Don’t you hate to hear your customer say “no”? You spend a lot of time and energy with a customer and when you get to the final stage of the sales process, the customer says the dreaded “no” word. You were all excited and hoping for a sale and then poof, the air goes out of your sails. The good news is that you can change from getting “no” answers to “yes” answers.

First, you must recognize that getting a “no” answer isn’t accidental or bad luck. When a customer gives you a “no” answer, it is systemic from a thought or feeling that occurred before decision time occurred. Although it’s not possible to get a “yes” answer 100 percent of the time, it is possible to improve your ratios tremendously by doing a little review.

Review the last 20 customers you have been with who said “no.” What were their objections? Write down all the objections. Categorize each objection. The good news is that objections only fall into a few categories. Once you realize that you face the same objections over and over, it’s easier to prepare for them in the future.

Now let’s dig into why the objection occurred. For all the complexity of human beings, we are pretty basic in that thoughts and emotions drive our decisions. Small companies, big companies, your country of residence, foreign countries — those things do not change human nature. As a salesperson, you must dig deeper, dig deeper, dig deeper. When you get to the core, you will find fear. What fear is the customer feeling? The overriding fear is of making a mistake.

When you receive an objection, you must now practice risk reversal. The fear has reached a crescendo and created a perception of extreme risk. Sometimes the easiest way for a customer to deal with risk is to say “no.” Customers object for only four reasons: to stall, complain, negotiate or make a valid objection.

Unfortunately, the majority of objections are also unspoken. You have to use your gut to feel the objections of your customers. You may listen to what the customer says, but you also have to feel what they are trying to say and also what they really mean. These three things can be very different from one another. Listening without feeling and understanding will only cause you to chase veiled objections. You will forever be trying to change objections without getting to a “yes.” Your objective is not to handle or fix objections, but to get your customer to the point of not only saying “yes” but feeling good about their decision. Notice I used the word “feel” once again.

Fears can be either intrinsic or extrinsic. The customer can have information given to them extrinsically that creates a fear around you, your product/service or the money. Or the customer can create fear based upon their own thoughts or feelings. Remember that perception is reality to the customer. What will change their fears, whether they are intrinsic or extrinsic? Confidence is the game changer — confidence that you can show and transfer to the customer. People want to feel confident. Usually, your confidence will come from competence.  The more competent you are in listening, understanding, communicating, problem solving, persisting and creating a kindred friendship, the confident you will be and the confident your customer will feel. Your confidence will trump any extrinsic information given to the customer by another salesperson.

Try the following risk reversal techniques.

1. Re-demonstrate Your Product or Service — Move people back from their head with their heart. It’s hard for people to make decisions based upon logic only without creating fear around our logic. People tend to have more confidence and conviction around their emotions than their logic. Emotions are fun and logic is boring, scary, black and white, right versus wrong. Re-demonstrating your product or service renews the emotion that justifies logic.

2. Ask the Pointed Question — “Mr. Customer, if you had to pick one thing only that is keeping you from buying what would that be?”

3. Reduce the Scary Monster of Decision — “Mr. Customer, the hardest part of getting what you want is to make the decision to do so. That’s normal. The root meaning of the word ‘decide’ means to cut off from all other things. That can be a scary thing. Once you make the decision, all the fear goes away and you lift a ton off your shoulders. It’s okay to make the decision to have what you know you already want to do.”

4. Make No Mistake — “Mr. Customer, based upon what you have told me, based upon what you have said you want to do, what your goals are, what you are getting and accomplishing, you are not making a mistake.”

Just as the customer has to decide, you have to decide as well. Do you feel worthy of making this sale? Do you feel like you and your product/service is the best for the customer? When you do, you will go from more “no” answers to more “yes” answers.

Don’t you hate to hear your customer say “no”? You spend a lot of time and energy with a customer and when you get to the final stage of the sales process, the customer says the dreaded “no” word. You were all excited and hoping for a sale and then poof, the air goes out of your sails. The good news is that you can change from getting “no” answers to “yes” answers.

First, you must recognize that getting a “no” answer isn’t accidental or bad luck. When a customer gives you a “no” answer, it is systemic from a thought or feeling that occurred before decision time occurred. Although it’s not possible to get a “yes” answer 100 percent of the time, it is possible to improve your ratios tremendously by doing a little review.

