Sales are flat – we need more training! Turnover is up – we need more training! Grosses are down – we need more training! We just got a bad review – we need more training! Salespeople aren’t making their calls – we need more training! I can almost hear Jan Brady now: “Training, training, […]
Craigslist Posting Basics for Car Dealers I’ve shared versions of these Craigslist best practices with clients and on the various industry discussion forums over the years, yet never thought of organizing these into an article until someone asked me recently if I had these tips all in one place. Hmm, good idea… so, here they […]
As I’ve written before, your website has just two goals: Attract and Convert. Your site should be constructed in a way that is search-friendly so as to attract visitors; and then once they’re on your website, your only goal is to convert those visitors into buyers. That’s it; the only two goals. Unfortunately, while […]
You Don’t Have Sales Managers; You’ve Got Deskers! Most dealerships I work with seem to suffer from too few managers. They don’t have enough managers to control the sales floor, monitor phone calls and other activities, oversee the basic Road-to-the-Sale, ensure the CRM is being used properly or even train their own sales teams. Why […]
No gimmicks and no tricks. In this article I am going to give you the step-by-step instructions you need to start mystery shopping your dealership’s internet sales team (and your competitors’ teams) without spending a dime (or by spending very little). In the interest of full disclosure, my company completes a comprehensive mystery shop […]
There is a misconception in automotive retail that you only need one trade-in partner providing your dealership with trade leads. This is lunacy and would be the 1990’s equivalent of advertising on just one radio station. For those who weren’t around dealerships back in the 90s, limiting yourself to advertising on just one radio […]
The Solution to the Never-Ending Car Dealer Staffing Problem So much has been written about the decades-long issues of turnover and staffing in automotive retail that I continue to be amazed when I read headlines like this one from Automotive News recently: Dealership turnover squeezing profits – NADA study spotlights struggles in recruitment and retention How […]
Sorry, but Your Special’s Pages Stink… and That’s Costing You Sales! Let’s agree on a few things before we dive into some very simple steps to growing your sales with working specials pages: As the article title explained: Your specials pages are meant to drive customers, not drive them away!; and Your website has […]
As I wrote in 2015’s Self-Driving Cars: the Winners and the Losers, new car dealers will be among the “Obvious Losers” when, not if, self-driving vehicles become ubiquitous. However, I also predicted that this evolution wouldn’t likely begin impacting new car dealers before 2025. My timeline has actually contracted a little in the last […]
This may sound like strange advice since I teach dealers how to implement both an Appointment Culture and The Perfect Appointment in their dealerships… but, will you please shut up about the appointments already? You are failing to set real appointments that show and buy, precisely because you talk so much about appointments that […]
(This is an update of a 2011 article I wrote for Digital Dealer Magazine. For some reason, my byline is absent in the online version of that post.) As I’ve said (and written) for a decade, if you’re a for-profit business, your website has only two goals: Attract Visitors. Convert those Visitors into Customers. Attract. […]
One of the great things about what I do is that I get to speak to a lot of dealer groups. It’s something I really enjoy doing; but more than that, it’s something I feel needs to be done. I believe an educated dealer is a successful dealer; and there is just so much misinformation […]
I hate to break it to you, but if you run a for-profit business – like a car dealership – then your website has just two important goals: Goal #1 – Attract Visitors Goal #2 – Convert Visitors Sorry, that’s it. Attracting and converting visitors are the only real value your website provides and […]
Stop Overthinking Internet Sales: 7 Simple Strategies for Closing More Deals Today! The perception of internet sales for many dealers and traditional sales managers is that it’s still a confusing area best left to those who are more “technologically proficient.” Moreover, industry vendors, other so-called experts and even some trainers continue to profit in keeping […]
The Best Way To Overcome Today’s Price Objections Whether training sales managers for an OEM or a call center for a single-point dealer, the concern posed more than any other recently is how to overcome price objections on the phone in today’s transparent environment. Most dealers, you see, do a decent job of managing objections […]
The three-minute Be-Back process that actually works… When dealers ask me to help their teams improve their be-back appointment percentage, the first thing I say is “call them.” By that, I mean, “Pick up the damn phone and actually call a be-back for once in your ever-loving life!” I’m not trying to be a jerk; […]
I’ve often heard top process people say something like “The first step to process improvement is understanding what needs to be improved.” Knowing, they say, is half the battle. We mystery shop hundreds of dealers each year and like to think we learn something new with each shop. Certainly, the shop reports can be eye-opening […]
As my friend Jeff Kershner so eloquently Tweeted last week: “A few years ago everyone was going BONKERS over ZMOT and now going BONKERS over Micro-moments. It’s like breaking up a turd into pellets.” A few years ago everyone was going BONKERS over ZMOT and now going BONKERS over Micro-moments. It’s like breaking […]
The 5 Car Dealer Sales Call Situations (and why a BDC is best) With today’s connected customer, there really are only a few types of phone calls your team will find themselves involved with. Gone are the days of a customer phoning and saying, “I need something good on gas for under $8,000; what do […]
In a transparent, information-rich world where showrooming is commonplace, a pricing tactic used by many retailers seems strangely shortsighted. For lack of a better term, let’s call this shortsighted pricing practice “Duplicitous Pricing” or DP for short. Simply put, DP occurs when a retailer posts one price in their store while maintaining a different price […]