Do you work in a franchise dealership? Are you a director level or higher? Do you love DrivingSales and want to be more involved with the events?

If you answered YES to these questions, you're the perfect candidate for our DrivingSales Dealer Panel. 

Being on the Dealer Panel means you'll pick speakers for DSES, Canadian Dealer Forum, and President's Club. You'll also direct the dialogue of these events, be the voice of change and improvement, and much more! We're looking for people who want to be engaged in our community, and really influence the industry as a whole. You'll get an inside look at DrivingSales, as well as other aspects of automotive.

As a thank-you, you'll get free passes for each of the events that you're involved with.

We will review your application and contact those who meet our requirements.

Unfortunately, you won't be allowed to be a speaker at our event if you are on the Dealer Panel. 

We interviewed many vendors during NADA 2017 to hear what they think is ahead for the auto industry. Check out our interview with automotiveMastermind where we discuss leveraging big data, retention, and how to find the one thing that matters to customers. Check back for more NADA 2017 Vendor Insights! 

*The thoughts and opinions expressed by interviewees do not reflect the opinions of DrivingSales. These interviews are purely editorial content and are not sponsored by any party.

If you're wondering which auto industry vendors are the most popular and best liked, we have the answers for you! The Dealer Satisfaction Awards recognizes the vendors who have the best ratings in the industry, and last night the winners were announced. 

Check out the Dealer Satisfaction Award Winners

It's valuable to know what other people in the industry think about different vendors, as it gives you a unique perspective as you are deciding which will be best for your dealership. 

As we speak to dealers we learn that different vendors will work, or not work, just depending on dealership size, needs, location, etc. It's so valuable to be able to locate dealers who are in a similar situation as you, and then make decisions based on their thoughts and experiences.

Whether you're talking within your 20 Groups, visiting Vendor Ratings, talking to friends in the industry, or working with vendors individually, we find that dealers can greatly benefit from doing homework on vendors before purchasing. 

Yes Lifecycle Marketing recently released a study about the gaps in email marketing. I took this research and have created a three part series on improving your email marketing by closing these different gaps. The first gap in email marketing is between subscriber RESPONSE and subscriber ENGAGEMENT.

Open rates have remained consistent over the past 3 years, but click rates and CTO rates are on a downward spiral. Unique click rate has gone down 15 percent year over year, and CTO rate has gone down 12 percent year over year. What do these numbers tell us? They say there’s a growing gap between response and engagement. Customers are opening emails as frequently as ever, but they’re not engaging and converting.

In the auto industry specifically, there is an 11.1% open rate, a 1.3% click rate, and a 8.7% click to open rate. The rates in the auto industry are better than in many other industries, but there still seems to be a major disconnect.

So how can you start improving? Brands often find success by using specific taglines many times in their marketing, so that when customers are ready for an oil change or for a new car, they’ll remember your consistent marketing.

Another easy way to work on your email marketing is by evaluating the day of the week that you send emails. Many studies show that Friday and Saturday are actually some of the best days for conversions, so that may be something to take into consideration.

I recommend always personalizing emails by name; consumers have come to expect this.

Studies also find that holiday and event emails give you a large advantage as they create a sense of urgency.

Trying these things and even being more aware of the disconnect between response and engagement can help you work on your email strategy, and drastically improve it.