Sean V. Bradley Training On Automotive Sales, Phone Process, Objections & Rebuttals - Strategy
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In the city I live in, there is a run down, nasty looking house taking up some prime commercial real-estate that I'm pretty sure every Realtor in town has taken a crack at trying to sell. Seriously! Every couple of months there is a new sign out front from some poor real-estate professional who gives the property a try. I may be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure this property has been on the market for quite a few years.
Last night, my wife and I were driving past the house and I couldn't help but think that it was the appearance of the property that was causing the lack of interest. Think about it, even though the for sale sign mentions the great "Commercial Property" potential, there has been no movement on it whatsoever.
The solution I came up with is simple. Tear the sucker down. Pull out the grass and weeds and promote the empty dirt lot. Right now, the house is causing a major distraction in the minds of potential buyers because they can't see their business operating in such a disgusting place. Tear the building down and clean up the property and I think you'd be surprised at how fast this thing will sell.
So How Does This Relate To Automotive Sales?
It actually relates well to any form of sales, but since this is an automotive and RV community, let's talk vehicle sales. You see, there are a couple of fundamentals about appearance that every sales person looking to improve their game should be mindful of. Let's take a few minutes to break a couple of them down.
Dress For Success
I'm sure you've heard this one before right? According to an article on usatoday.com; Gladys Edmunds shares an experience she had at a major mortgage firm where everyone from the receptionist to the executives had too casual of an appearance.
If you're interested in boosting your sales, take some time to consider whether or not your appearance at work is too casual and what effect it has on your demeanor. I'm not suggesting that you need to wear an expensive three piece suit to work (unless that's you're thing), but what I will say is that dressing for success has a positive impact on how you conduct yourself and how others deal with you. I'd encourage you to test it out and see if you notice any positive impact on sales and personal productivity.
We talk about this all the time. Vehicles are often the second largest investment that people will make in their life, so think about what kind of experience you are offering if your appearance is too casual. What kind of experience and professional would you want to deal with if you were expected to fork out thousands of your hard earned dollars?
Eliminate Distractions
The whole idea here is to eliminate anything and everything that will shift the focus of your customer away from the vehicle. I'm not going to waste any time beating around the bush, so I will just come out and say it. Do you stink? Let's face it, we've all been in a situation where we've had to talk to someone that smells foul. It's pretty awful isn't it?
I was in a dealership not too long ago and had a conversation with one of the sales consultants who was A.) Wearing a Hawaiian T-shirt and B.) Had the worst body odor I've come across in a long time. Oh, where's your compassion Mike?!? This article is my compassion. If you or anyone you know has an issue with smelling like a dumpster fire, you pass along this article for them to read.
Think about it though, how can your customer possibly stay focuses on your presentation if throughout the entire visit, they are trying to discreetly hold their noses, hold their breath or fan the air around their face? They're distracted and don't want to be around you anymore.
On the flip side, and in defense of smelly people everywhere; this can also be said of sales people who take a shower in cologne or perfume.
Think about the house again for a second. The reason I'm sure that property hasn't sold is because nobody can envision what their building will look like there because every time they do, they see this nasty looking house that get's in their way.
I think you get where I'm going with this - let's just say if you create distractions for your customers, they aren't able to fully focus on what you are presenting.
Conclusion
Your appearance definitely has an impact on your sales. Of course there are a variety of other things that may impact sales performance, but how you present yourself is the easiest to change because you can do it as early as your next shift. Give it a try and see what happens.
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Question: Have you had an experience where appearance (either yours or someone else's) has impacted you positively or negatively? Share your experience in the comments below!
Is It Time To Reevaluate Your Opinion About TrueCar?
I have seen many issues polarize dealers, and at times energize them during my 30 years in the car business. Very few issues have rallied so many people in the auto industry to cry out than the advent of TrueCar’s advertising campaign in the Fall of 2011. In fact, since the creation of the two automotive professional networks I am involved with, AutomotiveDigitalMarketing.com and DealerELITE.net, there has been no other issue that has attracted even a tenth of the visitors to these sites, or engagement in the form of comments and subsequent posts… From October 2011 through January 2012 the most popular subject matter on many online sites catering to people working in the car business was the thorough vilifying of TrueCar.
Meanwhile, the outcry from dealers reached a crescendo of volume that was enough to get many State Dealer Associations and a handful of state regulators to “investigate” TrueCar for potential violation of everything from brokering without a license, to operating out of compliance with advertising regulations.
Amazingly enough, despite all the name calling and personal bashing that executives at TrueCar received, not a single “cease and desist” letter was sent, or lawsuit was filed by TrueCar against those of us who pushed our criticism of TrueCar beyond the boundaries of civilized and professional discussion or debate. In hindsight, I am very surprised that TrueCar took such a beating without resorting to legal measures against some of the worst name callers and accusers, including yours truly!
After receiving several phone calls and speaking with Scott Painter in December 2011 I put off visiting TrueCar’s headquarters at their invitation until just a few weeks ago. My first encounter with TrueCar executives on a face to face basis was in March 2012, at the Automotive Leadership Roundtable in Miami, FL. Bernie Brenner from TrueCar’s board came over to my table and asked me if I would sit with the TrueCar team during the lunch session and discuss changes they were making to their business model. Curiosity piqued, I accepted. Looking back on that lunch, I gave the TrueCar executive team a fairly strong rebuttal… I was polite, but explained my objections to their business model as inserting an unnecessary dealer expense. Mike Timmons, Bernie Brenner and a couple other TrueCar executives were polite, rational in their explanations and determined to convince me that they had seen many of the problems with their pricing models and were making changes so that TrueCar would make sense for dealers as a means of acquiring incremental business at about half of what the NADA average cost of advertising is Per Vehicle Retailed (PVR). At the time I remained resolute in my stated opinion that TrueCar was a bad deal for car dealers. However, I will admit that maintaining that opinion in the light of new information, changes TrueCar was making and the logic around their affinity model was already starting to erode the certainty I had in my position on TrueCar… Not that I was admitting any of that at the time!
