Finding more business is a challenge for most car dealers, how to sell more cars, write more RO’s and sell more parts. Often it is easier to look outside for a shiny, magic bullet that promises increased business than to take a good hard look in the mirror. During my 30 years in dealership sales management I was constantly bombarded with the idea that more training was the solution to all sales woes; hire an outside sales trainer, set aside an hour each shift for sales training or make the Friday morning meetings at least half sales training etc. etc. etc.… Not once did I ever hear about the importance of training on the tools we used. No one ever told me I should brush up on my knowledge of the dealerships DMS, ever! Most of the time when I would accept a new position, I would be shown how to operate the DMS by another sales manager and many times they barely knew the basics themselves! I will admit that my ego often got in the way as I nodded along and said things like, “oh yeah I know how to use the ‘M&M’ (or CYA, or Adnot, or UCMe etc etc) system, we had it at my old store…” and then tried desperately to figure it out on my own because I was usually being shown how to use the system in ways that were not the most efficient and sometimes even wrong! I know I am not alone in this experience, as I have visited and worked with over a hundred dealerships this year so far I have continued to recall my own experiences in joining a new dealership and can’t help but wonder how many others were brought on-board the same way. From the office staff to service advisers and from parts counter guys to salespeople, how many of your dealerships team were hired and then shown ‘the ropes’ of your store by someone who may not have been qualified or even interested enough to train your new employees in the best manner possible? Ask yourself, ‘how many of my staff were actually trained on our systems by the trainers from that company, and how many have been trained by other staff that may not even know how to best use it themselves’? Scary when you stop and really think about it right?!
If I were to jump back into managing a dealership today, my first course of action would be to personally speak with all my staff and ask them who trained them on our system and how well they feel they know it. Often, we look at our dealerships DMS as a commodity only, a necessary component to running our business however our team’s efficiency with the system can be an asset or a hindrance to how our business runs. For instance, does your Business Manager have to dedicate an entire day, or more, to complete the General Ledger report for end of month? How much more could they accomplish if they were able to get it done in a couple of hours or less even? How many more RO’s could be written in the Service Department if your advisers were more proficient with the system? Here’s another angle to consider… How long is the customer wait time between accepting the terms of their car deal and them going into the contract office to sign? If your Sales Manager were a bit faster with the system and could load deals quicker is there a chance your back-end would go up a bit? Without hiring any new staff or spending any more on advertising I firmly believe that there is more business right in the dealership at this very moment and with a focus on ensuring our teams are running on all 8 cylinders with our operating system we can increase sales, profit AND customer satisfaction.
Of course, this is just my own $0,02 but… it is $0.02 that could make your dealership another $100,000, or more, next year! 😉