Recruiting and hiring quality personnel for vehicle sales has never been easy, but according to most dealers I talk with, it’s never been as difficult as it is today. Even most of those in the job market with an interest in a “sales” career state that they want to stay away from selling cars!

Although the automotive sales profession has pretty much overcome the stereotyping of the ‘50s, ‘60s, and ‘70s, it is still plagued with negative perceptions, the most predominant of which relate to hours required and compensation structure (the mix between salary and commission). Although a number of dealership organizations have prevailed over these negatives, most are still struggling with how to effectively communicate the unparalleled benefits of a career in automotive sales (and possibly a subsequent one in sales management).

One of my clients asked for my help in developing a visual tool that she and her management team could use to better present the most significant benefits of an automotive sales career. So I developed and submitted a chart that was focused on the Employment Timeline, the Sales and Sales Management Career Path Possibilities, and the Annual Income Level Opportunity. You can review and print this chart by scrolling to the bottom of the https://www.ghagps.com/free-stuff web page and clicking on Download “Career Paths_Variable.pdf”. Please let me know what you think of my efforts.

Although the detail on this chart may not exactly fit the sales department position and compensation structure for your organization, this sample will provide a pattern for developing a similar tool that will best serve your needs. Please let me know if I can help you with this task. This message is just a further demonstration of the Value First policy of Garry House & Associates!

Regards,

Garry House

561-339-0043

It seems like I’ve recently been getting more inquiries like the following from client-dealers and their managers:

“I know I can become a more effective and productive leader/manager, but how can I learn how to do this without adding an increased time investment to my professional life. I’m already committed for 60+ hours per week!”

Well at least they’re not saying 80+ hours per week like I was frequently hearing during the 2003 – 2010 period! And although I think that 60+ hours per week may still be excessive in many cases, it may be OK if it includes drive-time to and from home.

Which brings me right to my recommendation for those of you unfortunate enough to be experiencing a 20+ minute daily one-way commute to work. Since you are already suffering with that time commitment, why not make it productive by listening to podcasts. The available podcast resources and content are virtually unlimited, and it’s relatively easy to find subject matter specific to the retail automobile business.

If you’ve been reading my messages, you know that I’m a big fan of Dave Anderson at LearnToLead.com. In May of this year he began producing The Game Changer Life podcast series, and there are now nearly 50 audio recordings available, with even more to come. According to Dave, “Being a game changer is all about being energized, passionate, consistently focused, and creating a high impact every single day.” In these 17 – 25 minute podcasts he “reveals principles gained throughout his extensive retail automotive career and conducts interviews with special guests from a variety of industries, all to help you: become more focused, stay energized, remain effective, and live The Game Changer Life!”

You can view the entire podcast catalog and access any individual podcast at no charge by clicking on http://thegamechangerlife.libsyn.com/website or by pasting it into your browser. This message is just a further demonstration of the Value First policy of Garry House & Associates!

I wish you a Very Happy, Healthy, and Successful 2018!

Warmest Regards,

Garry House

Your Highest-Value Activity (HVA) will drive your greatest incremental profit! And most retail automotive management professionals acknowledge that the largest potential profit improvement can be achieved by generating additional vehicle sales department gross. So, I have recently made a point to ask my dealer-clients, their CFOs, their GMs, and their sales managers, “How do you ensure that the people that work for you in Variable Operations are spending the right amount of time on the highest-value activity they should perform, and how do you currently measure that?”

This question requires the respondent to first identify, and state, what he/she believes the HVA to be. I have heard a variety of HVA descriptions, including a) achieving sales productivity objectives, b) maximizing deal $PVR, c) maintaining acceptable closing ratios, d) consistently performing the “Road to a Sale”, e) inventory planning and management, and f) providing an exceptional customer experience. But never did any of the management personnel express the one HVA that I was hoping to hear:

         “Habitually perform, and flawlessly execute, the Appointment Development Process.”

My intent here was to help the person to whom I posed this question to discover that he/she didn’t know something that he/she should know…and potentially something that would improve his/her results, together with the results of the Variable Operations team.