The next time I saw any TrueCar executives was at Digital Dealer 12 in Orlando last April… Bernie Brenner approached me and asked me to bring any dealers who were avid TrueCar haters to him so he could meet them and listen to their grievances. Seemed like an odd request, but he was sincere and the entire TrueCar team was looking for people with negative perceptions of their company so they could show them all the aspects of their business model that had been changed, so that with new information these dealers might reevaluate their perception of the benefits of doing business with TrueCar.
What I have since learned is that from the beginning of January through May of 2012, TrueCar experienced a large number of dealers cancelling their TrueCar agreements and dropping out of the TrueCar program. This, combined with various state legislative issues is what prompted TrueCar to make so many dramatic changes to the way they do business. They simply had to change in order to move forward. Something that more people in the car business ought to consider!
When I accepted TrueCar’s invitation to visit their headquarters in Santa Monica, CA the timing was perfect… I arrived the day before a “all hands on deck” meeting where every TrueCar employee who works out of the headquarters was traveling in to attend. During my visit and tour I was able to spend more than an hour of quality time in detailed conversation with Scott Painter. Mike Timmons arrived a couple hours after I did and took me on a tour to meet various team leaders and department heads in the two building that TrueCar operates out of. I met many people and watched a team of TrueCar employees working directly with dealers all over the country, helping them to put deals together and sell cars. The people I met were intelligent, well spoken and knew what their part of the TrueCar mission was, and how it tied into selling cars. What I found was hardly a bastion of evil, nor were there any indicators that they were trying to eliminate car dealers or harm anyone working in a dealership. Like many companies I have visited, such as Edmunds, Kelley Blue Book, Dealix, AutoUSA, Cobalt, Reynolds, ADP and others, what I found at TrueCar was over 250 people who are educated and intelligent going about their specific duties and focused on generating more car sales for their participating dealers.
So, what about all these so called “changes” that TrueCar has made since the end of 2011? Let’s take a look at ten of them, why TrueCar made the changes and their intended impact.
10 Key TrueCar Changes – January to April 2012
In late 2011, TrueCar started receiving significant feedback – much of it critical – from the automotive retailing industry including dealers, dealer associations, manufacturers and industry consultants. In the first half of 2012, TrueCar made substantial changes to address industry concerns. By no means is TrueCar finished with implementing changes and revisions, but they do feel they have taken the necessary actions to ensure TrueCar is acting as a key auto industry partner. Listed below are 10 key recent changes:
1. Changed Website Experience Nationwide and Billing Model in Certain States to Address Regulatory Compliance Concerns
What TrueCar Heard: Through trade publications, dealer association communications and social media sites, there was a lot of attention on whether TrueCar’s novel business model complied with the existing regulatory framework in certain states.
What TrueCar Did: Completely overhauled its website experience to address state-specific concerns related to advertising regulations. Among other changes, dealers no longer communicate price offers relative to invoice through the TrueCar website experience. Additionally, “bait and switch” concerns have been addressed through website features expressly clarifying that TrueCar users who use our website to explore the new car market are configuring “virtual vehicles” – not vehicles that are actually in inventory at our participating dealers. TrueCar has also implemented a subscription-based billing model in certain states. 30 of the 50 states continue with TrueCar’s pay for performance model, while 19 other states have variations designed to comply with that state’s laws. Lousiana remains a state not served by TrueCar.
2. Overhauled Display of Information on TrueCar Price Curves and Dealer Portal to Address Dealer Concerns
What TrueCar Heard: Though not our intent, TrueCar heard loud and clear from dealers that the TrueCar price curves and Dealer Portal did not provide the most contextualized, relevant, and informative display of information to assist consumers and dealers.
What TrueCar Did: TrueCar’s continued success depends on providing services that result in a better car buying experience for dealers and consumers. TrueCar changed the TrueCar price curves in January to provide more robust, comprehensive data that allows consumers to understand what constitutes a “fair” price in the current market. They also switched from providing “network-pricing” information in the Dealer Portal (which focused on the pricing of other TrueCar dealers) to providing “market-based” pricing information driven by recent transactions in the dealer’s local market area (not just transactions by TrueCar dealers).
3. Reduced DMS Data Received From Dealers
What We Heard: A small number of industry consultants used social media sites to spread misinformation that participating dealers’ sales matching data is used to create the TrueCar price curves and/or that TrueCar actively markets to customers found in the dealers’ DMS. To be clear, these are both myths.
What TrueCar Did: TrueCar only requires dealers to provide customer contact information (name, address, phone, email for buyer and co-buyer) and basic vehicle information (VIN, make/model/trim, year, new/used, stock number, sale date) in order to perform the sales matching, billing (in states with performance-based billing models), dealer scoring and analytics and reporting aspects of their business. TrueCar does not directly access dealer DMS systems and we never have. All data extraction and compilation is handled by respected third-party vendors, Digital Motorworks (DMi) and Netlink. All dealers also have the option to “push” their sales matching data via FTP to TrueCar’s third-party vendors; the data received by TrueCar is the same whether the dealer chooses automated or manual sales data reporting. To address concerns that TrueCar was receiving extraneous data from its third-party vendors, TrueCar worked with both Digital Motorworks and Netlink in February to remove all unused fields from the data feeds sent to TrueCar, reducing the fields to just those listed above.
4. Rolled Out More “Dealer-Friendly” Dealer Agreement, Including Indemnification
What TrueCar Heard: Some dealers told TrueCar that the dealer agreement needed to be more fair.
What TrueCar Did: In February, they rolled out a new dealer agreement, the key aspects of which include: (i) dealers can cancel at any time for any or no reason; (ii) more clarity and control on how dealers provide sales reporting data to TrueCar; (iii) confirmation that the dealers’ sales reporting data is NOT used to create TrueCar price curves; and (iv) confirmation that dealers’ sales reporting data is NOT used to send marketing-related communications to customers. In April, we added a limited indemnification provision to the new dealer agreement. The decision to indemnify dealers is another manifestation of TrueCar’s commitment to their dealer partners and underscores that they are fully invested in standing behind the valuable services that TrueCar provides.
5. Launched TrueCar National Dealer Council
What TrueCar Heard: Many dealers, dealer associations and manufacturers expressed concern that TrueCar was making major product, process and policy changes without incorporating feedback from dealers.
