WOW!!! That is the first word which comes to my mind as I sit in the airport recapping in my mind the Internet Sales 20 Group in Dallas Texas. 

I first must say I am honored to be associated and friends with Sean V Bradley and the lovely Karen Bradley. Sean makes me go harder and want more out of life. I hope to follow in his foot steps and to be as big of a impact on people's lives as he has been on my own. 

The roster at this event was like the "original Dream Team" from the Olympic Games. 

It was awesome to watch and learn not just Sean in action again but also the other heavy hitters in attendance like:

 - Ralph Paglia 

- Tom Stuker 

- JD Rucker 

Etc.. Etc.. 

Not only was it awesome to watch and learn from many of the superstars that attended the previous Internet Sales 20 Group in Chicago, but also from some of the other legends that were there this time around. 

Off the top of my head:

- Danny Alkassmi 

- Jim Ziegler 

- Ken Potter from True Car 

- Craig Lockerd 

and many others made this event a home run! The nuggets I am taking back with me are priceless, as well are the new friendships, contacts and opportunities. 

I have to say this event was another 10 and if you have not been to one of these Internet Sales 20 groups you need to make it happen. It is unlike any other "workshop" or "conference" you have attended and not only will you enjoy it your bank account will!!! 

Dealers are constantly looking for ways to get an edge in the digital age, yet many continue to follow the same sales and advertising practices that they’ve been using for decades.

The problem is that the game has changed and consumers have access to much more information and choices than ever before. In the past the dealer controlled all of the information, but today it’s just the opposite. Any information you offer is now carefully scrutinized and validated by a vast amount of online data. As a result, the likelihood of old-school sales practices backfiring has increased substantially.

So what type of “old-school” practices am I talking about? How about pricing vehicles without disclosing that there are rebates that most people don’t qualify for; trade-in values where the selling price is increased; trade under-allowances; withholding information on phone pops and internet leads (“just get ‘em in”); write-ups and F&I presentations (four-squares & payment packing); bait & switch advertising; and non-disclosure of vehicle histories and add-on fees?

I have spoken to many people who think this new-fangled transparency talk is just nonsense. After all, we've been doing business the same way for decades and it’s been wildly successful. If it ain't broke we’d be stupid trying to fix it.

I get it. I’ll be the first to admit that I spent most of my career as a poster child for the “but we've always done it this way” mindset. My thinking has changed though. I’ve had the privilege of meeting some amazingly-smart automotive thought-leaders who have taught me that there’s more to success then the “whatever it takes to make a deal” mentality. While the business-as-usual way of thinking sure is comfortable, I’ve come to realize that it’s probably not the key to long-term success.

So before you discount the idea of transparency in your dealership, you may want to consider these 10 potential benefits.

Increase Lead Conversion - The ultimate goal is still to “get ‘em in” and close the deal, but for an increasing number of shoppers, transparency is the only thing that will get them in. Not being upfront about details used to have its benefits. Up until recently, the salesperson could control the selling process because he or she controlled the information. Today, it’s just the opposite - consumers have all the information they need at their fingertips. If you resist answering customer’s questions, chances are you’ll never hear from them again.

Increase Closing Ratios - Higher levels of satisfaction with the selling process result in higher closing rates and higher sales. A recent survey by Maritz Research of over 163,000 Americans found that 64.0% are completely satisfied when one person with pricing authority negotiates a car deal vs. 20.7% when two or more with no pricing authority are involved.

Improve Your Reputation (your REAL reputation, not necessarily the one you “manage” online) - A dealership’s reputation is difficult, if not impossible, to maintain when staff members depend on “old school” practices. Customers often make decisions during a vehicle sale transaction that they come to regret after the “ether has worn off”. You can be sure they’re telling somebody about the transaction.  Or perhaps they’re telling thousands of people online?

Avoid Legal Problems - State & federal regulators frequently target “non-transparent” dealer practices as unfair and deceptive. These practices include bait and switch advertising, failure to sell at advertised prices, payment packing, vehicle history disclosures, yo-yo financing, improper fee disclosure, and misleading pricing.

But it ain’t illegal if you don’t get caught, right?

The new reality is that “getting “caught” is no longer likely to be just a fine and slap on the wrist. Regulators now have a new trick up their sleeve - using the media to humiliate those dealers caught in order to intimidate others. There’s plenty of political capital in going after car dealers for ambitious regulators. These regulators want press, and the tougher and more far-reaching the press the better. As a result, the severity of the offenses is often exaggerated (think about what the FTC did to those 5 unfortunate dealers last year). You need to ask yourself what the cost of that kind of negative publicity would be.

Increase Customer Satisfaction - Lack of transparency and old school tactics invariably diminish the customer experience. Nobody likes surprises. Sure, you made the deal but are your customers truly satisfied with your processes or do you just wear them down?

At the end of the day higher customer satisfaction translates into more repeat and referral business.

Increase Customer Loyalty - Customers only have loyalty if you earn it from them.

Transparent processes help build customer loyalty and retention. You’ll find that customers will be willing to spend more when they feel they’re buying from a business they can trust.

