and transfering them to the proper department.  The difference between a poor and high quality receptionist is drastic here.  We've listened to a lot of phone calls.  Trust me.  There is a difference.  Between their greeting, the tone of voice, how efficient they are in transferring, there are multiple opportunities to create a favorable impression here.

Using this example, most of the training efforts should be spent on phone skills and interacting with customers.  Your dealership can benefit most by focusing here.

Let's take a look at the sales manager position.  If you walk into a dealership, the sales manager is always busy.  There are no shortage of tasks for them to do.  In my opinion, there are two functions essential to this job role.  The first is having high-quality conversations with customers.  Selling cars.  The other?  Having high-quality conversations with the sales staff.  Developing people.  How often are your managers doing 1 on 1's with your staff?

Here's another way to separate the work.  What tasks are your managers doing that you could pay someone $10 an hour to do?  Not that you need to add more staff, but if these tasks can be accomplished by someone with a lower skill set, they probably are functions of that job that require emphasis and training.

Bottom line: separate the functions of the different roles in your dealership and identify the elements that need focus and training.  Build your training regimen around these important areas and see lift from your training efforts.  The bigger the opportunity, the higher the priority.

Check out John's entire interview here.