Keeping Customers Informed: How Realigning Customer Expectations Drives Greater Customer Satisfaction Managing customer expectations is not just about setting them properly, it’s also about realigning the customer’s expectations as the situation warrants. Think of this as a series of minor course corrections in the customer’s mind – keep you informed, the third deliverable of customer-first […]
Viewing Your Business Through Your Customers’ Eyes If you read the earlier posts in this series, you already know that customer-first companies: Make “it” easy Manage expectations Keep you informed Keep their word In the last post, we learned that becoming a customer-first company (when your definition of good enough meets or exceeds the consumer’s […]
Good Enough v. Good Enough In this post we want to explore Chick-fil-A’s secret to delivering a mind-blowingly great customer experience; though let’s first clear a couple of things up: Chick-fil-A doesn’t provide a “mind-blowingly great” customer experience… and there is no secret to what they do. The customer experience at Chick-fil-A is good. Compared […]
Customer Service 101 The Customer Is Not Always Right You’ve probably heard (more than once) that the customer is always right. They are not. Of course, they don’t have to be right. They are your boss’ boss. They pay the bills. The customer is not always right, but they are always the customer. Given that […]
Ridiculously Simple Customer Experience How to Quickly Build and Maintain a CX Juggernaut “What’s a CX juggernaut?” you ask. We think the simplest way to explain this is to point to Chick-fil-A. Chick-fil-A is a CX juggernaut. Despite being closed on Sundays and despite the constant calls for boycotts because of stances on controversial issues, […]
How to Improve the Customer Experience: Meet the Experts Ridiculously Simple Customer Experience Video Transcript: CORY: Welcome to Meet the Experts, the show that introduces you to the thought leaders that can impact your business, your brand, and your bank account. I’m Cory Mosely, your host for today’s show. Do you remember this expression, the […]
What the Auto Industry is Getting Wrong About the Carvana Experiment Many in the automotive industry are not surprised at Carvana’s downfall. (I’ve been writing about the reasons they would fail and the absurd comparisons to Amazon since 2017.) A few, like Jim Zeigler, were vocal about their doubts very early on. Many, however, are […]
Digital Retailing: Lessons from the Winners Among my regular duties over the last several years, I’ve been working with OEMs and dealers to fine tune their digital retailing efforts. Throughout this time, I’ve seen everything from utter failures to smashing successes. The failures were most often due to a lack of buy-in and (believe it […]
Is Selling a Vehicle Above MSRP “Price Gouging?” (Don’t worry, you won’t have to read this entire post to learn how I feel about calling this practice “price gouging.”) Ugh. I am truly sick of seeing post after post about some new car dealer “price gouging” because they added a $6,000 “market adjustment” to a […]
Just Don’t Screw It Up: The Key to Delivering a Great Customer Experience in 2022 I’ve written before about how Chick-fil-A’s reputation for delivering a great customer experience is not about solving issues, it’s about avoiding issues in the first place. Add in some manners, speed, and efficiency, and you’ve got Chick-fil-A’s secret recipe for […]
Attack of the Karens: Irrational Humans and the One-Star Review Movement Perhaps it’s the result of lockdowns and restrictions; maybe it’s what we should’ve expected from social media; perhaps it’s the result of everyone getting a trophy; or maybe it’s an offshoot of screen addiction, where everyone now has a shorter attention span (and less […]
The Great Car-Buying Experience: Telling is Only Half the Equation Even before the pandemic, many dealerships were beginning to focus their marketing and messaging away from low prices toward providing a better customer experience. Certainly, the lockdowns and resulting (now fading) rush to at-home test drives and (still in its infancy) online buying sped up […]
Managing Expectations: Going from Happy Customers to Raving Fans A 5-minute wait. Is a 5-minute wait short or long? Of course, the answer depends on the circumstances. Waiting five minutes for a waiter in a busy restaurant to bring the pre-dinner drinks to your party of six is nothing. Waiting five minutes for a hotel […]
Our Sales are Through the Roof, So Does Lead Response Time Really Matter? Today, most dealers are selling every piece of inventory they can get their hands as desperate consumers willingly pay more for a new or used car, truck, or SUV than they would’ve paid a couple of years ago. This supply and demand […]
Priorities for the Modern Automotive Salesperson Are you an automotive salesperson managing not just Floor Ups, but also Phone Ups, Internet Leads, and perhaps Website Chats? If so, then you likely encounter times when multiple opportunities appear simultaneously, each requiring your immediate attention. The simplest idea, the one where you prioritize the person in front […]
Free Inbound Sales Call Cheat Sheet and Assessment for Car Dealers If you’re just here to access the free assessment page for use in your dealership, you can click here: Free Car Dealer Call Monitoring Cheat Sheet. If you’re interested in what each area involves and why these are the important areas to grade on […]
The Future is Not Online Car Buying; The Future is Omnichannel Digital Retailing I dislike the term “omnichannel digital retailing” because it’s a smash-up of buzzwords meant to make vendors sound cutting edge and smart. Of course, “omnichannel digital retailing” certainly rolls off the tongue easier than saying, “using a tablet or kiosk in-store to […]
Should You Buy an Extended Warranty When Purchasing a Used Car? I know there are lots of online opinions written by “experts” telling you whether it’s a good idea to purchase an extended warranty. Add my opinion to this long list. However, understand that mine is an opinion I would give my children if they […]
Customer and Employee Safety Doesn’t Have to Equal a Bad Experience Despite the long post, I’ll start with a quick tip to businesses small and large regardless of the market conditions: Make it easy to do business with you! Oh, and to that end, your messaging should reflect this! Despite the continued, often confusing government […]
Automotive Retail Disruption: How Process Would’ve Made a Difference We all know good habits are learned in bad times, and bad habits are learned in good times. For virtually every car dealer in America, the good times started sometime around 2011, and ended suddenly in mid-March 2020. An industry disruption no one could’ve predicted. So, […]