Your Customers Have Unprecedented Access to Information in Real Time - A recent JD Power report highlights a growing trend called 'Showrooming' where prospects sitting in your showroom are actually price competing your deal with another dealership using their mobile devices. Consumers not only have more access to information but also have access to more dealers. In the past, consumers were limited to dealers in their local area. The increase in the amount of information available to consumers has brought consumers a quick and easy way to analyze not only different prices via internet quotes but also to identify who they want to do business with. Customers simply have too many choices and will quickly discard dealers they feel are hiding something. Holding back information will only make them trust you less.

Reduce Chargebacks – What happens after the ether wears off and the customer goes home and reads the contract? I’ve found that the percentage of chargebacks and cancellations is directly related to transparency in sales and finance processes. For instance, staff members who participate in payment packing typically have a much higher chargeback rate. Once customers figure out that the “protection package” wasn't really only a “few extra bucks a month”, they want to know why. You can only hope they don’t ask an attorney that question.

You’ll Stand Out From Your Competition – Let’s face it, there just aren’t a great number of dealers who are transparent yet. Progressive dealers can easily differentiate themselves by marketing their transparent processes and demonstrating their honesty. Consumers will respond - after all, how many consumers prefer old-school tactics?

Transparency is what consumers have been begging for so why not treat them the way they want to be treated? – Here’s a hint: it’s happens to be the right thing to do. In my opinion, subjecting customers to old-school processes doesn’t give them the respect they deserve. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.

The good news is that transparency can be the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. A transparent business model can greatly enhance your sales, reputation, customer retention, and bottom line. But first you must find the vision and courage it takes to break down deep-rooted stereotypes and embrace transparency.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Transparency is not a dirty word but complacency is. Do you have the vision and courage it takes to embrace transparency and go from being good to being great?

Call it human nature to mislead in order to promote a product. Call it deceitful selling. Call it ignorance. Call it whatever you want to call it, but the concept that has been being spread around the automotive industry that you don’t need content on your homepage is absolutely incorrect. In fact, the homepage is the most important page on your website from an SEO perspective. Building a website with a homepage that has no HTML text or links is like making a hamburger without a beef patty (even though ground turkey is acceptable and ground bison is actually superior in my opinion, but I’ll save that discussion for my food blog).

More than the sitemap, more than your navigation bar, the homepage content is the true gateway through which you can highlight the most important pages on your website for the search engines. On most websites on the internet  and nearly 100% of car dealer websites, the homepage is granted the highest level of authority by the search engines. The links within the content are given the most “juice”. Pages that are linked within the HTML of the homepage within context are considered to be the most important pages.

To have contextual internal linking within the context of your homepage content, you have to have homepage content. It’s that easy. Is it possible for a website to rank without content on the homepage? Of course. It’s also possible to eat a hamburger with buns, lettuce, tomato, onions, pickles, and mustard. Just as must people who order a hamburger expect meat of some sort inside, the search engines expect their “hamburger”, the homepage of your website, to contain meat.

Does HTML content detract from lead generation? No. Your customers aren’t that naive. This isn’t the first website they’ve ever visited that has words on it. Many won’t even scroll down to see the content and will find what they really want to see (inventory, specials, or department pages) in a second or two.

It came to our attention at NADA that at least one website vendor is preaching the concept that the homepage content clutter factor of content is not beneficial for SEO. It may be more. If you hear that idea spoken, don’t buy it. Instead, ask them, “Where’s the beef?” Even a vegan burger has a soy patty. Your website needs homepage content just the same.

Social media icons and signs that say “Like us on Facebook” or “Follow us on Twitter” aren’t nearly as common in brick and mortar stores today as they were a couple of years ago. Many companies who tried to make it work (or are still trying) found that the presence of signs didn’t do much to improve their following.

Today, it can be different. Many people use their mobile devices to stay active on social media, much more than they did a couple of years ago, but even with this the old school follow/like signs still won’t work. They can, but not if you don’t give them a reason. Thankfully, this is one of the easiest and most efficient ways to increase your following. To do it, you have to make it worth their while.

One car dealership I’ve worked with has found strong success by using the concept in their service department. They’ve gone so far as to give three reasons for people to follow them on Facebook (they aren’t as hip on Twitter yet but I’m trying to get them interested). There’s a sign at the pay counter that says, “Get a 5% discount just for liking our Facebook page.”

In the “small print” under the offer, they write, “We post 4 or 5 times a week and we won’t annoy you with bad jokes or links to our blog. Instead, we post Facebook-only service specials and only the best of the best cars for sale from time to time.”

It works like a charm. Their numbers are constantly rising. Then, the take it a step further with the third incentive in even smaller print below the second line. “If you like us already and still want the 5% discount, just post that you’re here and that you ‘like getting my service done at [dealership name] because _______.”

Signage is the least used effective way to get fans, followers, engagement, and endorsements. These are people who are already doing business with you and if they like the way they’re treated, you should encourage them to let their friends know. It doesn’t have to be a discount. It does have to include a reason. I know one non-dealer that has stuffed animals, the small ones you see at the carnival, stacked on the wall with a sign that says, “Get your kid (or yourself) a stuffed elephant or moose by becoming our Facebook fan.”