What TrueCar Did: In April, 2012 TrueCar launched a National Dealer Council with 20 Members representing 24 states, 35 unique makes and 281 franchises. The purpose of the Council is to ensure TrueCar is actively listening to dealers, and the Council is chaired by Gary Marcotte (former SVP Marketing & Strategy at AutoNation). The inaugural full-day Council meeting in April was excellent, with great feedback from the Council Members. Going forward, the Council will meet periodically with TrueCar senior executives to provide guidance on how TrueCar can improve the services it provides to dealers.
6. Initiated Dealer Associations Outreach
What TrueCar Learned: TrueCar had not historically communicated with state and large metro dealer associations and paid a price for not directly engaging this important constituency.
What TrueCar Did: In March, TrueCar hired Pat Watson, VP of Industry Relations, to directly communicate and work collaboratively with dealer associations on how to help our mutual partners – dealers. Pat is the former CEO of the South Carolina Automobile Dealers Association, where he worked for 38 years.
7. Started Participating In Key Industry Conferences
What TrueCar Learned: Prior to 2012, TrueCar did not have an active presence at key industry conferences, which was perceived by some as an indication that TrueCar did not care to engage directly with the industry.
What TrueCar Did: In 2012, TrueCar has sponsored and actively participated at key industry conferences, including Automotive Leadership Roundtable in March and Digital Dealer 12 in April, and the upcoming AutoCon 2012 in September. TrueCar will continue to have an active presence at future conferences, including Digital Dealer 13, Driving Sales, J.D. Power Automotive Internet Roundtable, various 20 Groups, trade associations and dealer group events.
8. Improved TrueCar’s Social Media Response and Presence
What TrueCar Learned: Social media can be a powerful medium for individuals in the automotive retail industry to share opinions and shape stories.
What TrueCar Did: Mike Timmons, EVP of TrueCar and an auto retailing veteran (VP Operations AutoNation; independent auto dealer; new car sales and management) has taken ownership of monitoring and responding as appropriate to social media related to TrueCar and industry-related issues. Additionally, Mike has directly reached out to key TrueCar detractors to understand and address their concerns, as well as to correct any misinformation, and he will continue to do so. In the future, TrueCar will be taking a more proactive approach to leverage social media to showcase our product and company changes.
9. Increased Communication With Manufacturers
Before: Previously, TrueCar’s communication with manufacturers was sporadic and reactionary, sometimes leading to significant misconceptions.
What TrueCar Did: In the past four months, Larry Dominique, EVP Data Solutions, with over 27 years of OEM experience (former VP Advanced and Product Planning and Strategy, Nissan, plus stints at GM and Chrysler), has met with key decision makers from 20 manufacturers to listen to their concerns and inform them as to what TrueCar is all about. Going forward, TrueCar will continue to directly engage with manufacturers to discuss ways that TrueCar can improve the services it provides to dealers.
10. Added More Dealer Support
What TrueCar Heard: Dealers have told us they want more face time and support from TrueCar dealer-facing personnel.
What TrueCar Did: In the first four months of 2012, they added 13 new employees to the TrueCar Dealer Development Team, including Ken Potter (VP Dealer Development; former VP & GM of Internet Brands / CarsDirect; former GM of two dealerships), Amir Rizkalla (Director Account Management; formerly of Fisker Automotive and Toyota), two Area Sales Managers and four Account Managers. TrueCar is currently looking to hire 9 additional dealer-facing employees in the next 60 days, including six more Area Sales Managers (Philadelphia, Charlotte, Atlanta, Seattle, Des Moines, and St. Louis) as well as two more Account Managers, to ensure that we continue to provide dealers with the support they want and need.
After traveling to TrueCar headquarters on a Monday in July and then visiting Southern California dealers, I returned home to Phoenix on Tuesday evening. Later that week I had an appointment with the owners and management team at Courtesy Chevrolet in Phoenix. This is the same Courtesy Chevrolet that I worked at from 2005 to 2007, and I have a close bond with the leadership team there… During my visit, which was to convince them to attend AutoCon 2012, I mentioned visiting TrueCar headquarters earlier in the week. The response I received from the owner and several managers was “we really like the TrueCar program, they have gotten a lot better about invoicing us and the business we get from them seems to be purely incremental… deals we would not otherwise have made.” These statements and the discussions I had with the team at Courtesy, as well as all the information I had witnessed firsthand during my meetings at TrueCar, and from the conversations I had with at least a dozen TrueCar employees lead me to a conclusion I feel very certain about. It would be foolish for any dealer to ignore the changes that TrueCar has made and not reevaluate whether to do business with TrueCar based on the new information available and the changes TrueCar has made to the way they do business.
Researched and written by Ralph Paglia
http://www.automotiveinternetsales.com
Automotive Dealer Principals & General Managers BEWARE of Internet Sales or BDC Department!
"automotive sales" "internet sales" bdc "phone sales" "call center" "dealership department" "dealer principal" "general manager" gm manager management beware "be careful" "car sales" "auto sales" prospects leads opportunities ups
http://www.alanvinesautomotive.com
A Tennessee Chrysler, Dodge & Jeep Dealership is Looking To Hit Their OEM Bonus ($50,000 Retro CASH) - Can They Do It? Of Course They Can!
Meanwhile, nearly every business is represented on Facebook, including the automotive industry which has also parked their cars on Facebook. But once convinced, many people build loyalty with a car brand, sometimes for a lifetime. Cars are emotion and social media is also emotion-driven. Car manufacturers are only too well aware of the emotional appeal and cleverly pitch their marketing at the niche markets they know will be interested in their products. Social media offers many possibilities for interactive communications with fans, loyalists and potential customers. Cars on Facebook seem to be a perfect fit and we try to investigate this.