As a 50+ year retail automotive professional, I am absolutely convinced that effectively managing and implementing the three phases of the Appointment Development Process…1) Internet lead conversion, 2) inbound telephone inquiry conversion, and 3) salesperson direct prospecting…will result in a significant incremental profit improvement for most dealerships. Do the math yourself! Go to my web site, www.ghaGPS.com, and, under the menu heading, Browse Our RESOURCES, in FREE Stuff, download, review, and utilize the following two files:

                                                  “It’s More Than a Job Description.pdf”

                                         “Sales Consultant Productivity Modeling.xlsx”

I believe that you will convince yourself that a salesperson who successfully sets two valid appointments per working day from his own pro-active prospecting efforts (not including Internet, inbound phone inquiries, and 1st time walk-ins) will deliver 15+ units per month just from those prospecting efforts. If you would like to discuss, at no charge, either of these files on the telephone, please click the Book Online menu button on the web site, and select a time to talk.

We must remember, however, that it’s not just about the sales consultant! It’s also about the Sales Department Culture! All variable operations managers and support personnel must also fully embrace the Appointment Development Process! Let’s affirm that,“the more appointments we generate, the more vehicles we’ll sell!”

Universally, dealers experience the greatest deficiencies in the area of Salesperson Direct Prospecting, particularly as it relates to the following appointment opportunities:

       Unsold prospects (potential “be-backs”)                Service Customers

       Bird Dog referrals                                                        Repeats (including lease renewals)

       Additional household vehicles (owner data)          Owner referrals

       Dealership employee referrals                                  Salesperson’s Circle-of-Influence

       Orphan Owners                                                            Collision Center Customers            

Let’s FIX the Sales Department Culture by ensuring that ALL of the Variable Operations Staff becomes 100% knowledgeable of, 110% committed to, and 125% supportive of Salesperson Direct Prospecting.

                  “Efficiency is doing things right, and effectiveness is doing the right things.”

                                                                                                                               Peter Drucker                       

The right things in your business are your High-Value Activities. Your HVAs are the activities that either generate revenue directly, or indirectly enable you to generate revenue. The more of your HVAs that you do, the more effective you are. And the more effective you are at “appointing” your potential customers and bringing them into the dealership, the more money you’ll make.

Warmest regards,

Garry House

On my new web site at www.ghaGPS.com, under the “Develop Your SELF” menu tab, I discuss how to achieve a Culture of Accountability. One of the most important elements of accountability management, Clearly Defining and Communicating Your Expectations, is a critically needed, but rarely well-practiced, discipline within the retail automotive industry. You’ve heard it before: people will rise to the level of performance and/or behavior that is set for them. Mind reading is not a job requirement for our employees, in spite of what some dealership managers think. Throughout my 30-year consulting experience, I’ve become convinced that most managers don’t set job expectations very well. They are often excellent at noticing when things aren’t done right, but when it comes to telling their employees up front what they want, they try to communicate by mental telepathy.

Performance and behavioral expectations are fundamental to building and sustaining a successful dealership operation. Expectations can be described as objectives presented in small, edible bites for employees. They set the standard for excellence. Managers must communicate what they expect from their employees today, tomorrow, next month, and next year. Many (if not most) managers in the retail car business fail to adhere to this discipline. They fail to tell their employees what the most important tasks are they should accomplish each day. They fail to communicate.

Where possible, expectations should be focused on activities, not results. Here are a couple of examples of some metrics you might use in defining expectations:

For a Vehicle Sales Consultant -  inbound telephone appointment percentage, outbound phone and email follow-ups per day, number of CRM updates per day, demo percentage, number of potential vehicle replacements discovered on the service drive, etc.

For a Service Advisor – number of outbound status calls per customer per day, percent interactive walk-arounds, percent menu penetration, percent sales penetration on ASRs received from technicians, percent email penetration, etc.

Start with a vision of what you want the end result to be for the employee. Clearly define the activities required to produce the desired end result; these are your expectations. Today’s expectations should produce tomorrow’s results!

From the very beginning, establish your expectations in writing. A detailed job description or a set of job objectives is a MUST. An example of the “Job Objectives” format that I like best, It's More Than a Job Description.pdf, is available within FREE Stuff under the Browse Our Resources menu tab at www.ghaGPS.com. This format also serves as an employee evaluation tool. Also make sure that you ask employees to sign any document related to expectations. After the document is signed, give the employee a copy for his records. A signed acknowledgement of expectations stands to reinforce employee performance and behavior.

Never check for understanding of expectations by asking, “Do you understand?” Your employees don’t want to look stupid, so they will answer in the affirmative. Instead, ask questions about the expectations: “Which one is most important? Why? What will be your first steps? If you perform this activity as it’s laid out, what will the result look like?”