Review the last 20 customers you have been with who said “no.” What were their objections? Write down all the objections. Categorize each objection. The good news is that objections only fall into a few categories. Once you realize that you face the same objections over and over, it’s easier to prepare for them in the future.

Now let’s dig into why the objection occurred. For all the complexity of human beings, we are pretty basic in that thoughts and emotions drive our decisions. Small companies, big companies, your country of residence, foreign countries — those things do not change human nature. As a salesperson, you must dig deeper, dig deeper, dig deeper. When you get to the core, you will find fear. What fear is the customer feeling? The overriding fear is of making a mistake.

When you receive an objection, you must now practice risk reversal. The fear has reached a crescendo and created a perception of extreme risk. Sometimes the easiest way for a customer to deal with risk is to say “no.” Customers object for only four reasons: to stall, complain, negotiate or make a valid objection.

Unfortunately, the majority of objections are also unspoken. You have to use your gut to feel the objections of your customers. You may listen to what the customer says, but you also have to feel what they are trying to say and also what they really mean. These three things can be very different from one another. Listening without feeling and understanding will only cause you to chase veiled objections. You will forever be trying to change objections without getting to a “yes.” Your objective is not to handle or fix objections, but to get your customer to the point of not only saying “yes” but feeling good about their decision. Notice I used the word “feel” once again.

Fears can be either intrinsic or extrinsic. The customer can have information given to them extrinsically that creates a fear around you, your product/service or the money. Or the customer can create fear based upon their own thoughts or feelings. Remember that perception is reality to the customer. What will change their fears, whether they are intrinsic or extrinsic? Confidence is the game changer — confidence that you can show and transfer to the customer. People want to feel confident. Usually, your confidence will come from competence.  The more competent you are in listening, understanding, communicating, problem solving, persisting and creating a kindred friendship, the confident you will be and the confident your customer will feel. Your confidence will trump any extrinsic information given to the customer by another salesperson.

Try the following risk reversal techniques.

1. Re-demonstrate Your Product or Service — Move people back from their head with their heart. It’s hard for people to make decisions based upon logic only without creating fear around our logic. People tend to have more confidence and conviction around their emotions than their logic. Emotions are fun and logic is boring, scary, black and white, right versus wrong. Re-demonstrating your product or service renews the emotion that justifies logic.

2. Ask the Pointed Question — “Mr. Customer, if you had to pick one thing only that is keeping you from buying what would that be?”

3. Reduce the Scary Monster of Decision — “Mr. Customer, the hardest part of getting what you want is to make the decision to do so. That’s normal. The root meaning of the word ‘decide’ means to cut off from all other things. That can be a scary thing. Once you make the decision, all the fear goes away and you lift a ton off your shoulders. It’s okay to make the decision to have what you know you already want to do.”

4. Make No Mistake — “Mr. Customer, based upon what you have told me, based upon what you have said you want to do, what your goals are, what you are getting and accomplishing, you are not making a mistake.”

Just as the customer has to decide, you have to decide as well. Do you feel worthy of making this sale? Do you feel like you and your product/service is the best for the customer? When you do, you will go from more “no” answers to more “yes” answers.

Every salesperson is really in two businesses: the people business and the marketing business. If you are great with people but don’t have any customers to demonstrate this quality to, you’re in trouble. Marketing must become the No. 1 function of any business, including sales. Marketing precedes sales.

Begin to think in terms of leads, not sales. You need marketing that will generate leads. Most salespeople think only in terms of advertising. Salespeople either wait for their business to advertise, or take a blind “stab-in-the dark” approach to advertising. Usually, the results are minimal to non-existent.

One-stage advertising asks people to buy now. For most salespeople, this technique is too expensive and will lead to too few results. A better technique is two-stage marketing. Two-stage marketing is designed to get interested parties to raise their hands, so to speak. You just want to create leads from qualified potential customers. Lead generation = dollar creation.

There are several techniques to get leads. One way is to create a special report. For example, this report may have a title of “Ten Things Every Car Buyer Must Know.” It’s always best to create a simple report that walks customers through the process. Paint a picture of the “do’s and don’ts” of car buying. Be an advocate to the buyer in order to create trust. When you write the report, follow some important, time honored advice: “Enter into the conversation the customer currently has in their mind.” In other words, TLC — think like a customer.