Cars On Facebook – The Brands In Our Comparison Group
As usual, we need to limit the amount of pages we take into a comparison. We use the number of Facebook fans to form a comparison group in this case. We know that this way of selecting the pages does not satisfy all needs, but we think it is a good starting point for a discussion.
| Name | Logo | Fans |
| BMW |  |
10,58m |
| Ferrari |  |
8,88m |
| Mercedes-Benz |  |
7,80m |
| Audi USA | 5,48m | |
| Porsche |  |
4,31m |
| Ford Mustang |  |
4,22m |
| Lamborghini |  |
3,66m |
| MINI |  |
3,07m |
| Chevy Camaro |  |
2,93m |
| Jeep |  |
2,73m |
You can see a mix of big brands such as Audi, Mercedes-Benz and BMW, next to dream car manufacturers such as Ferrari and Lamborghini, in addition to target group-specific popular brands such as Jeep and MINI.
Ford and Chevrolet are even represented by the, of course historically and emotionally models Camaro and Mustang.
But of course fan count is just the beginning and not the right metric to make statements about the success. For more insights we need to check the engagement of the fan base.
People Talking About Cars On Facebook
The People Talking About This – Rate displays the absolute number of people talking about this divided by the number of fans. In the following chart we chose a data range from 1/1/12 till today to create a better and more meaningful overview and exclude some kind of dilutions through special weekly campaign peaks.
Apparently Lamborghini was talking point number one for cars on Facebook for the first quarter of this year. The highest peak for the supercar manufacturer was on the 9th of February with a PTAT – Rate of 17.09%. During the year change the iconic American car, the Ford Mustang, was on everyone’s lips. Lately, it seems to be Audi USA, that fans are talking about.
In this post introduction, we wrote about the interactive communication between brands and fans, it’s now time to measure these interactions.
Interaction Rate Of The Top Car Manufacturers
The following chart shows the average number of interactions (likes, comments and shares) per own post normalized per fan for a specific time interval. Since a daily summary of the intercation rate is somewhat cluttered, we measured the rate in a monthly interval since the beginning of the year 2012. But for the daily time interval, we can at least constitute the highest interaction – rate peak for Audi USA on the 30th of June. So, in order to protect your eyes, here is the monthly evaluation:
Not surprising, we can see in this chart similar results as in the PTAT-Rate chart before. Lamborghini, Ford Mustang and Audi USA are again on the podium. So these three brands have a relative high amount of active fans, one of the most important factors for effective Facebook marketing.
But what type of content is catching the fans interest?
The Interaction Rate By Post Type
Cars on Facebook – an image driven business. Like already mentioned, photos and videos are attracting the most likes, shares and comments. Once again Lamborghini plays the dream car card and leads in case of most photo interactions. Ford Mustang beats Mercedes-Benz for video content. A rarity is certainly the music content of Mercedes-Benz and Ferrari.
Naturally you need to check the interaction rate by post type chart in connection with the post type distribution of the car brands on Facebook.
Post Type Distribution Of The Car Brands
In this chart you can clearly see the content type preferences of the brands. While photos are the leading source for Audi USA – Porsche and Mercedes-Benz have the highest amount of video content, Ferrari prefers the posting of links and Chevy Camaro likes to use status updates to talk with the fans.
Please note: You can click on every chart and then hover over the data to check any of the numbers.
Facebook Key Metrics For The Automotive Industry
Now to the hard facts for cars on Facebook – the key metrics from 1/1/2012 up to today:
In this table you can easily see the leader in every relevant Facebook metric. Therefore BMW gains the largest fan growth and also the highest number of absolute people talking about since the beginning of this year. Ferrari published so far 594 own posts, a really impressive number and therefore got the most likes and comments. But the most shares were grabbed by Mercedes-Benz. The maximum number of user posts was generated on the Facebook page of Jeep. At least, the highest average interaction rate was created by Lamborghini. And this brand with the famous raging bull logo, which belongs to Audi since 1998, also seems to pull the the emotions of the most Facebook users.
Hopefully, our analysis gave you a deeper look into the world of cars on Facebook and what marketing strategies the automotive industry uses to attract the attention of potential customers.
Are you missing a relevant metric or do you have a question? Just drop us a line in the comments.
Source - http://blog.allfacebookstats.com/2012/07/cars-on-facebook-an-analysis/
Master Sales Consultant Robert Wiesman Shares Some of His Tradecraft Secrets (Has MORE Online Visibility Than Most Dealerships)
I know what you're thinking – who does this guy think he is? How does he know what my “thing” is. Good – I have your attention.
I find it absolutely fascinating just how many dealerships I've walked into over the past couple of months and found, you ready for this? Silence. No customers on the lot, sales people hanging out around reception, flirting, cracking jokes, texting and the list goes on. Everything opposite of what should be happening is happening.
I spent a few minutes with a client at a major franchise dealership just last week talking about this exact topic. He is at his whits end with how things are looking at his dealership but just doesn't know how to turn things around and foster a productive change at his store.
Are you, or someone you know feeling the same way? Let's bring things back to basics for a few minutes and look at a couple of ways to turn things around. Success is hanging in the balance.
Do You Dream?
Sounds cheesy I know. One of my kids favorite movies is Disney's “Tangled”. The story of Rapunzel who has been locked up in a tower her whole life and has a dream to check out the annual lantern festival on her 18th birthday. Haven't seen it yet? Sorry for the spoiler.
There's one scene in the movie where in Disney fashion, the characters break out into song about Having a dream. The essence of it is that each character had a dream at one point and for whatever reason it was taken from them. Now, back to you and I.
Do you have a dreams? Have they been taken from you due to the economy, dream stealers or a plethora of other excuses? Do you still know what you want for your dealership?
If you'd like to create positive, productive and profitable changes within your business, here are the first two steps.
Define (or re-define) your dream
Gain a burning desire for its achievement.
Moving on...
Willingness to Learn / Willingness to Take Action
Have you ever read any self-help “be successful” types of articles? They all seem to offer the “fail proof” way to achieve greater success. They always seems to start with putting the pen to paper and writing down goals. Goals are great, don't get me wrong. I just don't agree that they are a sustainable driving force to helping you accomplish the success you are seeking.
Don't believe me? How many people do you know that actually stick to their New Year resolutions? If setting goals gave us enough sustainable power to act, there would be no more New Year Resolutions – the world would be a better place filled with extremely thin, successful, wealthy, patient, traveling, money-saving people.
