Imagine you are blind, it's 9:00 AM and you just walked from the tarmac to witness the training of a brand new Automotive Internet Sales team. You're excited to meet the people and watch them learn as you learn. You've got your note taker all charged up and you get a phone call from the lead trainer saying he missed his flight and won't make it until the end of the day...but that he's done you a big favor and called the dealer and there on their way to pick you up. What do you do?
Quite naturally, you're terrified. Here you are in the airport, with zero agenda, thirty minutes away from the biggest moment in your career and you want your mommy. But of course you represent the number one training/consulting firm in your industry, so you gotta take this shot. You've been through the trainings, you know this stuff and you can teach it. You just have to let them get to know/like/trust and believe you. You make that your only mission...well, that's if you think like me!
I experienced this firsthand and let me tell you; it was exhilarating! Standing there with seven brand new Internet Coordinators, three more experienced ICs and an internet director with over fifteen years in the car business...it was the rock star stage spotlight all over again. We conducted preliminary introductions, then began to synergize!
Throughout the week, my goal was to show them not only how much I knew…but how much I truly cared about their success. We discussed the numbers, we talked about the minds of the prospective customers and even dove into how important their personal success is to the entire automotive industry. I had to show the entire place, that although I don’t have physical sight, I do have an amazing vision…and if they bought into it, they would reap the benefits. Wow, did they ever.
I felt the love and respect from the moment I walked in the door. From the managers, to the frontline employees, even a few customers expressed how they felt the excitement of change…an upgrade in quality. My career was completely altered by these encounters. I now have even more esteem for my company because I was privileged enough to come into contact with a dealer group that was tired of the old and ready to completely embrace the new. We…were able to introduce them to the “new” they were searching for and more. As per their testimony, it also changed the lives of the people with whom I interacted. This is what Dealer Synergy is all about, a new approach to doing business in the automotive industry.
More importantly, this experience inflated my self-confidence balloon. I already knew there was nothing I couldn’t accomplish, but the ability to transcend that belief into others was what I questioned. Honestly, I thought I lacked it. Well…I was proven absolutely positively wrong! If you're thinking there’s something you can’t do, you’re more than likely in the wrong column as well. Here’s the Bottom line…If I can jump on an airplane to a far away/strange land by myself and make out alright, then don’t tell me you can’t succeed at selling some cars over the internet!