Next, think of how you can get the potential customer to learn about your report. Where do your customers hang out? Where do they live? What do they do? Where do they go? Where do they belong? You may pass out the reports. Run an ad in the local newspaper publishing an “800 hotline” number for people to receive the report. Create an alliance with other businesses to give reports out to benefit their customers. Always think of ways to benefit other businesses as well, so they will want to give out your report.

Cross-promote between businesses such as restaurants, body shops, car washes and insurance agents. You promote their business and they give out a coupon for yours. Make the coupon a two-stage mechanism by providing something of value, such as information or a free gift, rather than a discount or special deal.

Go to the reference desk at your public library and study the SRDS: Standard Rate and Data Service Guide. You will find endless streams of information and ideas on how to access lists and groups of potential customers. You may buy subscriber lists from magazines that appeal to your potential customers.

Create a “Be-Back” CD and give it to every person who does not buy from you. In the CD, give them the reasons to do business with you and create a hook. Get a list of inactive or orphan owners from your business and begin to send a three-stage mailing sequence trying to get them back into the fold.

When you create a river of leads, your pipeline of sales never dries up.

Every salesperson is really in two businesses: the people business and the marketing business. If you are great with people but don’t have any customers to demonstrate this quality to, you’re in trouble. Marketing must become the No. 1 function of any business, including sales. Marketing precedes sales.

Begin to think in terms of leads, not sales. You need marketing that will generate leads. Most salespeople think only in terms of advertising. Salespeople either wait for their business to advertise, or take a blind “stab-in-the dark” approach to advertising. Usually, the results are minimal to non-existent.

One-stage advertising asks people to buy now. For most salespeople, this technique is too expensive and will lead to too few results. A better technique is two-stage marketing. Two-stage marketing is designed to get interested parties to raise their hands, so to speak. You just want to create leads from qualified potential customers. Lead generation = dollar creation.

There are several techniques to get leads. One way is to create a special report. For example, this report may have a title of “Ten Things Every Car Buyer Must Know.” It’s always best to create a simple report that walks customers through the process. Paint a picture of the “do’s and don’ts” of car buying. Be an advocate to the buyer in order to create trust. When you write the report, follow some important, time honored advice: “Enter into the conversation the customer currently has in their mind.” In other words, TLC — think like a customer.

Next, think of how you can get the potential customer to learn about your report. Where do your customers hang out? Where do they live? What do they do? Where do they go? Where do they belong? You may pass out the reports. Run an ad in the local newspaper publishing an “800 hotline” number for people to receive the report. Create an alliance with other businesses to give reports out to benefit their customers. Always think of ways to benefit other businesses as well, so they will want to give out your report.

Cross-promote between businesses such as restaurants, body shops, car washes and insurance agents. You promote their business and they give out a coupon for yours. Make the coupon a two-stage mechanism by providing something of value, such as information or a free gift, rather than a discount or special deal.

Go to the reference desk at your public library and study the SRDS: Standard Rate and Data Service Guide. You will find endless streams of information and ideas on how to access lists and groups of potential customers. You may buy subscriber lists from magazines that appeal to your potential customers.

Create a “Be-Back” CD and give it to every person who does not buy from you. In the CD, give them the reasons to do business with you and create a hook. Get a list of inactive or orphan owners from your business and begin to send a three-stage mailing sequence trying to get them back into the fold.

When you create a river of leads, your pipeline of sales never dries up.

Surveys continually show that people dislike buying a vehicle. Although the numbers have gotten better over the years, people still dislike the car-buying experience. The key word here is “experience.” Everything you do is sales and selling. Every person in the dealership is in sales. Everything the customer sees is selling. What message is the customer receiving?

Selling today is not about feature-benefit selling alone. Any dealership that is being trained primarily on feature-benefit sales approaches is boring their customers to death and practicing “me-too” sales approaches.

Imagine a good old-fashioned water slide. I like to call these “slippery-slides.” When you get on a slippery-slide, you start at the top and you effortlessly slide down with nothing to obstruct your destination. In traditional selling, we teach a road-to-the-sale process that is akin to making a customer go through an obstacle course. Have you ever seen a person at the end of an obstacle course? That person is tired, drained and spent. Do your customers feel the same way?

Here are some points to observe in your dealership:

Do your customers experience an easy, simple and pleasing first impression and perception?

