Are you looking to increase your sales for the 2nd-4th quarter this year?  We are all looking to increase our sales year over year.  Here are 50 creative things you can add to your to-do list to bring in customers to your auto dealership and make that happen.

1. Send hand written thank-you notes to ALL the people who visit the dealership and follow them up.
2. Work EVERYONE-in or out of the market.
3. Be more of a doer.  Make things happen.  Concentrate on the activities that will get results.
4. Concentrate on getting more owners from prospects and bird-dogs.
5. Treat every customer as a buyer for today.
6. Do outside prospecting-‘I must get 3 sales a month from outside sources.’
7. Come in and work the service lane once a week.
8. Catch showroom overflow whenever possible.
9. Do service follow up a day or two after your customer was in for service.
10. Prospect the body shop weekly-get with your body shop manager for leads.
11. Get EVERY customer in the CRM and follow up!
12. Concentrate on following the ‘Road to a Sale.’  Always give a complete feature and benefit presentation 100% of the time.
13. Know what cars are coming in on trade and on ordered cars.  Have or find a prospect for all trades.
14. Work to keep a Positive Mental Attitude at all times (Leave stuff at home).
15. Seek people out, go to their business.  Do whatever it takes to get face-to-face with all prospects.
16. Close everyone you get in front of-stop the shopper.  Now, while they are ‘Hot’, sell…sell…sell.
17. Sell from stock-“Mr./Mrs. ____, I can save you money if you buy from stock, because we can give you a better buy and no price increase on cars in stock.’
18. Work an extra hour on you shift one night a week.
19. Have planned appointments every Saturday.
20. Pick out another salesperson and try to be responsible for keeping each other’s attitudes up.  Remember, Iron sharpens iron.
21. Adjust your attitude to ‘positive/upbeat’ every morning while you are getting ready for work.
22. Make 5 cold phone calls, without fail, EVERY day.
23. Write letters to selected business people.
24. Work owners effectively (bird dog programs).
25. Follow-up on personnel promotions listed in the newspaper.
26. Take a CPO vehicle when following up on owners and prospects.
27. Read and study (through training tests, research on automotive sites)
28. Relax.  Work toward developing a better physical condition and, therefore, being more alert mentally.
29. Have a better knowledge of inventory.  Know what’s coming in and the approximate time and date and walk the inventory EVERY day.
30. During scheduled floor time, be on the floor with a positive attitude at all times.
31. To start the day with a positive mental attitude, get up 30 minutes earlier and play an inspirational CD.
32. On days off the floor, do at 2 hours of face-to-face prospecting.
33. Plan and mail more cold letters.
34. Plan and do more cold prospecting.
35. Review weak points with team captains.
36. Review product knowledge.
37. Walk the inventory more often.
38. Follow-up an owner’s neighbors’ automotive needs.
39. Walk the used car lot and your CPO inventory every day.
40. Sell 75% of the people in the first closes. (Sell completely before you go for the close.)
41. Check family, friends, and neighbors.
42. Don’t forget about your owners-Keep close contact.
43. Review old buyer’s orders and your upcoming lease expirations for prospects (renewals).
44. Mail out-Follow-up with a phone call in 2 days.
45. Effectively use floor time and hawk the lot.
46. Be sure that you don’t shortcut.  Follow the ‘Road to the Sale’ every single time.  Turn over to manager 100% of time.
47. Keep smiling.  It improves your face value.
48. Always look for the positive.  Be a ‘good finder.’
49. Social Network – Let everyone on your facebook and twitter know that you are in the business and let them know of specials or cream-puff trades that are coming in.
50. Last but not least, HAVE FUN!

Are you looking to increase your sales for the 2nd-4th quarter this year?  We are all looking to increase our sales year over year.  Here are 50 creative things you can add to your to-do list to bring in customers to your auto dealership and make that happen.