Set your expectations high…not so high that they are impractical or unreachable, but just high enough so your team has to stretch a bit to get there. Every professional believes that stretching is good for you!

If you feel you might need outside assistance in setting expectations or documenting job objectives, please call me at (561) 339-0043. There will be no charge for our initial conference, and I’ll be happy to provide you with some free samples. Remember, GH&A always provides Value First!

Warmest regards,

Garry House

Accountability management involves making sure that everyone in your dealership is held responsible for both the behavior and performance that you have outlined as non-negotiable. The first step is clearly defining and communicating your expectations, and, in general, I have discussed my recommended strategies and tactics for doing so, and in detail, I offer sample tools on my web site at www.ghaGPS.com. Today I’ll be presenting one of the processes that I suggest you employ to manage expectations…the “One-on-One Meeting” discipline. 

Why should we have One-on-One meetings? Because every employee needs and deserves to have quality, individual, interactive communication with his or her supervisor on a frequent and regularly-scheduled basis.

Here are the “Big Picture” goals for the One-on-One meeting:

• Develop and enhance your “connection” with subordinates and improve employee engagement
• Re-enforce the “Principles of Accountability Management.”
• Report and review actual behavior and job performance vs. expectations.
• Provide a forum to achieve continuous improvement.
• Impart “Feed-Back” to the employee and vice-versa (receive Feed-Back).

Here is the recommended “Meeting Frequency” at auto dealerships:

• Senior managers and department managers - no less than once per month.
• Sales department desk managers - weekly.
• Financial services managers – weekly.
• Vehicle sales consultants - weekly.
• Service Advisors (ASMs) - bi-weekly.
• Sales team leaders and technician group (team) leaders - weekly.
• Service and collision center technicians - no less than once per month.
• Parts counter personnel - bi-weekly.
• All other dealership employees - no less than once per month.

At one time I believed I had a pretty good road map of how to launch the One-on-One Meeting process and how to plan and conduct those meetings. I have since discovered a far better solution to overcome those challenges. Get Lighthouse, Inc. has recently published an eBook titled “10 Steps to Having Amazing One on Ones with Your Team.” But it’s more than just an eBook…it’s the process in a box…all you need to do is add water. Consistent with my philosophy of providing Value First, I have arranged for you to access a FREE copy. Just click on the link below, or copy and paste it into your browser. You’ll be glad you did! Enjoy this great resource! 

https://getlighthouse.com/blog/free-book-10-steps-amazing-one-ones/

Warmest regards,

Garry House

In my message of December 28, 2016, I suggested that you immediately focus on what you might most wish to accomplish in the first 75 days, or the earliest 20%, of 2017. If you decided not to follow my suggestion, you need read no further! However, if you did define and commit to 3 – 5 short-term goals, and since the 1st Quarter of 2017 is nearly history, please reflect on your YTD performance, and answer a few questions for yourself:

• How many of your goals did you accomplish?
• Did you (like me) have a Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG)? If so, did you get close to achieving it?
• If you continue doing exactly what you’ve done during the first quarter, where will you be at the end of the second quarter…or at the end of the year, for that matter?

Many of you are probably disappointed with yourselves. I’m sure that you started out the year with the best of intentions, determined that 2017 would be different. However, somewhere along the way, you may have lost your focus and dropped the ball…and now you find yourself having to play catch up. It happens to the best of us, and the good news is that you can turn things around.

An arrow can only be shot by pulling it backward. If Q-1 difficulties dragged you backward, it may only mean that you are about to be launched into something great. So, keep aim on your goals! If you had a slow start, or are unhappy with your performance, you need to step up your game and deploy better execution strategies to ensure that your goals are achieved in the second quarter.

So, what can you do if you find yourself currently underperforming? What strategies can you deploy to make up for lost time? How do you right your wrongs? How do you quickly redeem yourself in the second quarter? If you are like many of the clients I have worked with, one or more of the following are probably absent from your dealership culture:

Focus…Urgency and Agility…Activity Management…Accountability

Each of these four areas of opportunity are addressed on my new website (also mobile-friendly), ghaGPS.com, and I welcome you to visit and take a tour. I think you will find a lot of great ideas and tools that will help you stage your comeback and crush your second quarter goals. And no one will bother you while you’re looking around. From the “Home” page, click on any of the areas in which you seek improvements. Investigate all the useful content in the “Browse Our Resources” section. Finally, be sure to check out the FREE Evaluation page in the “Connect with Garry” section.