Website - Receptionist - Inventory Merchandising - Salesperson Greeting - Process

Websites — The best Websites aren’t often the prettiest or have the most bells and whistles, but are simple and easy, catch a customer’s attention and invite, engage and create a call to action. What is the “TOT?” What is “The One Thing” you want your customers to do who visit your site?

Your Website sells.

Receptionist — Has your receptionist ever been trained? Do you ever pay attention to how he/she greets customers on the phone or in person? Most dealers would be shocked if they took the time to “look under the covers.”

Your receptionist sells.

Inventory/Merchandising — Go across the street from your dealership and look back. Get in your car and drive by your dealership from every angle possible. Look through the eyes of the customer. What do you see? Where is the natural sight line of your customers in relation to your dealership? What message are you conveying and are you inviting and engaging your customer? When your customer pulls on the lot, do you have clearly marked directions? Do you have clearly marked and easy access to parking? Is your inventory clean, grouped and aligned in a way that it displays absolute fanaticism and perfectionism towards creating a “wow” experience for the customer? Is your lot clean, painted and policed on a regular basis?

Your inventory and the merchandising of your inventory sell.

Salespeople and Managers — Do your salespeople greet customers? If so, how do they do it? Yesterday, I walked into 12 different dealerships and the greeting at all but one of those dealerships was either non-existent or horrific. How does your dealership recover from a bad greeting? Many dealerships are spending a ton of time and money on Internet leads but not a minute or a dime on what to do when you get them. Yesterday, I experienced not being greeted at many dealerships. I experienced greetings from salespeople and managers who would not get out of their chair to greet me. I experienced many unexcited, non-smiling greetings that would make any customer feel uninvited and uneasy. I also experienced group greetings by managers and salespeople congregating in groups who stared at me but did not greet me. I wonder how your customers are being greeted? I am beginning to believe that all managers’ chairs should be removed from showrooms.

Your salespeople and managers sell with everything they do or don’t do.

Process — What do your customers hate about your process and why? Do your customers hate your negotiation process? If so, it is easy to fix. Train on how to negotiate without the customer feeling the negatives of negotiation or eliminate most or all of negotiation. Do your customers hate your F&I process? What do they hate and why? Remove the things they dislike or just proactively change the perception of the process. Perception becomes reality for a customer.

Your process sells.

Everything and everybody associated with your dealership sells. The question is, how well?

For a free Special Report “Ten Things Every Dealer Must Do to Be Successful This Year” e-mail me at the address below with the phrase “Ten Things” in the subject line.

Surveys continually show that people dislike buying a vehicle. Although the numbers have gotten better over the years, people still dislike the car-buying experience. The key word here is “experience.” Everything you do is sales and selling. Every person in the dealership is in sales. Everything the customer sees is selling. What message is the customer receiving?

Selling today is not about feature-benefit selling alone. Any dealership that is being trained primarily on feature-benefit sales approaches is boring their customers to death and practicing “me-too” sales approaches.

Imagine a good old-fashioned water slide. I like to call these “slippery-slides.” When you get on a slippery-slide, you start at the top and you effortlessly slide down with nothing to obstruct your destination. In traditional selling, we teach a road-to-the-sale process that is akin to making a customer go through an obstacle course. Have you ever seen a person at the end of an obstacle course? That person is tired, drained and spent. Do your customers feel the same way?

Here are some points to observe in your dealership:

Do your customers experience an easy, simple and pleasing first impression and perception?

Website - Receptionist - Inventory Merchandising - Salesperson Greeting - Process

Websites — The best Websites aren’t often the prettiest or have the most bells and whistles, but are simple and easy, catch a customer’s attention and invite, engage and create a call to action. What is the “TOT?” What is “The One Thing” you want your customers to do who visit your site?

Your Website sells.

Receptionist — Has your receptionist ever been trained? Do you ever pay attention to how he/she greets customers on the phone or in person? Most dealers would be shocked if they took the time to “look under the covers.”

Your receptionist sells.

Inventory/Merchandising — Go across the street from your dealership and look back. Get in your car and drive by your dealership from every angle possible. Look through the eyes of the customer. What do you see? Where is the natural sight line of your customers in relation to your dealership? What message are you conveying and are you inviting and engaging your customer? When your customer pulls on the lot, do you have clearly marked directions? Do you have clearly marked and easy access to parking? Is your inventory clean, grouped and aligned in a way that it displays absolute fanaticism and perfectionism towards creating a “wow” experience for the customer? Is your lot clean, painted and policed on a regular basis?

