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The last quarter of the year rolls around and you begin to hear some common refrains:

• “We are waiting until the first of the year”

• “Starting in January I am going to…”

• “We have to wait until spring when business picks up”

• “The first of the year I am really going to get into it.”

Here’s the reality for most people who make these statements: The calendar is the only thing that changes.

If you are waiting for the calendar to change your life or your business, you are kidding yourself. My own observation is that these false start dates are nothing more than excuses and actual obstacles to not face reality and take action. No matter your intentions, I think everyone has been guilty of false statements at some time.

Words are cheap. A U.S. General once said, “Every year I pay less attention to what people say and more to what they do.” Action is always where the rubber meets the road. However, actions are preceded by proper thoughts and beliefs. Just because a person says they are going to do something does not mean that their brain buys into the idea.

When you make a statement, you are consciously choosing to do so. The problem begins when your subconscious does not match up to the conscious choice. If your subconscious does not have any evidence to support your statements, the subconscious immediately begins to sabotage your thoughts. This is precisely why traditional goal setting and New Years Eve resolutions fail.

I have heard many times that in setting goals they must be believable to work. You can hear the “believable goals” mantra and interpret this to mean you need to pick a safe goal. Safe goals rarely inspire you to action. Safe goals are easy to say but they don’t fill enough emotional needs. Behind all realized goals are strong emotions that were on fire to be realized.

First of all, you have to set inspiring goals that create emotions inside you. Otherwise all you are doing is writing out a To-Do list. When was the last time you were “geeked” by your To-Do list? Stop listening to everyone’s “10 steps” and “10 rules” to everything and the “Dummy’s Guide to Goal Setting” and start living by your rules. It’s your life, your goals, your emotions and your rewards if you reach your goals. You make the rules. Go for as large a goal as you desire.

Secondly, start giving your subconscious all the evidence it needs to start believing. You may write your goal 100 times a day. You may write your goal and put on your bathroom mirror and say the goal aloud 10 times every morning. You may find 10 people who have reached your goal and reach out to interview them on what they did. You may close your eyes and visualize yourself at the moment you reach the goal and see it in vivid colors, feel the feeling as strongly as you can feel.

No matter what goal you choose, you have to take some kind action. Take a step, no matter how small, and then set in stone your next action and action date. The next action should be soon. The next hour or the next day would be best. Don’t make the next action step too long after the first, or leave it to chance that you will take your next step.

The dirty little secret to reaching any and every goal is that most goals are made up of small, boring, mundane steps that lead to your success. We live in an instant gratification society – “8-Minute Abs,” “Lose 10 Pounds in One Week,” “Lose Six Inches in One Week,” and so on. Those ads are all brilliant marketing strategies, because they promise instant results. The headline of “Lots of sweaty exercise and eating tons of vegetables will help you lose weight this year” would not get a lot of response. The general public would say they hate hype but the truth is most people love hype. People love HOPE — the easier the better.

Don’t wait for a calendar to change your life or your business. Usually the only thing that changes is the calendar.

The intention of goal setting is to look toward the future and think of and plan for what you desire. Goals provide hope. My definition of hope is “Having Optimistic Predictions & Emotions.” However, goals can create your biggest stumbling block to getting what you desire.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “The only thing that will grow is that which you give energy to.” To focus your mind on what you desire is great. Concentrate on the why? “When the why gets strong the howgets easy.”

The Law of Attraction will bring to you what you think about. Your thoughts are impressed into your subconscious mind. “What you impress, you express.” All thoughts and actions will attract similar people and events that support your thought and action patterns. The Law of Attraction is an irrefutable universal law, supported by Meta-Physics and Quantum Physics.

Failure in goal setting comes in trying to get something rather than attracting it. Usually the obstacles anticipated when plotting to get something, rather than asking why you want it, create subconscious messages of struggle and difficulty. A person with the best of intentions can quickly tire of struggling and quit. This let down begins a pattern in the subconscious: struggle, frustration and failure. Reasons to lower standards or to quit can become a reality.

True power comes from knowing “you are who you decide to be at any given moment.” It doesn’t require jumping hurdles; it only takes deciding to become the person you desire. At that moment, by not seeing the how-to hurdles as obstacles, you will begin to think, act and become your desires. You may not know exactly how and when this is occurring, but you must trust that it is.