As you may recall, developing and launching the new website was one of my 2017 jump-start goals, and I managed to “get ‘er done”. Unfortunately, I didn’t do as well on my other two goals!

We’re all staring down the barrel of the same reality; April 1st begins the second quarter of the year, and if we want to drive more, better, and faster results…we must enforce greater self-discipline and unleash a performance explosion.

I’ve spent the last 30 years of my life working with dealer principals and dealership managers, showing them how to build and maintain superior performance and helping them achieve more than they ever thought possible. My style is to mix a blend of encouragement, tough love, strict discipline, hyper accountability, and a strong sense of urgency to keep senior managers and their teams fully engaged and performing at the very top of their abilities. My career is defined by my relentless search for fresh strategies that work in the retail automotive industry. I always provide “Value First!” I try to do “Great Things all of the time!” And some of the time I get paid for it! I hope to have the opportunity of working with you soon.

Warmest regards,

Garry House

In my 30 years in the dealership training and consulting arena, I have been exposed to numerous dealership executives, department managers, and sales and service personnel who felt the need to be “on the job” 60, 70, and, yes, even 80 hours per week. And no matter how much you love the retail business, and its diversity, excitement, and challenges, that level of time investment in your business career will never allow you to achieve any type of reasonable balance between your professional life and your personal life. Believe me, when I was on the retail side of the business, I learned the hard way, that “a retail automotive dealership will suck every hour out of your personal life that you allow it to!” 

It shouldn’t, and it doesn’t have to! In an effectively staffed dealership, with good business processes and reasonable personnel scheduling, combined with sound Time Management practices, there should be no need for any manager or employee to “clock” more than 55 hours per week. Should we expect that all employees clock 55 hours? Certainly not! That would be totally unrealistic, particularly considering the maximum work schedules desired by most Generation “’X”, ”Y”, and “Z” employees who work in our industry. But for some reason, 55 hours seems to be the magic number that top performing executives, managers, and sales and service professionals know that they need to work to be successful in the retail automotive business.

The key to becoming highly successful within the magic “55 hour workweek schedule” is Time Management.  Dave Anderson, of LearnToLead.com has written numerous articles on this subject, all of which are available on his web site. Following, I have selected what I consider to be “the 3 best things” that Dave recommends:

1. Structure your day around the discipline of priorities! “First things first, last things not at all.” (Peter Drucker)
2. Leave as little unmanaged time on your daily calendar as possible! Unmanaged time is a killer! It slays drive, passion, rhythm, momentum, execution, and accomplishment.
3. Build a routine and stick to it! Structure keeps you focused! Develop highly productive habits. If you’re a leader without a solid routine, you have no credibility telling others to get their act together!

Developing and executing sound time management practices is easier said than done. But it’s certainly worth the effort required! I wish you well in your effort!

Warmest regards,

Garry House

How much time, collectively, do your dealership managers spend on Used Vehicle Price Management? Most of you won’t have any idea. Some of you will say, “I don’t understand the question.” Many of you will say, “Not enough!” Some of you might say, “My Used Vehicle Manager (UVM) spends about “xx” percent of his time on that.” And, hopefully, a few of you will say something like, “I’m trying to watch that closely, and it looks like my UVM spends about 8 hours per week on that. I don’t know whether that’s not enough or too much. How much time should we be spending?” However, I’ve never had a client-dealer or GM tell me, “My UVM spends about “x” hours per month per used retail unit sold, “My GSM spends about “y” hours per month per used retail unit sold, and I spend about “z” hours per month per used retail unit sold. All in all, we collectively spend about “x + y + z” hours per month on this important responsibility.”

So why is this so important? According to industry marketing experts, almost 90% of used vehicle buyers perform extensive Internet research prior to contacting or visiting a dealership. So…when a prospect submits his/her search criteria, your vehicle shows up on a Search Results Page (SRP), or not, depending on how closely it matches the customer’s criteria, one of which might very well be price range. Or if he/she didn’t input price into the search criteria, he/she might search the SRPs, ranking the vehicles by price, low-to-high. Our first need is to have our vehicle show up on one of the customer’s first two SRPs, and one of the driving factors is price!