1. Send hand written thank-you notes to ALL the people who visit the dealership and follow them up.
2. Work EVERYONE-in or out of the market.
3. Be more of a doer.  Make things happen.  Concentrate on the activities that will get results.
4. Concentrate on getting more owners from prospects and bird-dogs.
5. Treat every customer as a buyer for today.
6. Do outside prospecting-‘I must get 3 sales a month from outside sources.’
7. Come in and work the service lane once a week.
8. Catch showroom overflow whenever possible.
9. Do service follow up a day or two after your customer was in for service.
10. Prospect the body shop weekly-get with your body shop manager for leads.
11. Get EVERY customer in the CRM and follow up!
12. Concentrate on following the ‘Road to a Sale.’  Always give a complete feature and benefit presentation 100% of the time.
13. Know what cars are coming in on trade and on ordered cars.  Have or find a prospect for all trades.
14. Work to keep a Positive Mental Attitude at all times (Leave stuff at home).
15. Seek people out, go to their business.  Do whatever it takes to get face-to-face with all prospects.
16. Close everyone you get in front of-stop the shopper.  Now, while they are ‘Hot’, sell…sell…sell.
17. Sell from stock-“Mr./Mrs. ____, I can save you money if you buy from stock, because we can give you a better buy and no price increase on cars in stock.’
18. Work an extra hour on you shift one night a week.
19. Have planned appointments every Saturday.
20. Pick out another salesperson and try to be responsible for keeping each other’s attitudes up.  Remember, Iron sharpens iron.
21. Adjust your attitude to ‘positive/upbeat’ every morning while you are getting ready for work.
22. Make 5 cold phone calls, without fail, EVERY day.
23. Write letters to selected business people.
24. Work owners effectively (bird dog programs).
25. Follow-up on personnel promotions listed in the newspaper.
26. Take a CPO vehicle when following up on owners and prospects.
27. Read and study (through training tests, research on automotive sites)
28. Relax.  Work toward developing a better physical condition and, therefore, being more alert mentally.
29. Have a better knowledge of inventory.  Know what’s coming in and the approximate time and date and walk the inventory EVERY day.
30. During scheduled floor time, be on the floor with a positive attitude at all times.
31. To start the day with a positive mental attitude, get up 30 minutes earlier and play an inspirational CD.
32. On days off the floor, do at 2 hours of face-to-face prospecting.
33. Plan and mail more cold letters.
34. Plan and do more cold prospecting.
35. Review weak points with team captains.
36. Review product knowledge.
37. Walk the inventory more often.
38. Follow-up an owner’s neighbors’ automotive needs.
39. Walk the used car lot and your CPO inventory every day.
40. Sell 75% of the people in the first closes. (Sell completely before you go for the close.)
41. Check family, friends, and neighbors.
42. Don’t forget about your owners-Keep close contact.
43. Review old buyer’s orders and your upcoming lease expirations for prospects (renewals).
44. Mail out-Follow-up with a phone call in 2 days.
45. Effectively use floor time and hawk the lot.
46. Be sure that you don’t shortcut.  Follow the ‘Road to the Sale’ every single time.  Turn over to manager 100% of time.
47. Keep smiling.  It improves your face value.
48. Always look for the positive.  Be a ‘good finder.’
49. Social Network – Let everyone on your facebook and twitter know that you are in the business and let them know of specials or cream-puff trades that are coming in.
50. Last but not least, HAVE FUN!

Pricing vehicles effectively in the market place can be a challenge at times.  However, when you do, you can have some serious velocity for the business; not only sales, but fixed operations also.  There are a few different pricing softwares out in the marketplace that you can use.  The bottom line is you have to use them effectively.  I remember several years ago while I was a sales manager, there weren't pricing tools available that would scan all the different websites.  I would have to go to autotrader and cars.com to make sure that I wasn't pricing myself out of the market.  I would also do a KBB on the vehicle to go along with what I found and just shoot from the hip on the pricing with what I found online.  Now, those pricing tools have everything that you need with a few clicks of the mouse. 

Here is a scenario for you.  Would you rather have a gross of $2200 per vehicle sold or would you rather have things priced effectively within the market and make $1400 per vehicle, but sell more cars at the lower gross?  Here is a dose of reality that sales managers have a hard time grasping.  If you carry a 75 unit inventory and make $2200 per vehicle, but your average inventory age is 50, you would make about $1,642,500 in a year.  This includes Finance income of $500 per vehicle and fixed operations making $300 profit on the sales department. 

Now, if you carry the same inventory and bring your front gross down to $1400 and your average days in inventory down to 30 days, that will bring the bottom line to $2,007,000, a net gain of $365,000 with the same amount of vehicles in inventory. 

To me, going with the second scenario would make more sense.  However, there are a lot of Sales Managers that don't see it that way.  They go for the gusto and want to be the hero in making the most money for the department on bigger deals when they would be doing justice for the company to go for a little lower gross and turn the inventory faster.  The second scenario, you would be selling 365 more vehicles (30 per month) at a lower gross per vehicle, but making more money for the company in the long run.  The more effectively you price your vehicles, the more clicks you will have on those third party websites, therefore, more floor traffic, and more sales.  Cheers to good selling!