Your inventory and the merchandising of your inventory sell.

Salespeople and Managers — Do your salespeople greet customers? If so, how do they do it? Yesterday, I walked into 12 different dealerships and the greeting at all but one of those dealerships was either non-existent or horrific. How does your dealership recover from a bad greeting? Many dealerships are spending a ton of time and money on Internet leads but not a minute or a dime on what to do when you get them. Yesterday, I experienced not being greeted at many dealerships. I experienced greetings from salespeople and managers who would not get out of their chair to greet me. I experienced many unexcited, non-smiling greetings that would make any customer feel uninvited and uneasy. I also experienced group greetings by managers and salespeople congregating in groups who stared at me but did not greet me. I wonder how your customers are being greeted? I am beginning to believe that all managers’ chairs should be removed from showrooms.

Your salespeople and managers sell with everything they do or don’t do.

Process — What do your customers hate about your process and why? Do your customers hate your negotiation process? If so, it is easy to fix. Train on how to negotiate without the customer feeling the negatives of negotiation or eliminate most or all of negotiation. Do your customers hate your F&I process? What do they hate and why? Remove the things they dislike or just proactively change the perception of the process. Perception becomes reality for a customer.

Your process sells.

Everything and everybody associated with your dealership sells. The question is, how well?

For a free Special Report “Ten Things Every Dealer Must Do to Be Successful This Year” e-mail me at the address below with the phrase “Ten Things” in the subject line.

 “The more things change, the more things stay the same.” This quote can be an accurate reflection of most industries. With all the massive changes underway in the automotive industry, the majority of the industry operates in much the same way as it did 50 years ago.

One small part of an industry begins to change and reaches what Malcolm Gladwell termed in his book the “tipping point.” That tipping point allows the change to gain momentum and become norm for an industry. This change usually occurs in one small segment and can be isolated. If you examine the business or industry as a whole, you find that even with the change being influential, the rest of the industry or business remains intact adhering to traditional thoughts and norms.

With dealerships there are a couple of old sayings: “The front-end sells the first car and the back-end makes the next one,” or “the frontend gets the customers and the back-end keeps them.” There is a lot of truth to both of those sayings and to the importance of understanding the roles both areas play in your business.

I find the majority of emphasis is still placed on customer acquisition in most dealerships. If you want to build a solid business, you must emphasize acquisition and maintaining — this is how to experience exponential versus linear growth. Here are a few tips in making that happen:

Tip No. 1 - Create continuity, loyalty, rewards, VIP or recognition programs with enough real teeth in it to motivate a customer

Every time I shop at Kroger’s grocery store I love putting in my reward number and then watching the total bill go down as my rewards points are deducted. At Panera Bread when I give them my rewards card, I usually get something free and build redeemable rewards for the future. I love when I make flight or vacation reservations for free using my airline and credit card rewards. I love when I get a free car wash after my tenth visit.

Do you get the point? People love to be rewarded with free bonuses and will be motivated more to get that free bonus than to get a discount on something. Rewards and loyalty programs influence shopping patterns and behaviors — bottom line, end of story. Stop making lame excuses like “rewards programs get expensive,” “loyalty programs take away my profit” and “I am giving away profit I don’t have to give away.”

Most dealers spend vast fortunes on getting customers and little on keeping them. It would be hard to spend too much effort and money on customer retention. Your profit creation for long term is so great from continued business and referrals that the amount spent on retention is paltry compared to a typical dealerships advertisement budget.

Tip No. 2 – Create forced continuity programs

A forced continuity program is a program that forces your customer to use your service department in exchange for something of value they receive at no charge. Over the last several years I have asked more than 100 dealers what their long-term service retention as a percentage of their sales are, and only one dealer knew the answer. The answer to that question a vital sign to the future of your dealership.

When conducting sales training sessions, our trainers tell salespeople that in the beginning of their sales career they should spend 80 percent of their time on customer acquisition and 20 percent on customer retention. However, as time progresses, salespeople should work on flipping those percentages. A dealership is no different than a salesperson.

A product our company provides for dealerships is lifetime power train coverage. I have witnessed firsthand that with the right underwriter for this product, lifetime power train programs are worth their weight in gold. It is simply amazing how much this forced continuity program provides in increases to sales to service retention, new and used sales, gross and net profit, vehicle maintenance and vehicle service contract penetrations and repeat sales. Just like the loyalty and retention programs mentioned earlier, I have heard every fear-based excuse dealers have for not having programs like this in their dealership, but nothing in well-executed experience proves those fears are real.