The root of the word “decide” means “to cut off.” Thus, to decide is to cut off from all other possibilities. This decision for your desires will propel your actions toward a much higher level. The people who succeed at such levels operate at greater consciousness than people who do not.

Understanding the power and process of your mind helps create exactly what you desire. Set goals and focus on what you want to happen, which will put into motion the energy, and through the Law of Attraction, will bring to you the people, things and events to match that energy.

The key to getting what you want is realizing the power of now. To get what you desire for the future, you must realize and accept that the creation and cultivation of your desire is this very moment. Decide, accept and act with the power of now.

Watch the tips featured in this week's Think Tank Tuesday and increase your profitability with your management style.

“I want to think about it.”

Baloney. If you believe and allow this excuse from customers, you and your family will be eating Ramen Noodle soup your whole career. When customers tell you they want to think about it, they are really telling you they either have an unspoken objection or they are not convinced that you or your product and service is right for them.

The next time a couple tells you that they want to think about it, watch them as they get out of earshot of you. They will turn to each other and begin to talk about why they are not buying. Whether it’s an objection or a concern, it’s going to boil down to Money, Me or Machine. Money can be price, terms, payments etc. The ‘Me’ portion can be you, the business or service reputation or ability. The Machine segment is your product or service.

First you have to identify the customer’s possible thoughts and emotions. Customers have three forms of spoken and unspoken communication when they say, “I want to think it over.”

• What they are saying

• What they are trying to say

• What they really mean

To get past the smokescreen of “I want to think about it,” you must listen to and understand what they are saying and onto what the customer is trying to say and what they really mean.

When you hear the dreaded stall or objection phrase, don’t do what the majority of salespeople do. Do not ask the customer, “What is it that you want to think over?” With that phrase you create a “Turtle Customer.” They are going to feel threatened or embarrassed and pull into their shell. You will force them to feel scared, embarrassed or intimidated and they are going to run like rabbits.

When you hear the objection, the first step is to agree with them by saying, “Sure, I understand, it’s a big decision so you should take your time.” Next, move your customer to the future. The future does not carry the pressure that today does. “Mr. Customer, if it were a week or a month from now and you had given everything consideration and were ready to make a decision, do you think the No. 1 consideration or thing that had held you up from buying would have been the machine or the money?” Notice, I didn’t mention the “you” portion because the customer would usually be too embarrassed to say you were the problem. Most likely if they are still with you, the problem is the product/service or the money.

If it’s the product or service, it’s easy to suggest alternatives that might fit what they are looking for. A salesperson without alternatives fails by a lack of alternatives. If money is the issue, then break the money portion down — Price, Payment, Down Payment, Monthly Payment, Term, Rates etc. Ask, “Mr. Customer what part of the money is the most important to you?” and then give the possibilities.

Next you must move them to close. “Mr. Customer, in the future, when you are making your decision to purchase and feel good about the payments, would the payments be ____, ______ or ______?” Give stair stepped based options on whatever it is that is their main concern. Customers feel less threatened about options and feel like they are in control. The customer will feel less embarrassed in sharing with you what they can and are willing to do.

When you get the answer from the customer, use the “Up to” and “No more than” phrases to raise the customer’s thinking and commitment. Example — “$500 up to?” “Now if you really had to, no more than?”

Notice that the art of closing this sale is not about closing, but about opening possibilities. You must open to be able to close. To get past the “I’ll think it over” objection, you must listen closely and try to really understand what the customer is communicating. You must move the customer forward in a manner that lessens the customer’s anxieties, rather than increases them. All of these steps must be performed with confidence and with an attitude of TLC – “Think Like a Customer.”

http://www.dealersynergy.com 856-546-2440 

Make Money Mondays with Sean V. Bradley - 'Pro Pay Plan' - Automotive Sales - Car Sales 

2013 GMC 2500 Denali. $45,000. Below Blue Book!!!! Why you ask? This truck may be more loaded than an Irishman in a whiskey-drinking contest, but it is no Sunday driver. It is a ¾ ton, 4-wheel drive, luxury work horse and it was cast from smelted bullet casings and stealth fighters by God’s own iron fist to be rode hard and put away wet. It may have a couple of scratches on it but that is ok. And do you know why? Because it’s a truck. And you’re a man. And together you are Maximus Meridius from Gladiator. And while women may swoon at your kind hard heart and gentile touch, underneath it all you are a BAMF who doesn’t back down from a fight and you have the scars to prove it. Because you sweat pure gasoline, and bleed oil and all you need is your 360hp Vortec chariot to get you to the promise land.