Let me submit that before putting pen to paper, one must determine the level of their willingness to learn and willingness to take action. Think about this for a second. You've clearly defined your dream and now have a burning desire. If your dream is to have a more successful dealership by selling more vehicles, take a moment to rate your willingness to learn and willingness to take action in order to make that dream happen.
If I asked you to give yourself a “Willingness” score, what would it be?
Take a minute, pull out a piece of paper and give yourself a “willingness to learn” score between 1 and 10 (1 being none, and 10 being high). What did you come up with? Now do the same for your “willingness to take action”. What? Two 10's? Really? That's amazing! Now where would your score go if I told you the only way to make this happen is to abstain from drinking coffee for one full month? Why the sudden decrease?
Here's why goal-setting isn't the first step to success. All of us have goals, most of us haven't really determined whether or not we have the willingness to make them happen. Often the only thing that stands in the way of achieving dreams is our willingness to learn new ways of doing things and our willingness to take necessary action. Are you willing to do whatever it takes to make your dreams a reality or would you prefer to just keep going as you are?
Conclusion:
Stop with the shenanigans! Continuing to do business the same way with no willingness to learn or take action will just give you more of the same depressing results. If you aren't picking up what I'm putting down right now, then selling cars and being profitable just isn't your thing.
Now - Stop blaming the economy and other lame excuses for your lack of success. Achieving your definition of success is in your capable hands. Define your dream, determine your level of willingness, and enjoy the results. You deserve it.
Michael Cirillo is the Executive VP at AutoVelocity™ and works with dealerships to help them achieve greater success through their marketing efforts.
778-475-5412
For those of you who know a little bit about me, you know that I worked in the print media and advertising industry for nearly a decade and grew up around the industry my entire life. I want to spend a couple of minutes discussing some concepts that I am more than confident will help your dealership in attracting new and returning customers so that you can start seeing more (and better) results for your dealership immediately. That's right - I just said "IMMEDIATELY".
A little bit of background first:
Over the years, you've probably noticed that the ads you see in the newspaper or in magazines haven't really changed much. They consist of a bunch of pictures of vehicles and the prices associated with those vehicles; Starbursts with low finance rates, or bold letters promoting the BIGGEST SALE EVENT OF THE YEAR! Everything always seems to revolve around price.
There's no doubt that price is an important topic, but maybe not as important as you might think - especially if your aiming to get a fresh influx of new customers walking onto your lot.
To demonstrate, let me encourage you to drive down any auto mile wherever you are, and take a look at the signage that dealers are placing near the roadway with hopes that it will capture new business. What do you see?
Employee Pricing Event
Red Tag Sale
Really Big Sale
Year End Clearance
Inventory Blowout - unbeatable pricing!
Everything revolves around price!
Not even in the market!
Have you ever considered what percentage of people in your area are even in the market to purchase a vehicle? Think about it. What good is busting your chops over showing people how low your finance rates are, or how low your prices are when majority of people aren't even in the market to buy? Don't believe me? Consider this example.
Have you ever found yourself thumbing through a consumer electronics flyer from the weekly paper? If you're like me, you do it all the time. I'm sort of a gadget geek. But what happens when you get to the appliance section of the flyer? You slam the thing shut or throw it away? Why do you think that is?
Vehicles are much like appliances. When you have appliances that are working, purchasing new ones are the last thing on the totem pole of priorities aren't they? So it is with vehicles. When people have a vehicle that is working, they aren't really in the market. All the best pricing and finance rates in the world won't do a hill of beans for your efforts in attracting new business.
Plenty of Fish in the Sea...Just Not Where You're Looking
Have you ever heard that saying before? It's absolutely true. There are plenty of fish in the sea. The problem is that by focusing primarily on price, you and all of your competitors are fighting over a very small portion of in-market consumers. Have you ever wondered why your print ads aren't getting you the results you want? Have you considered why your website isn't producing the leads that you want it to?
When you really take a look at it, Dealers that enter the arena prepared to battle over price may not realize that they are fighting over around 2-5% of the entire population. That's really the percentage of people that are in the market to buy a vehicle today. So much effort for so little potential! It's kind of depressing isn't it?
Let's use the odds in your favor. In order to start seeing immediate (measurable and duplicate-able) results for your marketing efforts, you may be required to change the way you think a little, and perhaps; change some of your current process to meet consumer expectation. All in the name of profitability.
What Drives Consumers to Buy?
If only 2-5% of consumers are in the market to purchase a vehicle today, have you considered how you could tap into the other 95-98% of the market that perhaps would be willing to purchase a vehicle but may not necessarily be in the smaller percentage that cares about price?
It's absolutely vital for every dealer that wants to start selling more vehicles, products and services to understand what drives consumer purchase decisions in order to offer something really unique and actually tap into a never ending pool of customers. Let's take a look at a couple of examples of what drive consumers to purchase.
1. Emotional needs / wants: We all have them and because of that,advertising how your products and services can fill an emotional need will actually help you penetrate a larger market and get your business in front of more interested people.
I'm a perfect example of this. A couple of years ago, when my wife and I received news that she was expecting our second son, one of the first things we discussed is how our small sedan would no longer fill our transportation needs (Emotional need #1 - necessity). Could you imagine two car seats, potentially two strollers not to mention half the house that you have to pack up when you have kids, all crammed into the back of a small sedan? We went from not being in the market to being in the market in a matter of days.
The more we thought about what we would need, other issues came up. Safety (emotional need #2), Comfort (emotional need #3), Room (emotional need #3), Vehicle features (emotional need #4) and so on. Price wasn't even on our mind yet because we were too busy formulating our list of needs.
Then came the emotional wants. Status (emotional want #1), luxury (emotional want #2), add-ons (emotional want #3)...you get the picture.
You see, not everyone is in the market to purchase another vehicle. Everyone however, is in the market of fulfilling their emotional needs and wants. While all of your competitors are engaged in the price battle over a small percentage of the market, you could be addressing the demand of a larger market and funneling those consumers into your dealership. You will never run into a short supply by focusing your energy on the things that everyone wants fulfilled – Their emotional needs.
When you have your approach set up correctly, you've strategically provided the right information and uncovered the emotions of your customers, the results will be like magic.