Pricing vehicles effectively in the market place can be a challenge at times.  However, when you do, you can have some serious velocity for the business; not only sales, but fixed operations also.  There are a few different pricing softwares out in the marketplace that you can use.  The bottom line is you have to use them effectively.  I remember several years ago while I was a sales manager, there weren't pricing tools available that would scan all the different websites.  I would have to go to autotrader and cars.com to make sure that I wasn't pricing myself out of the market.  I would also do a KBB on the vehicle to go along with what I found and just shoot from the hip on the pricing with what I found online.  Now, those pricing tools have everything that you need with a few clicks of the mouse. 

Here is a scenario for you.  Would you rather have a gross of $2200 per vehicle sold or would you rather have things priced effectively within the market and make $1400 per vehicle, but sell more cars at the lower gross?  Here is a dose of reality that sales managers have a hard time grasping.  If you carry a 75 unit inventory and make $2200 per vehicle, but your average inventory age is 50, you would make about $1,642,500 in a year.  This includes Finance income of $500 per vehicle and fixed operations making $300 profit on the sales department. 

Now, if you carry the same inventory and bring your front gross down to $1400 and your average days in inventory down to 30 days, that will bring the bottom line to $2,007,000, a net gain of $365,000 with the same amount of vehicles in inventory. 

To me, going with the second scenario would make more sense.  However, there are a lot of Sales Managers that don't see it that way.  They go for the gusto and want to be the hero in making the most money for the department on bigger deals when they would be doing justice for the company to go for a little lower gross and turn the inventory faster.  The second scenario, you would be selling 365 more vehicles (30 per month) at a lower gross per vehicle, but making more money for the company in the long run.  The more effectively you price your vehicles, the more clicks you will have on those third party websites, therefore, more floor traffic, and more sales.  Cheers to good selling!

Online advertising in the car business can be a tough at times to track.  We hear the numbers from all of the vendors in how many people search and research on the internet before coming into a dealership.  Some will submit for more info, some will call, and some will just show up in your showroom.  There are some pretty stout numbers out there from Northwood University.  So how true are they?

We had a sourcing done by Autotrader and confirmed a lot of info that we kind of knew, but learned a lot in the process too.  We learned that 75% of OUR used car customers were on the internet doing research before they set foot in our door.  Of that 75%, 61% were what a lot of salesmen would say is 'drive-by' traffic.  Only 29% made contact with us before making the trip into the dealership.  This coincides with the Northwood University studies that have been done over the last few years.  They were using websites that we have not advertised on before and had no idea that they relied on that information that much.  With that in mind, we are now advertising there.  Still a little early to see the results.

On the new side of things, 73% of OUR buyers used the internet.  This may be a little low as we are a single point dealership and we rely heavily on repeat and referral business which was confirmed in our study (35% were a referral from a friend/family member).  69% of those people were just 'walk-in' traffic and didn't make any contact with us through email or phone.

This goes to show that even though some of the online advertisers may be a little pricy, it validated where we were putting our advertising dollars online.  We are now advertising on the top 6 of the 7 websites.  The one doesn't allow for advertising as of yet to my knowledge.  People are looking at you online and you have to look good.

You have to have good photos, good descriptions, and competitive pricing.  You almost have to have a pricing tool of some sort like vAuto, VIN Solutions, or something equivalent.  When you have that combination, you will succeed.  Just about every customer is an 'internet customer.'  So is your dealership an internet dealership?  All of the staff has to be prepared to handle the internet shopper because if they didn't submit for info or call in, 6 or 7 out of 10 did do their research online on the car, and the dealership.

Online advertising in the car business can be a tough at times to track.  We hear the numbers from all of the vendors in how many people search and research on the internet before coming into a dealership.  Some will submit for more info, some will call, and some will just show up in your showroom.  There are some pretty stout numbers out there from Northwood University.  So how true are they?

We had a sourcing done by Autotrader and confirmed a lot of info that we kind of knew, but learned a lot in the process too.  We learned that 75% of OUR used car customers were on the internet doing research before they set foot in our door.  Of that 75%, 61% were what a lot of salesmen would say is 'drive-by' traffic.  Only 29% made contact with us before making the trip into the dealership.  This coincides with the Northwood University studies that have been done over the last few years.  They were using websites that we have not advertised on before and had no idea that they relied on that information that much.  With that in mind, we are now advertising there.  Still a little early to see the results.