Your boats and snow machines are nothing but a light snack for this 6-speed auto, HD, demon-powered towing machine. With its Z71 Off-road package, you can enter dirt track races while towing your 17,800-lb life-size robot collection and a hot tub full of topless super models, and still win. All while outrunning the cops and mowing down zombies with your Mack truck-resembling chrome front bumper.

More technologically advanced than the Starship Enterprise, this truck will transport you in style while trusting you with all of its secrets. Wondering what your oil pressure is but don’t want go outside to check? Simply consult your smartphone and unveil everything you desire to know. Tire pressure, engine temperature, gas level, oil pressure, can all be summoned and accessible to you alone at the touch of your fingertip. Your friends will start to wonder how you became so wise and the Oracle from the Matrix will be calling to ask you for advice.

With its 6.0 liter V8, this truck will transport you to your destination faster than you can say Bad Mother Fu@#er and will arrive with about the subtlety of a tectonic plate shifting during the 1964 earthquake. Yes people will stare, my friend. Because you are always the winner in the reaux sham beaux that is your life; because rock trumps scissors, paper trumps rock, but a swift kick to the balls trumps paper, every time.

The rear automatic sliding glass window allows you to make sure that the grizzly you killed with your bare hands hasn’t come back to life. Or the sled you loaded up to high mark Mt McKinley hasn’t budged an inch. Since your 6 1/2′ bed is Rhino Lined with ¼” of near bullet-proof rubber, your big boy toys will be safely transported to the fiery inferno’s of hell and back, because that is where you go to play.

But what about the interior you ask? Hundreds of lambs died an honorable death to effectuate leather soft enough to make-up this hulk’s supple interior. The climate can be controlled to subliminal perfection by the shear omnipotent power in your callused right hand. The perpetually-complaining-about-the-cold woman in your life will be happy to know that heat can be generated at the touch of a button that will literally light a fire under her ass. In addition to heated (and cooled) seats, it’s power can be summoned from anywhere on the planet; it’s 8 powerful pistons coaxed into roaring to life for you alone, because you are the Lone Ranger, but Silver has nothing on this faithful steed. Sitting in the command center of this 2013 batmobile black, panty-dropping stallion, you will have more features at your fingertips than that kid David in “Flight of the Navigator,” but you will look like a lot less of a douche, because you aren’t flying a talking space ship 3 yards from the ground. You’re Han Solo, flying the Millennium Falcon, and The Force is for pussies.

Yes, this truck may have more options than a menu at Village Inn, but don’t let its Babylonian luxury fool you. It may have you feeling richer than a Russian Czar but it is about as tameable as a rogue wave and will chew you up and spit you out if you do not give it the respect it commands. But command it you will, and respect you will have because this truck is intimidating. Corvettes, Challengers and other gutless vehicles scurry out of its way, even when it’s in the slow lane. The pilot car in construction sites escorts it through immediately, even when it’s the only vehicle in line. It can out run the cops in 2nd gear, and does. It will park in a handicap space, then tow the tow-truck away. It will be the best man at your wedding, sleep with your bride, and never call her again. Yeah, it’s that bad.

If you like the looks of this truck but don’t think that is worth every bit of $45,000, then do not bother calling. Because this truck is the lovechild of Optimus Prime and Kit from knight Rider and if you don’t recognize its true potential, than you do not deserve to be at the helm of such an almighty machine.

Skip the dealership, all you will get there is a long-winded sales pitch. . …

For more information email, call, or text Caitlin xxx.xxx.xxxx

Who's Your Danny?

I know most of you hate wasting hours on a prospect that is already at your dealership.  You show the car, go for a test drive, they ask for numbers, you get ready to close the deal and you think you have them...then they say that they aren't ready to buy today...How about this for an approach close:

You start this close when you are about to show the car to the prospect at your dealership..your walking with them and you turn and say, " Mr. prospect, if I can show you the perfect vehicle that meets and accommodates all of your needs, as well as getting you the absolute best price, are you in a position to buy today?" 

If you've participated in automotive internet marketing for long enough, you've very likely heard the concept that "content is King." It was in play back in the days when I started researching search engine optimization all those years ago and it never really stopped. There was a dirty little secret that few of us in the SEO community ever mentioned, but it's been safe to say it for a little over a year now.