2. Reciprocity: Have you ever heard of the law of reciprocity? This is something that successful marketers have been using for decades and let me tell you, it works extremely well! Most cultures have this law hard-wired into the back of their minds. To simply define it, let me sum it up as I give you something and as a result, you give something in return.
Often I find dealers practicing this law, but in reverse. Customers often have to make a purchase before they can get the value added offer, when really it should be flipped the other way around. Give something of value to the customer first, build the relationship and they will reciprocate by making a purchase from you.
Conclusion:
Whether you want to believe it or not, it doesn't really matter. The definition of insanity is doing the same things over and over again and expecting a different result. If you truly want to increase the profitability of your dealership, stop focusing so much energy on pricing. Remove yourself from that never-ending uphill battle and re-target your efforts into fulfilling the emotional needs/wants of consumers. Provide value by offering the right information first and let the law of reciprocity take you all the way to the sale.
Your success starts here.
Google has entered the New Car Lead business with the recent unveiling and introduction of the Google Commercial Unit For Cars (CUFC). There is very little information regarding this new lead program for dealers, but here's what we know:
- Essentially, Google will pull the new inventories of dealerships (those participating in the program) in the area of the consumer and display the search results
- However, these unique search results with dealerships' inventory will only pop up when the consumer types in what Google calls "low funnel" search terms.
- Here are an example of a few "low funnel" search terms: "New Honda Civic", "Toyota prices," etc..
- This new program is still in BETA mode, and therefore, dealerships will have to pay per lead. It is unclear/not known whether or not this will change once in the future.
- Worth noting: Some states deem it illegal to pay per lead, so we shall see how it plays out.
What do you think of Google's New Car Lead Program?
TrueCar, Yahoo end exclusive partnership
TrueCar Inc., an online car-shopping service, has ended after just six months its exclusive relationship with search engine Yahoo to send auto shoppers to auto dealerships.
Yahoo Autos plans to keep TrueCar and sign other sales-lead generators, Yahoo confirmed in a statement.
Under TrueCar's original deal with Yahoo, TrueCar agreed to pay Yahoo a huge sum -- $50 million per year for three years -- to be Yahoo's exclusive auto-shopping partner. Shoppers on Yahoo Autos were referred automatically to participating TrueCar dealerships.
Under the revised deal, TrueCar's payments to Yahoo will be triggered when TrueCar receives a minimum number of leads and a minimum number of high-quality leads from Yahoo Autos, according to a TrueCar source. Terms of those minimums were not disclosed.
In a statement, TrueCar said: "The new relationship has been forged as a result of a better understanding of both parties' capabilities and aligns economics and services around a vision of mutual success."
The original deal, signed late last year, said Yahoo would deliver 10 million auto shoppers to TrueCar each month. It's not clear if Yahoo delivered that total, and statements from both companies did not address the issue. The exclusive partnership began Jan. 1.
Under the new arrangement, TrueCar will appear as a button that can be clicked on Yahoo Autos. Yahoo says it is opening Yahoo Autos to "multiple dealers and third parties."
Today, though, TrueCar was still displayed prominently on Yahoo with the phrase "Y! Autos in partnership with TrueCar."
Calls to Yahoo for more information on how shoppers will navigate the revised site were not returned.
Under the revised deal signed June 29, Yahoo Autos can sign other lead generators immediately, a TrueCar source said.
Read more: http://www.autonews.com/article/20120705/RETAIL01/120709928#ixzz1zsCbUUL2
Graphic Courtesy of http://www.automotivedigitalmarketing.com
DETROIT (Reuters) -- The deteriorating European markets have led auto industry executives to worry about possible contagion spreading across the Atlantic, but June new-car sales in the United States are expected to hit a five-year peak for that particular month.
Auto sales, which offer an early snapshot of consumer demand, have been one of the bright spots in the U.S. economy for several months until May results came in short of expectations and raised concerns about the sector's recovery.
Analysts and industry officials, however, said there are just too many old cars that need to be replaced, which will drive consumers into dealers' showrooms.
The average age of cars on the road is an all-time-high 11 years.
"The most interesting thing is the ongoing battle between pent-up demand and concern over financial issues," said Karl Brauer, chief executive of research firm Total Car Score. "There is, by no means, clear sailing ahead on the financial issues, but people are getting really tired of driving their old cars."
Economists polled by Thomson Reuters see the annual selling rate for new cars in the U.S. market in June finishing at 13.9 million vehicles.
That would mark the second month in a row below the 14 million rate, but would exceed last month's 13.7 million.
Opinions vary, however, as TrueCar.com expects a sales rate of 13.6 million, while General Motors CEO Dan Akerson said on Thursday the market was "surprisingly strong" and he saw it finishing between 14 million and 14.2 million.
J.D. Power and LMC Automotive, and Edmunds.com see sales rising 20 percent from last year to about 1.27 million new cars and trucks, while TrueCar sees an increase of 18 percent.
That would be the highest level since 1.46 million were sold in 2007, just before the U.S. economy slipped into a recession that forced GM and Chrysler into bankruptcy.
Some of the projected increase will be due to a recovery by Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. from the impact of last year's earthquake in Japan that hurt U.S. supplies.
Major automakers including GM, Ford Motor Co. and Toyota will report June U.S. new-car sales on Tuesday.
Second-half worries
The downward spiral of the European market has raised concerns, however.
"I'm a little bit worried about the second half because we see softness in Europe," Akerson said Thursday at an event in Chicago. However, his positive forecast for June U.S. sales was based on the pent-up demand in the market.
Ford echoed Akerson's concerns on Thursday when it warned that second-quarter losses from operations outside North America could triple the $190 million first-quarter loss, hurt mainly by weakness in Europe.
The No. 2 U.S. automaker still sees an overall profit, however, as North America remains strong.
"The good news is we still have growth in the economy. It is moderate," Ford North American chief Mark Fields said earlier in the week. "Some of the economic figures in the last six weeks are a little bit contradictory.
The housing starts and permits actually were up. At the same time, we've seen consumer confidence come off its high earlier this year."
Ford expects a June sales pace in the high 13 million-vehicle range, he said.