However, the chances of having our vehicle make the customer’s “short list” (and giving us a shot at making the door swing or the phone ring) are slim to none unless the customer decides to click on our Vehicle Details Page (VDP). What drives his/her decision to click on our VDP? Quality of our lead photo…Number of photos/videos…Our compelling short description (if permitted by vendor)…CPO or not…Odometer reading…Color… and Price! Which of these influencers is the most important? Price!

If we’re not getting any action on a vehicle (Internet leads and inquiries, telephone inquiries, dealership visits), wouldn’t that suggest that we’re getting very few VDP hits? Doesn’t that suggest a “lack of interest” in our vehicle? How much does this “lack of interest” is a result of our price? Me thinks quite a lot! To me, that means, if we’re not getting a reasonable number of VDP hits, our price is too high, and we need to reduce it to an equilibrium point, where there is a sufficient level of interest, as measured by the number of VDP hits…regardless of our price rank or percent of market price!

So, yes, we need to find a way to accurately measure VDPs per vehicle on every web site on which we are featured. And we need to regularly and thoughtfully adjust prices down (and sometimes up), continuously attempting to identify the “sufficient level of interest.” That’s what Price Management is all about!

I know you’re waiting to hear “How Much Time” Used Vehicle Price Management (UVPM) should take. My answer, which I’m sure you won’t like, is “it depends!” On what? Your franchise (UVPM takes a lot longer in a Mercedes-Benz store that in a Honda store). Your intended Inventory Turn Velocity (ITV)…The dealer who expects to turn his used vehicle inventory 12-14 times per year will spend more time on UVPM than a like-volume dealer who is satisfied with 8-10 turns per year. Your core inventory level…The dealer with a “core to speculative” inventory ratio of 1.00 to 1.00 will need to spend less time on UVPM than a dealer with a ratio of 1:00 to 1.50. I’ll give you a general rule that I have observed with aggressive and successful used vehicle operators. But, it most certainly does not apply in every dealership circumstance. If you retail 100 used units per month, you should probably plan on a collective management UVPM time investment of 30 minutes per vehicle, which translates to 3,000 minutes per month, or 692.3 minutes per week, or most importantly, 138.5 minutes per day (2.3 hours per day) in a 5-day work week!

Does that surprise you? Do you agree, or not? As always, I’d love to receive your input.

Warmest regards,
Garry House

Recent discussions I’ve had with potential clients suggest that one of the biggest road blocks to maximizing retail automotive success is the dealership (or department) culture. I decided it was again an opportune time to tackle this thorny issue. “Culture” can be defined as the shared values and practices of the company’s (or department’s) employees, and it’s important because it can make or break your dealership. Business cultures change over time, primarily as a result of employees leaving and joining the company. These changes may be positive, or not…they may be intended, or not…they may be major changes, or not.

In assessing your culture, you probably need to ask yourself some hard questions. Here’s a few starters:

• Do you accept mediocre performance?
• Do you tolerate negative behavior?
• Do your employees understand your expectations, and are they committed to them?
• Do you inspect what you expect?
• As a leader, do you continually set a good example?

If you like the way the culture looks and feels at your dealership as a whole (and in each of your operating departments) then all you need to do is focus on supporting and sustaining your current values and practices. On the other hand, if you believe your culture needs to change…and you wish to implement that change…you probably have some painful days ahead. Your first step must be to alter the attitudes and behavior of (or de-hire) the “granfalloons” in your organization. “Granfalloons” -- isn’t that a great word? It was first penned by Kurt Vonnegut in 1988 when he wrote Cat’s Cradle. The word means “a group of people who claim to have a shared identity or purpose, but whose mutual association is essentially meaningless.”

What are the characteristics of the type of culture we see in a highly successful dealership, or department thereof? The list may include, but is certainly not limited to, the following:

• Clarity of Company Mission
• Employee Commitment
• High Integrity Workplace
• Highly Effective Leadership
• Effective, Well-Executed Processes
• High Accountability Standards
• Customer-Focused Initiatives
• Absence of Departmental Silos
• Commitment to Learning and Skill Development
• Commitment to Recruiting and Retaining Outstanding Employees
• Performance-Based Compensation
• Support for Innovation and Change

Warmest regards,

Garry House

gha4you@gmail.com

RELATED: 10 Warning Signs Your Dealership's Culture is Toxic