Content wasn't really king. It was important, but it wasn't king - not by a long shot.

When I started at TK Carsites in 2007, I wanted to prove that point. I was given a single website that belonged to the company that we wanted to rank for the important "used cars" keywords. They had a gameplan that included creating pages for every major metro in the country, populating them with tons of unique content, and playing the game the way that it's supposed to be played. I told them to hold off for a while. This was an opportunity to do some testing.

We didn't add the content... nothing. The homepage was flash and had three words in the title tag - two of them being "Used Cars". I then went through an extremely aggressive link-building process and started attacking dozens of cities. In less than two months, we were ranked in the top 3 for over 30 major metros and #1 for a dozen. These weren't easy keywords. "Baltimore Used Cars". "Dallas Used Cars". "New York City Used Cars". We Google-bombed the site and it paid off. Sadly, we didn't develop the site very much after that, but the point was made.

Fast forward about a year and we started recognizing that Google was changing the game. I was certain that they were heading towards a set of quality-control mechanisms that would make the spammy techniques obsolete. We started shifting towards a content model that included high-value sites, blogs, and guest posting. We still used some of the lesser link-building styles such as directory submissions, but we stopped all forms of footer/sidebar/signature link building. If it could be done in bulk, we weren't going to use it. Google was catching on. I was sure of it.

2009 came and went. No major change. Content was a little more important, but link-building still ruled. In fact, our high-touch, high-maintenance technique was working but not much better than the spammy techniques some were using that we had long-abandoned.

2010 - same thing. I was getting worried. I was sure Google was close. They had to be. Unfortunately, I was getting a little pressure from the SEO team because they were seeing that the techniques that I assured were evil were still working.

2011 - Panda. YAAAAY! No, wait. It didn't address the links. The spammy techniques were still working and my expensive strategy was having trouble fighting off the bulk players.

Then it happened. Penguin. April 24, 2012. The day that I thought would be coming in 2008 or 2009 finally arrived and all of the things I had hoped for came true. Some of our competitors fell of the map, Death-Star-style... "as if millions of SEO's cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."

Today, the strategy, a content- and quality-based strategy, is alive and well. Finally.

So what was the point of all that? Today, content truly IS king, but not in the way that most perceive it. The reason that I built a new company that focuses solely on content, search, and social is that the three are now part of the same digital marketing strategy. You cannot do well with any one of them without doing well at the other two. Content is king because the quality necessary for pure link earning and social media marketing is finally bridging the gap. Unfortunately, that's bad news for the vast majority of dealers because the boilerplate content that populates so many dealer websites is hurting you. Chances are you're not really feeling it because you've never experienced the difference; if nearly everyone is doing it wrong, then "bad" is actually average.

Here is a good infographic that demonstrates many of the connections that are associated with content as part of SEO and thus part of the holistic digital marketing strategy, via automotiveseo.org. Enjoy!

http://www.internetsales20group.com 856-546-2440

Karen & Sean V. Bradley Discuss the Panels at the Internet Sales 20 Group - Atlantic City, NJ

 “Work harder.”

“Work more hours.”

“Put your nose to the grindstone.”

“You have to pay your dues.”

“Climb the ladder of success.”

Do all of these sayings sound familiar? These common phrases often espouse ideas that become anchored as limiting beliefs in your brain. Here’s the shocking news; these phrases often put into motion a cycle of struggle and failure. These common teachings may have kept you from having the kind of success you desire. The missing ingredient is not your work; it’s your thoughts.

Just reading that first paragraph may have made you mad. You may disagree so strongly that your emotions may cause you to disregard the possibility of truth from the message intended. If so, this is a direct reflection of those often well ingrained lessons. Dwell upon this for a minute: If these commonly held beliefs were true, why aren’t more people happy, successful and rich?

The answer to the question is those beliefs by themselves are wrong and harmful. People who dig ditches work hard. Salespeople work lots of hours. Corporate people try to climb the ladder of success. People who manage you often want you to pay your dues. How many of these people do you know that are wildly happy, successful or enjoy their success? The answer is often few, if any.

What you generate in your brain is the key. More hours and more work with misguided thoughts will only speed up your frustration and failure. The first step is to throw away and clean the slate of all the damaging sayings, lessons and beliefs that you have been taught. Start by writing down your 20 earliest thoughts about money. Do the same with work. When you are finished you may notice that most of these memories are negatively based or entrenched in scarcity based thinking.