"The (annual sales rate) does appear to be slowing down from the 14.6 million level in the first quarter, which we attribute to some demand pull forward into the first quarter with the warm winter and an increasingly cautious consumer given some signs of a slowing U.S. economy," RBC Capital Markets analyst Joseph Spak said in a research note.
Spak expects a June sales rate of 13.9 million vehicles, but said lower gasoline prices, easier access to credit and newly launched cars will bolster second-half demand.
He added there are more downside risks to his industry estimate at this time.
Analysts expect sales in June to decline from May, but Kelley Blue Book said such a decrease is what normally occurs this time of year.
Since 2007, the daily selling rate has dropped between 3 percent and 10 percent from May to June, putting the company's projected 8 percent decline within that trend.
Despite the expected second straight month below a 14 million sales rate, analysts are not backing off full-year U.S. sales projections yet.
"Despite the relative slowdown in the last few weeks, the first-half sales results this year indicate a relatively healthy car industry; perhaps the brightest spot in an otherwise struggling U.S. economy," said TrueCar analyst Jesse Toprak. "We expect second-half of 2012 to average around 14.5 million units."
J.D. Power and LMC still expect 2012 sales of 14.5 million new cars and trucks.
"We're seeing healthy retail sales growth as we head into the summer selling season and as automakers change over to the 2013 model-year vehicles," said J.D. Power analyst John Humphrey. "All indicators point toward an industry that continues to get healthy."
Source: http://www.autonews.com/article/20120630/RETAIL01/120629879#ixzz1zNUwocKk
Google Enters New Car Lead Generation Business
Another prediction that I wrote about has come true. Change is in the air again at Google. Paid Search just took a big step forward or backwards, depending on how you think. It's called "Google Cars"
In November 2011, I wrote about a product called "Google Advisor" which will change the landscape of paid search marketing for new car sales. It has taken a very long time for this product to get off the ground. This type of product has been around in the mortgage lead generation business for years.
Well the Google Advisor product for automotive leads is here and it has a name: Google Cars.
I finally was able to see the product live today and so can you. Just change your browser location to Zip Code 94301 and conduct a search on Google with this phrase:
Palo Alto Toyota
What you will see might shock you, as Google has clearly entered into the new car lead generation business. I created a few screen shots to explain how the model works, and I am sure this will be evolving. I would love to get your opinion on this strategy and if you would be interested in testing this new service.
San Francisco Bay Beta Test of Google Cars
Currently, this product is only available in the San Francisco Bay area. We will find out when this will open up to other markets. This is only for new cars and it requires a dealer to provide and inventory feed of their new cars.
Google Cars Inventory Model Results Page
When you Click on the first photo of the Toyota Camry in the red box above, you will be shown this page
Google Cars Pricing Info
If you click on the "Google Price Info" link, you might get a chill down your spine, like TrueCar did for car dealers.
The Google Price popup box is shown on the right. If you click on the "Learn More" link, you can read about how these prices are determined.
The "regional price paid" data according to Google comes from data shared by dealers to the DMV in their state. Here is what Google says:
Regional price paid tells you how much the vehicle you want tends to sell for in your area. It is calculated from real new car sales in your area over the past 90 days, as reported by dealers to the DMV.
Regional price paid is specific to the make, model, trim, packages, and options shown. It includes destination charge; it excludes taxes and fees. It may include incentives and other promotions running at that time that may have impacted the average price paid."
Google Cars VDP
When you you click on a specific vehicle, you will be taken to a VDP page that looks like this:
Google Cars Email Contact Options
And when you click to contact the dealer, you have three options. Clicking on the "Email Dealer" choice reveals this screen.
Notice that the consumer can easily select other local dealers to quote on the same vehicle. Today, I have no details on how this advertising product works and the costs associated with it. Give me a few days.
Just Google "How To Buy a Car" or YouTube "How To Buy a Car" and what you see on the FIRST page is THIS video (The Original One). This video is from 2007, its HORRIBLE, ITS Filled with lies and misconceptions. The speaker is obviously NOT an Automotive Sales Expert...
What seriously disturbs me is that NO ONE is doing anything about this... NO ONE? No OEMs, No Dealer Groups, No Dealerships, No Automotive Managers, No Automotive Sales Consultants... No one.
There is this stupid propaganda video LOCKED online and it just sits there without challenge? I am not sure about you but this video offends me, it has always offended me. Because it is so one sided and so filled with mistruths and straight out lies...
What is sad is that the PUBLIC sees this as REAL, as the TRUTH. Why...? Because it is on the FIRST page of Google and the First Page of YouTube!!! Most people are NOT subject matter experts. They are going online for some information, some direction and then they stumble into this type of trash... What is SAD is that they actually believe it. And why shouldn't they...? Its not like there are other, more compelling videos that tell the REAL story.
So, if you are watching this video or reading this post with distain... DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!
Here are a bunch of ideas of articles, blog posts or VIDEOS you could write, record and POST all over the internet:
* How To Buy a Car?
* How to Buy a New Car
* How to Buy a Used Car
* What to expect from Car Dealership
* What makes a GREAT Car Dealership
* How Do you Choose a specific Car Dealerships
These are just some basic ideas. The point is CREATE CONTENT, INFORMATION to the PUBLIC. Stop just thinking the internet is a "Point of Sale" resource... You need to capture people at "Point of Interest" and CULTIVATE the opportunity.
If you are as pissed as I am when watching this video... Let me know your thoughts-
**ORIGINAL Video is titled "4.1.5 Rob Gruhl - How to Buy a New Car - Ignite Seattle 2007.mp4"
And this COMPLETE Idiot! "Automotive Executive Breaks Code of Silence" (Way Too Many Mafia Movies Dork)
How many times as a manager have you looked through a deal that one of your salespeople just dropped on your desk and you asked yourself. "Who filled out this credit application? Or who filled in the blanks? Why are there crossouts? It sure looks like my salesperson did this. I have a complete deal in front of me. Ok let's call it in. " That's the norme in most dealerships. We wag the dog, push the paper, let's spot the car. This is a major problem. Dealers we have got to get out of this old habbit!