To quote one of the greatest marketing lessons I have ever learned, “You must put an iron cage around your customers.” If what you do and what you provide is exceptional, your customers will want to continue to do business with you. Your goal must be to stop further commoditizing a commodity business and become a category of one.

To receive my free Special Report, “Putting an Iron Cage Around Your Customers,” e-mail me with the term “Iron Cage” in the subject line at the address below.

 “The more things change, the more things stay the same.” This quote can be an accurate reflection of most industries. With all the massive changes underway in the automotive industry, the majority of the industry operates in much the same way as it did 50 years ago.

One small part of an industry begins to change and reaches what Malcolm Gladwell termed in his book the “tipping point.” That tipping point allows the change to gain momentum and become norm for an industry. This change usually occurs in one small segment and can be isolated. If you examine the business or industry as a whole, you find that even with the change being influential, the rest of the industry or business remains intact adhering to traditional thoughts and norms.

With dealerships there are a couple of old sayings: “The front-end sells the first car and the back-end makes the next one,” or “the frontend gets the customers and the back-end keeps them.” There is a lot of truth to both of those sayings and to the importance of understanding the roles both areas play in your business.

I find the majority of emphasis is still placed on customer acquisition in most dealerships. If you want to build a solid business, you must emphasize acquisition and maintaining — this is how to experience exponential versus linear growth. Here are a few tips in making that happen:

Tip No. 1 - Create continuity, loyalty, rewards, VIP or recognition programs with enough real teeth in it to motivate a customer

Every time I shop at Kroger’s grocery store I love putting in my reward number and then watching the total bill go down as my rewards points are deducted. At Panera Bread when I give them my rewards card, I usually get something free and build redeemable rewards for the future. I love when I make flight or vacation reservations for free using my airline and credit card rewards. I love when I get a free car wash after my tenth visit.

Do you get the point? People love to be rewarded with free bonuses and will be motivated more to get that free bonus than to get a discount on something. Rewards and loyalty programs influence shopping patterns and behaviors — bottom line, end of story. Stop making lame excuses like “rewards programs get expensive,” “loyalty programs take away my profit” and “I am giving away profit I don’t have to give away.”

Most dealers spend vast fortunes on getting customers and little on keeping them. It would be hard to spend too much effort and money on customer retention. Your profit creation for long term is so great from continued business and referrals that the amount spent on retention is paltry compared to a typical dealerships advertisement budget.

Tip No. 2 – Create forced continuity programs

A forced continuity program is a program that forces your customer to use your service department in exchange for something of value they receive at no charge. Over the last several years I have asked more than 100 dealers what their long-term service retention as a percentage of their sales are, and only one dealer knew the answer. The answer to that question a vital sign to the future of your dealership.

When conducting sales training sessions, our trainers tell salespeople that in the beginning of their sales career they should spend 80 percent of their time on customer acquisition and 20 percent on customer retention. However, as time progresses, salespeople should work on flipping those percentages. A dealership is no different than a salesperson.

A product our company provides for dealerships is lifetime power train coverage. I have witnessed firsthand that with the right underwriter for this product, lifetime power train programs are worth their weight in gold. It is simply amazing how much this forced continuity program provides in increases to sales to service retention, new and used sales, gross and net profit, vehicle maintenance and vehicle service contract penetrations and repeat sales. Just like the loyalty and retention programs mentioned earlier, I have heard every fear-based excuse dealers have for not having programs like this in their dealership, but nothing in well-executed experience proves those fears are real.

To quote one of the greatest marketing lessons I have ever learned, “You must put an iron cage around your customers.” If what you do and what you provide is exceptional, your customers will want to continue to do business with you. Your goal must be to stop further commoditizing a commodity business and become a category of one.

To receive my free Special Report, “Putting an Iron Cage Around Your Customers,” e-mail me with the term “Iron Cage” in the subject line at the address below.

Everyday managers walk into their dealerships in the morning and start their day with tasks or TO-Do list items. Unfortunately, those items rarely involve direct interaction with their sales team. The ultimate place for managers to be is in front of customers and salespeople.