Those memories and beliefs are exactly why when people tell you to just think positive that they are not only wrong but potentially harmful. Until you erase the negative programming that you have acquired, you will not be able to truly have positive thoughts that are believed and lasting. Everyone has a tremendous amount of negative programming that you have acquired from parents, teachers, bosses, newspapers and books.

When you are programmed over and over with those messages, you begin to buy into those messages and accept them as universally true. Over a period of time this leads to negative cycles occurring repeatedly and you don’t know how to change them. So what do you do? You revert back to your programming. You work harder. You work more hours. You put your nose to the grindstone. You pay your dues. You climb the ladder of success.

I have a little saying, “Stop the train.” If you aren’t getting to your destination, you have to change something. The most critical thing to change is your thoughts. Thoughts create action and action creates habits and habits create results and results create your destiny. It’s that simple.

In Robert Ringer’s book, “Winning through Intimidation,” he talks of the “Leapfrog Theory.” His idea is that you can leapfrog your way to success. You don’t have to climb the ladder rung by rung. He is absolutely correct. However, if your subconscious has been bombarded by messages your whole life that teach you that you must pay your dues and you have to work harder, you will either disregard the message or sabotage your actions. Everyone either has at one time or knows someone who when they were experiencing success began to take actions that lead to the demise of that success.

Most people chalk those experiences up to fate or bad luck. That belief will forever keep you in a cycle of frustration and repeated failures. Sheer luck by itself is a rare thing. Success and failure are almost always created in your mind first. Any other belief is simply allowing you to be lead by other’s beliefs. When this happens you are now in bondage and slavery. Slavery of the brain and spirit is the worst possible fate.

There is a saying, “Pray, but move your feet.” You can pray and you can move your feet and get going, but if you control and guide your thoughts you will learn to attract more success than you ever would have before dreamed. The amusing thing is that much of the success you attract will seem to come effortlessly and the phrase “Hard Work” will not even be a part of your thoughts.

It's easy for us to take the high road and call it abysmal to utilize the strategy demonstrated below. We would never do it to two dealers, let alone dozens. We also understand the need to make a solution scalable for the sake of profits as we have worked for companies that need to scale to serve hundreds or thousands of dealers. With that said, it is still atrocious and should stop immediately. This gives quality automotive social media marketing companies a bad name when they pull this sort of stuff.

When Brian West from @FusionZONE Automotive, Inc. showed this to me today, I begged him to let me expose it. He cordially allowed me and now I can't really say much about it without spewing more vitriol than I'm used to spewing.

The justification that I've heard for this type of activity is that nobody will like more than one dealership on Facebook. This is a naive statement, especially considering the rise of the pay-to-play social media model, the fact that they're posted at the same time, and sheer silliness of the question itself. Some of the stores for which the question was posted were in south Florida on a day when it was 75 degrees.

Social media is about creating a channel of communication between the dealership and local people. It's about posting relevant messages and exposing those messages to potential customers. It's about participating in the community that is comprised of the very people who can and should be buying cars. To auto-post using an automated, push-button strategy is absolutely worthless.

Here's the post itself. Looking at the dozens of dealers that posted this content led me to realize that this wasn't a mistake. It wasn't a one-off instance. Every piece of content is posted across the board.

This infuriates me. It isn't just lazy and ridiculous. It's sad that dealers are actually paying for this to happen. It doesn't have to be this way.

http://www.internetsales20group.com 267-319-6776
Co-Creators Of The Internet Sales 20 Group, Karen & Sean V. Bradley Invite You To Join Them In Atlantic City In April

One idea to improve sales that most people don’t want to talk about is the ability to recharge your batteries. Salespeople who run on low batteries don’t perform as well as when they are charged up. Recently, I went with my family on a cruise and had a fantastic trip. We went scuba diving in Grand Turks and, during the dive, had three dolphins come up to us and play with us for most of the dive. The dive masters on the trip said it was a once in a lifetime experience to not only see the dolphins but to have them play with us for so long.

What if we had decided not to take the trip? What if our fears had kept us from becoming certified divers years ago? I have never left a vacation saying I should take less vacations. I have forgone vacations before because of business or other concerns. I think that’s shortsighted thinking. Vacations allow you to have those great experiences and recharge your batteries. You seem to have a different perspective after a vacation.