On the new side of things, 73% of OUR buyers used the internet.  This may be a little low as we are a single point dealership and we rely heavily on repeat and referral business which was confirmed in our study (35% were a referral from a friend/family member).  69% of those people were just 'walk-in' traffic and didn't make any contact with us through email or phone.

This goes to show that even though some of the online advertisers may be a little pricy, it validated where we were putting our advertising dollars online.  We are now advertising on the top 6 of the 7 websites.  The one doesn't allow for advertising as of yet to my knowledge.  People are looking at you online and you have to look good.

You have to have good photos, good descriptions, and competitive pricing.  You almost have to have a pricing tool of some sort like vAuto, VIN Solutions, or something equivalent.  When you have that combination, you will succeed.  Just about every customer is an 'internet customer.'  So is your dealership an internet dealership?  All of the staff has to be prepared to handle the internet shopper because if they didn't submit for info or call in, 6 or 7 out of 10 did do their research online on the car, and the dealership.

Craigslist has been around since 1996 with approximately 49 million unique page views.  The question is do you advertise there and what do you advertise? 

I have been dabbling with Craigslist for a couple of months with our used car inventory.  At one point, I was putting all 150 vehicles on there.  I was finding through analytics that the higher priced vehicles weren’t getting much action, but I had found a sweet spot with vehicles that are under $10,000.  If I have something that is a little higher up to $11,000, I may post it depending on what it is. 

You have to post effectively and be consistent with it.  I post every Thursday or Friday with about 30 vehicles.  I see my website traffic go up significantly when I post.  People are looking for that $10,000 vehicle that is a cherry.  We have a tool within our website provider that will generate code for us and all I have to do is cut and copy to the appropriate fields.  Click here to see an example of a Craigslist ad that we have. 

When you click on the vehicle presentation, it takes you to our dealership website.  Just by posting about 30 vehicles a week generated 348 unique visitors and 2312 page views in January.  We had some customers walking in with print outs of the ads.  We had 16 phone calls, and we had 12 email inquiries.  I know that I can account for 18 sales that we know of that they saw the vehicle on Craigslist in January.  Of those sales, that generated $42,966 of gross profit for the store.  Not a bad return on investment since all it cost was time. 

The question is are you posting there and how are you doing it?  Are you linking back to your dealership website?  Are you posting with pictures?  Do you have a tracking number within the ad so you can track the effectiveness?  Are you willing to step outside the box and post with personal ads, ads for ‘junk items’?  Maybe you will think it is a better idea to post there with that other stuff that is on there and dominate your market.  Good luck with your postings.

Craigslist has been around since 1996 with approximately 49 million unique page views.  The question is do you advertise there and what do you advertise? 

I have been dabbling with Craigslist for a couple of months with our used car inventory.  At one point, I was putting all 150 vehicles on there.  I was finding through analytics that the higher priced vehicles weren’t getting much action, but I had found a sweet spot with vehicles that are under $10,000.  If I have something that is a little higher up to $11,000, I may post it depending on what it is. 

You have to post effectively and be consistent with it.  I post every Thursday or Friday with about 30 vehicles.  I see my website traffic go up significantly when I post.  People are looking for that $10,000 vehicle that is a cherry.  We have a tool within our website provider that will generate code for us and all I have to do is cut and copy to the appropriate fields.  Click here to see an example of a Craigslist ad that we have. 

When you click on the vehicle presentation, it takes you to our dealership website.  Just by posting about 30 vehicles a week generated 348 unique visitors and 2312 page views in January.  We had some customers walking in with print outs of the ads.  We had 16 phone calls, and we had 12 email inquiries.  I know that I can account for 18 sales that we know of that they saw the vehicle on Craigslist in January.  Of those sales, that generated $42,966 of gross profit for the store.  Not a bad return on investment since all it cost was time. 

The question is are you posting there and how are you doing it?  Are you linking back to your dealership website?  Are you posting with pictures?  Do you have a tracking number within the ad so you can track the effectiveness?  Are you willing to step outside the box and post with personal ads, ads for ‘junk items’?  Maybe you will think it is a better idea to post there with that other stuff that is on there and dominate your market.  Good luck with your postings.