DrivingSales
Delivering a Car Buying Experience Your Customers Want
The traditional 12-step "Road to the Sale" guidelines are out, and the Path to the Customer Purchase is in.
In a DrivingSales Webinar, MaxDigital says the reason the 12-step road to the sale doesn’t work is because it focuses on the way dealerships sell cars rather than the way consumers buy cars.
"If we think about the way a consumer does a lot of commerce today online, It's they way they want to do business. We need to think differently too about the customers road to the sale. Or what we (MAXDigital) call the Path to the Purchase."
The Path to Purchase should replace the Road to the Sale according to Patrick McMullen, SVP of Strategy and Innovation at MAXDigital. The main ingredients for the “Path to Purchase” model are two things.
"They (successful dealerships) infuse trust and confidence at every point of the car buying process."
To really be succesful, your store needs to bring trust and confidence into 6 different “P” steps: Your people, your process, your product, your pricing, your payment and your protection.
"Using trust and confidence in every single one of these elements is how they (successful dealerships) get to those great results."
By embracing the Path to the Purchase McM
ullen says your dealership will see an increase in profit, "Using the Customers Path to Purchase is how you create the experience customers want. AND the sales and profit that you want in your dealership."
This has been a quick recap of our most recent webinar. you can click HERE to watch the MAXDigital webinar in its entirety.
DrivingSales News features exclusive reporting directly from the DrivingSales editorial team. We cover important issues facing dealerships, with a focus on innovations that impact dealership operations. Do you have any stories you want us to cover? Or would you like to be interviewed? Reach out to Sherri.Riggs@drivingsales.com
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4 Comments
Chris K
Supersports
The industry is pushed by disruptors (money hungry entrepreneurs) who are not the typical car people we know of. I've never had anyone tell me, 25 years now, they want to buy a car online. Never. I have fielded 250,000 leads. Not one!!! Yet those vendors shove that down our face. It's regurgitated. That idea will never work, until the customers are actually demanding it, and they are NOT. Show me a study. I'll conduct a counter study and show it's a bunch of beeswax.
Jason Volny
DrivingSales
Maybe the customer is not ready to buy online due to serious lack of trust in the industry and the traditional dealer. Whos fault is that? Disruption is coming, will the traditional dealer be ready? Carvana sold almost 72,000 vehicles in 4 years and the sales keep climbing. Their whole focus is to challenge the traditional sales process. There are companies like Fair.com that offer pre-owned leasing from a mobile device and they are growing quickly. I think we are past asking if the customer is ready.
From Carvana's 10-K
The automotive retail industry’s structure presents an opportunity for disruption. It is the largest consumer retail industry in the United States and is highly fragmented. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the U.S. automotive industry generated approximately $1.2 trillion in sales in 2017, while Edmunds.com estimates the U.S. used vehicle sales market at over $739 billion in 2016. With little brand differentiation, there are approximately 43,000 used car dealerships in the United States according to Borrell Associates' 2017 Outlook and the largest dealer brand commands approximately 1.7% of the U.S. market according to Edmunds.com and publicly-listed dealership filings. Additionally, consumers are often dissatisfied with the car buying process. According to the DealerSocket 2016 Independent Dealership Action Report ("DealerSocket 2016"), 81% of North American consumers do not enjoy the car buying process, and car salesmen are among the least trusted professionals, according to a 2016 Gallup poll.
As dealers, we can dig our heels in like Blockbuster did (too easy, I know), or we can evolve to serve and treat guests the way they want to be treated.
Jerry Rice
Cardinal Buick GMC
So not one of the 250,000 leads that you've fielded over your career did not want to purchase a vehicle online? I talk to numerous customers a day asking if we deliver vehicles out of state, a few hours away, etc....
The average customer visits 1.3 dealers now. Which tells you everyone does their shopping ONLINE! You should revisit your process and do some more research about online shoppers and maybe you'll have a different view on the average consumer in our market.
DrivingSales News
DrivingSales
Chris K., it may be true that your customer base doesn't love buying cars online... but companies like Roadster are succeeding! they base their entire business on selling cars online... so there has to be something behind that success. BUT I'd love to hear your take in a blog! you should write something up. I bet there would be a lively and informational discussion.