Have you ever skipped taking time off because of a lack of money or time? Consider the mindset that creates a perception of a lack of time or money. To replace a mindset of scarcity and lack, you must first take the time to step back, evaluate your thoughts and actions that have caused the scarcity and begin to change those thoughts and actions. Often, I think we all get so caught up in day to day actions and challenges that we lose our best perspective.

Proper rest is one of the key ingredients to good health. Proper rest includes the mind as well as the body. A few years ago, I made the choice to get one more hour of sleep a night. The difference in my vitality of mind and body was remarkable. Waking up with a clear mind and body can change your appearance and first perception of you by a customer. When you recharge your batteries, you allow your mind to give and receive answers it cannot do when you are tired.

So often our culture promotes the theory of hard work. I believe you don’t have to associate work with being hard. The connection that links up in your mind about work being hard and a grind can be counterproductive. Every salesperson will say there are times when they are on a roll and in the flow and everything they touch turns to gold. I don’t believe those times are accidental. I believe those periods of seemingly easy success are attributable to previous thought and actions. Those successful thoughts and actions are easier to achieve when you are rested and clear of anything blocking your mind or body.

Our culture tends to lend a great amount of macho to the theory of hard work. The theory of resting, thinking and recharging your batteries is looked at as weakness by many. In the last several years I have found the quality of work is more important than the endurance. Bad thoughts and actions done over a longer period of time can never be as productive as good thoughts and actions over a short period of time.

Parkinson’s Law theorizes that work fills up to the time allotted. The more time you allow, the more you find to do. The question is what are you really doing?

I would invite you today to analyze your time in one hour time slots and observe your most dominant thoughts and actions. Secondly, I would advise you to be very careful to look out for time wasters. Time wasters can be people, processes and normal activities you may not be paying attention to.

How much time do you spend answering cell phones, checking e-mail and doing redundant tasks? You might be amazed at what you find. Create a plan to eliminate the things from your life that are not productive and add to your stress. Never forget to recharge your batteries. Maybe even go swimming with the dolphins.

Customer service is false propaganda.

Before you think I am nuts, let me explain. The factory gives customer service surveys and dealerships give customer surveys. Everyone seems to talk about Customer Satisfaction Indexes. Measuring your success and failure is obviously important. However, is customer service really about numbers? In customer service, the most important customers are the one’s who hate you the most and the one’s who do business with you the most.

People like to have nice things said about them. Every business owner and their employees would like to feel like they give good customer service. We all love the customer testimonial letters that praise us. How much time do you spend with the customers who don’t like you? How much time do you spend trying to cultivate ongoing relationships and purchases from your best customers?

The customers who don’t like you have a story to tell that can’t be told in numbers. If you want to really find out what your marketplace feels about you, ask the people who work at the gas station, local hotels and anyone who does not know where you work. One hour in a local eatery or tavern may give you more solid information about your dealership than all the surveys ever concocted in history.

When you find people in your marketplace that don’t like you or have a negative perception of your business, you must dig deeper to find out why. Remember that perception is reality to your marketplace. Discussions with your people in your marketplace can lead to simple changes that can lead to massive improvements — “Small holes cause big fl at tires.”

On the other hand, the old phrase that the customer is always right is bunch of baloney. The customer is not always right. Some things that make people upset with you may not only be acceptable for you but part of a purposeful plan. You cannot and should not try to be all things to all people. Define who your marketplace target is and begin to work towards them. Speak directly to them and treat them in a way they want to be treated. There are riches in niches. Targeting your primary audience and your best customers will pay you handsomely.

Your marketplace should be divided into five categories: 1) Active customers 2) Inactive customers 3) Customers of your competitors that own your brand 4) Customers of similar brands 5) General audience.

Write down three ways you currently contact and reward your current customers in an ongoing and even automated manner (and, by the way, three ways is not nearly enough). There is rarely a saturation point to customer contacts and rewards. Do you have a VIP Program for your best customers? Ten to 20 percent of your customers will reward you more than the other 80 percent combined. Your goal should be to take customers that do business with you — let’s call these customers supporters — and convert them to Advocates, who continually buy and service with you and refer you to your marketplace.

Do you have a written, automated campaign to convert inactive customers — ones who buy from you but don’t service with you? Do you have a three-stage letter campaign planned for inactive customers? Do you have an automated campaign involving e-mail, postcards, regular letters, dimensional mail, voice broadcast, phone calls, appreciation dinners/gatherings, special inducements, etc.?