Salespeople need interaction and input. If a manager allows a salesperson to direct their own day by their own design without input and coaching, the results will often be lackluster and will lead to feelings of being alienated.  Attitudes will decrease and salesperson turnover will increase.

Most likely you have heard of Pareto’s Rule otherwise known as the 80/20 rule. The rule states that 80% of the money will be made by 20% of the people. The rule has stood the test of time and will remain true forever. If you know that only 20% of people are self-directed, that means the remaining 80% need direction, coaching and guidance with their daily focus.

Gone are the days of salespeople working in the fashion of independent agents where they are measured at the end of the month for results and the winners are rewarded while the non-producers are fired and replaced. Salespeople will be coached and guided from the beginning of the day and then periodically throughout the day. Actions and productivity will be measured, praised and rewarded knowing that more often than not those things will produce results.

The Law of Reaping and Sowing will be applied by coaching salespeople to sow seeds continually during the day. CRM’s, BDC’s and social media tools will all push dealerships to measure and correct every daily action of salespeople.

Imagine if there was a football team with a head coach who did not believe in practice. Or, if the coach did not believe in coaching, monitoring and holding responsible his players for every detail of their normal day or what they did in the games. Imagine if a football coach each day said nothing to his team and at the end of games just looked to see if his team had won and who had played well or not. Would a coach do these things? Would a coach tell his team to go win and never guide this team?  Who is calling the plays at your dealership? Who is doing the coaching before the game? Who is monitoring every action and number?

The role of the traditional salesperson is dead. Gone forever are the days of waiting until the end of the month to see how the salespeople have done. Think of your salespeople as you would players on a team. Each has strengths and weaknesses. Each player will have expectations and responsibilities. Each player will be continually coached on techniques that involve sales skills, people skills, marketing skills and life skills. Create a team of team members rather than expecting all your players to be superstars that can do everything on their own and produce superior results. The old model is dead and it never was effective. Bury the old salesperson model and give birth to the new one today.

For the FREE Special Report “10 things Your Dealership Must Do to Be Successful” email me at info@tewart.com with 10 things in the subject line.

Everyday managers walk into their dealerships in the morning and start their day with tasks or TO-Do list items. Unfortunately, those items rarely involve direct interaction with their sales team. The ultimate place for managers to be is in front of customers and salespeople.

Salespeople need interaction and input. If a manager allows a salesperson to direct their own day by their own design without input and coaching, the results will often be lackluster and will lead to feelings of being alienated.  Attitudes will decrease and salesperson turnover will increase.

Most likely you have heard of Pareto’s Rule otherwise known as the 80/20 rule. The rule states that 80% of the money will be made by 20% of the people. The rule has stood the test of time and will remain true forever. If you know that only 20% of people are self-directed, that means the remaining 80% need direction, coaching and guidance with their daily focus.

Gone are the days of salespeople working in the fashion of independent agents where they are measured at the end of the month for results and the winners are rewarded while the non-producers are fired and replaced. Salespeople will be coached and guided from the beginning of the day and then periodically throughout the day. Actions and productivity will be measured, praised and rewarded knowing that more often than not those things will produce results.

The Law of Reaping and Sowing will be applied by coaching salespeople to sow seeds continually during the day. CRM’s, BDC’s and social media tools will all push dealerships to measure and correct every daily action of salespeople.

Imagine if there was a football team with a head coach who did not believe in practice. Or, if the coach did not believe in coaching, monitoring and holding responsible his players for every detail of their normal day or what they did in the games. Imagine if a football coach each day said nothing to his team and at the end of games just looked to see if his team had won and who had played well or not. Would a coach do these things? Would a coach tell his team to go win and never guide this team?  Who is calling the plays at your dealership? Who is doing the coaching before the game? Who is monitoring every action and number?

The role of the traditional salesperson is dead. Gone forever are the days of waiting until the end of the month to see how the salespeople have done. Think of your salespeople as you would players on a team. Each has strengths and weaknesses. Each player will have expectations and responsibilities. Each player will be continually coached on techniques that involve sales skills, people skills, marketing skills and life skills. Create a team of team members rather than expecting all your players to be superstars that can do everything on their own and produce superior results. The old model is dead and it never was effective. Bury the old salesperson model and give birth to the new one today.

For the FREE Special Report “10 things Your Dealership Must Do to Be Successful” email me at info@tewart.com with 10 things in the subject line.