For years I have been telling my salespeople. "The customer fills out the whole credit application! Not half, not some, but the whole thing! ' Would you let a mortgage broker fill out your mortgage application? So why would it be acceptable for are salespeople to fill out a customers 2nd biggest purchase application in their lifetime?
My article below is enough to scare anyone out of the bad habits of allowing a salesperson or any level of management to be filling out a credit application in there own handwriting for the dealer to save time.By having the customer
complete his or her application own reduces the chances of your sales staff from giving customers unnecessary pay raises, fake jobs, or even inflated investment income for a senior citizen so that they will qualify for a loan or lease with their high credit score. All of these scenario's are BANK FRAUD! Let's face it times are tough, and without proper process in set in place, as dealers we are wide open to lawsuits!
Automotive News reported on an informal online survey of F&I managers last month in which 29% responded that salespeople or sales managers fill in credit applications for customers at their stores. "Oh well they’re just trying to move the deal along quicker and help the customers fill them out the right way. What could go wrong?"
What happens if a customer claims that the income or time on the job shown on the application does not reflect the truth? How can that come up, you ask? How about a customer’s lawsuit over a deal that was rescinded when the customer’s financing was denied because his income could not be verified randomly by a Prime bank two weeks after being funded? Look at your dealer agreements with these banks. They can contact the customer the moment you send them a deal and request just about whatever they want to support the application that was submitted to them. Just because your funded, doesn't mean you won't get charged back!
What if the customer was at another dealership and the income you stated doesn't match the application that another dealer sent in the week prior? Red Flag. Now you need POI, that's if your lucky enough that the annalist or banks computer doesn't turn it down because they see it as a flam. In the world of computers banks are sharing more and more information to protect themselves by leaning on each other. In the end ultimately they are the ones who will get the car back when the customer stops making the payments. As dealers most of the banks that we use have zero recourse unless it is a sub prime bank that is for extreme risk. In cases of contracts with recoarse smart dealer makes sure the customer makes the first few payments right at the dealership. Or until the recourse period is over. Until then the car has a tracking unit in it, and the dealer has a spare key for easy recovery, and we have no worries. This is quite common in the Gulf Coast Region being that it is such a transient marketplace.
Or how about a claim against the dealership arising from a repossession where the customer claims that he could not afford the vehicle because his income on the credit application was falsified by the salesperson? To make matters worse the equipment that was stated on the book out sheet was also falsified. Now the dealer has REAL trouble. When matters like this become issues in litigation, it is easy for the customer to claim that he knows nothing about what was entered on the credit application if it is not in his handwriting. He will claim that the amount of income, the time on the job, and any of several other important facts were made up by the salesperson. Sure, he signed the application, but it was just another in an endless line of documents he was told to sign as part of his deal.
So where does your dealership stand if this happens? Where it leaves the dealer is basically in a position that he has to write a check and buy this vehicle back from the lender + any fee's the lender has incurred along the collections, and repossession process. Now you have an angry customer, without a car and destroyed credit. In light of the situation you as the Dealer have been deemed WRONG. Hopefully the customer doesn't look for a payday and proceed with a civial lawsuit. Unfortunately in this situation almost every dealer who has been forced to buy the vehicle back from the lender due to fraud, by a dealership employee a settlement has been rewarded. Oh and let's not forget what will happen if the State Attorney General decides to get involved. Whoever filled out that application may be paying fines, or even worse spending some time in prison. I don't know about you folks, but I'm way to cute for prisson
Not that it makes any sense? We get sued, or prosecuted for selling a car.The customer came to us. They begged and pleaded to get approved, and asked for our help. We did our job and sold them a car. But were the bad guys in the systems eyes to begin with. We are car dealers! "Us the big dealer vs the poor trusting customer." Who does the arbitrator or Judge rule in favor of? The little guy... Everybody's had a bad car deal including the arbitrator.
Certainly, dealers want credit applications to be legible and complete.They want salespeople to work with customers so that all of the required information is filled in. But a salesperson who is filling in the credit application for the customer makes it easy for the customer to claim that the salesperson made up the information. Here is the answer. Using blue ink pen. (Black ink can be accused as copy) Have all information on the credit application filled in by the customer. Have a seasoned salesperson, sales manager, or an F&I person work with the customer to develop all the pertinent information. Then have the customer sign the application, and initial the income and time on the job. The information on the credit application will be transferred into an electronic screen anyway "Dealer track, your DMS, etc." Even when the application is not legible, it should be handwritten again by the customer in the most legible form they can and signed again by the customer,. Along with the customer’s original handwritten application attached to the legible application, along with the printed copy of the application from the DMS system your dealership uses. Make sure you retain all original copies in the deal jacket with the orginal signatures. Doing otherwise is just being lazy, and you are not protecting the Dealership and it's Principal's best interest.
Being a thorough sales consultant or manager will only get you positive results, and enhance your chances of promotion because of leading by proper example.Regardless of all our efforts a customer can always claim that he wrote what he was told to write by a salesperson. But if it is the customer’s handwriting that is 100% throughout the application, and we have matching typed and written applications with original signatures on each. It will be a tough sale to a jury, or arbitrator that we as the dealer did anything wrong. Happy Selling! And remember compliance matters;)
By: Carter R. Nies
A car that drives itself? For the past few years, Google has been working on an autonomous vehicle. In other words, a car that can drive itself. As you can see in the video, they perfected such an idea. One of the first volunteers for Google's self-driving car was a man by the name of Steve Mahan, who is visually impaired.
The Self-Driving Car took Mr. Mahan to pick up his dry cleaning, to Taco Bell for a quick bite and then back home! It's absolutely incredible what technology can do in today's world! Additionally, this past week, Google was approved by the state of Nevada to work on testing several different self-driving cars on the road. And, the rumor is that Self-Driving/Autonomous vehicles could become a reality by the year 2020.
While everyone agrees that it's still a work in progress, the license that Google was granted in Nevada to do testing is certainly a step in the right direction. During their tests, they'll be monitoring the car's capacity and ability to brake, acceleration, and steering. According to Google, the car uses "artificial intelligence software, a GPS, and an array of sensors to navigate its way through traffic."
So, what's your take? Would you want to own one? Or, would you feel more at ease if you had full control of the wheel?