Any dealership can have an intensive and automated process that involves all the necessary media, volume and correct copywriting that utilizes emotional direct response marketing methods that are necessary to retain their customers, reward their best customers and learn from their lost customers.

You must make a commitment to spending resources on the most important thing of all — your most important customers.

Over the last couple of months, I've been researching reputation management companies in and out of the automotive industry. On one hand, I found a couple of shining stars that stood out from the competition. On the other hand, they were only the best but were still missing the boat when it comes to the true potential of what reputation "management" should be.

I've been told that my posts are too long, particularly when I'm in rant-mode, so I'll keep this as brief as possible. Car dealers deserve better. The industry started getting flooded with reputation management services a few years ago and they all migrated to the same basic premise: solicit reviews through emails. While this in itself isn't a bad thing (and I'd debate anyone who thinks it is a bad thing, including anyone at Yelp), it's only a small piece of the puzzle. For a true reputation management solution to work, it needs to have an holistic understanding of how to utilize the components of online reputation as well as a grasp of how to turn a quality reputation into an amazing marketing tool.

Again, I'll try to keep this brief. It will be challenging.

More than Defensive

We've learned that defense wins championships. However, the concept that reputation management is about keeping your review star-ratings high is like saying that a car is about having a place to sit while you travel. Your reputation can do so much more for you than a star-rating just as a car can do so much more for the owner than just act as a moving seat.

The concept of reputation marketing is completely underutilized at best and butchered by some at worst. The first step, getting your star-ratings higher, is good to keep people from dismissing you altogether when searching for you. That part's fine. However, those who click through to the review sites are most likely looking for dirt. They want to know what you've done wrong. They're scanning beyond the good reviews and going straight to the bad ones.

A strong reputation management solution should go on the offensive. Expose the great reviews. When someone is out there talking about how they just bought their fifth vehicle in the last decade from your dealership, your reputation management company should be getting that out to as many people as possible. No, that doesn't mean an automated feed from the review site to your Facebook page that will end up getting seen by 50 people in their news feed and actually read by somewhere between zero and one of them. It takes more effort than that and I haven't seen anyone doing it properly yet at the vendor level.

The Search Component

How in the world has nearly every reputation management firm in the automotive industry missed the tremendous benefits (and potential pitfalls) of utilizing reputation for search engine optimization? When I was at the SXSW convention last year, Google pretty much declared that online reputation and review sites would play a role in organic rankings as well as PPC exposure, yet I haven't heard a peep about it other than a mention on another site noting that Google had taken down an Adwords account because the dealership had a bad reputation.

The two companies that had the best solution that I reviewed both touched on the benefits of reputation from a search perspective but neither have taken the appropriate actions to put together a working strategy, yet. Hopefully, that will be coming, but most in the industry haven't even made the connection despite the clear message from Google.

Botching Social Media

I'm going to keep this part extremely short because I'll start spitting and foaming at the mouth if I talk about it too long. The absolute butchering of dealership social media pages and profiles by reputation management companies and their 2008 social media strategies makes me insane. I want to grab them by the shoulders and force them to listen to reason.

Just because reputation management and social media have a connection doesn't make a RepMan consultant a social media expert. Cars and planes are similar - they're vehicles that get people from point A to point B - but that doesn't mean that having a driver's license gives you the skills to fly a 747. The potential synergies between social media marketing and reputation management are clear, but so far I've seen nothing that even remotely approaches a cohesive and intelligent plan of attack to make them sing in harmony. It's like they took peanut butter, jelly, and bread, tossed them all in a blender and said, "Look, I made a PBJ!"

(wiping foam from mouth now)

Sorry for the Rant

Okay. I'm done. It's been bugging me since NADA and after seeing what I saw last night I had to get it out there. At the end of the day, it's the responsibility of a dealership to train employees on the art of treating customers well. Those of us who have been on the retail side of the car business know that you'll have customers who will burn you no matter how hard you try to please them, but their frequency can be minimized by an appropriate company culture and a well-trained staff.

That's the onus of the dealer. On the vendor side, I'm making it a personal mission to educate reputation management companies on the proper way to position this potentially powerful marketing tool. We deserve better. You deserve better.

Do you succumb to the ever present marketing sickness of wanting to do everything you hear about? It's better to have a solid, strategic marketing plan in place rather than numerous messages that will overwhelm and confuse your customer. Find out more on this week's Think Tank Tuesday.

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