Be creative. Be fun. Make a promise about how your social media profile brings value to your followers and then deliver on that promise by making your pages and profiles awesome.

People won’t like or follow you without a reason.

http://www.internetsales20group.com

Make Money Mondays With Sean V. Bradley "How You Can Make More GROSS"

Facebook has been trying to crack down on text within images for some time. They made a big deal out of it when they first rolled out Timeline but it was still possible to get by without getting noticed. Today, it's a lot harder.

While I've never been able to fully make sense of the rule, it's their site so we have to play their game. The way the rule works is that text in an image cannot cover more than 20% of the total space or you won't be able to run ads on it. You might be able to run it for a little while but they eventually catch it.

They continue to push the letter of the law further. If you have too much text in your cover photo, all of your ads get rejected automatically. They've now started including thumbnail images from links in the rule. The post above was rejected for this reason. The sad part is that there were other images on the page that I would have preferred to use, but Facebook didn't register them as a thumbnail option.

Be aware of the rule if you're running sponsored posts on Facebook. This isn't the type of rule that you'd ever want to try to break. Even with a direct line to a high level Facebook employee, it still took a couple of days to get a client unblocked who had been breaking the rule before we took over the account. I couldn't image how it is for those who have to try to plea with them if they didn't have a connection.

It might not make much sense, but again I'll stress - their site, their rules.

Have you ever met someone who moved 30 vehicles per month who didn't have a solid plan in place? A salesman is NOT going accomplish their goal of 30 units per month by waiting for "ups" to walk into the showroom. You need to be proactive instead of reactive. Are you? 

If you/your dealership is mostly selling from fresh ups, internet and phone, then you are leaving a lot of money on the table - especially knowing that a referral closes at 50% or more and has a higher gross profit. So instead of waiting for the next walk-in, why not create your own sales opportunities? Isn't it time to drive your own traffic to the dealership, start treating your career as your own business and start making more than $100,000 a year? If you're serious about selling cars - and making money - then this free 1 hour webinar is for you. 

This recorded webinar below will cover: 
ideas to help you sell 30 cars a month 
the lost art of prospecting 
how salespeople can create their own business plan to reach their sales goals 
...and much more.

PRESENTER: SEAN V. BRADLEY 
Sean V. Bradley, CEO of Dealer Synergy, Inc., is the top automotive trainer and consultant in the country and is currently the most sought after subject matter expert for Internet Sales, Business Development and Digital Marketing.

Why Should You Attend The Internet Sales 20 Group?

In one sentence, the advice that business owners and marketers need to hear is this: “Everything on your Facebook page should be centered around the real world.”

No, I don’t mean the reality TV show that launched it all in 1992. When The Real World launched on MTV 27 seasons ago (yes, it’s still going strong in case you weren’t aware), it set in motion a genre of television that many people claim to hate but that still gets millions of viewers every day. Today, the day to day version of “the real world of marketing on Facebook” should take one concept from the original show intro: “…start getting real.”

There’s a reason why you won’t hear this from people in the social media industries. The gurus and specialists who rely on Facebook management services to make a living don’t want businesses to know that the most successful local business pages are run from the stores themselves. The ability to stay real, organic, and authentic through social media is arguably the most important component in a successful business presence. To gurus, it means that their services cannot be as good as the real thing happening at the physical locations. To businesses, it means that all of the tools are either at your fingertips or scattered across the physical world around you.

As someone whose company offers social media products, one might wonder why I would give this advice. It’s simple – what can be done and what does get done are two different things. I wouldn’t be honest if I said that services offer the best possible results when the reality is that a well-guided and properly-deployed strategy by employees at a local business can be more effective than anything remote. However, the combination of a lack of updated knowledge in this constantly-changing arena mixed with the lack of time of the employees at a local business mean that sometimes it’s best to settle for second best.

Thankfully, when done right, second best isn’t far off from being the best. There are more failures happening from homegrown campaigns and strategies than from agency-run strategies because of both of these points. It takes time. It takes research. These are things that are easier left to those who do it on a regular basis for most businesses. However, if a business has the time to stay on top of the campaigns as well as the changes happening in the platforms, trends, and attitudes in the real world, they can have the greatest level of success.

The new Renault Clio was carried by Facebook Likes in the “Like Challenge”. See the story and video.

A social interactive live stream on Facebook connects the online and offline world in the newest social media campaign of Renault Netherlands.

Online likes measured the passion for the new Renault Clio.

Offline, a heaver construction with the car on one side and a Facebook box on the other, showed the weight of this passion.

In two weeks, the Facebook fans did succeed and showed that there is enough passion in the Netherlands for the new Renault Clio to carry the car.

How much passion do the Dutch people have for the new Renault Clio?

The passion for the new Renault model is measured by means of a heaver construction with on one side the new Renault Clio and on the other side the Facebook box.

Facebook fans show their passion for the car by giving a physical like.

Through a social interactive live stream the fans see how their online like is thrown offline in the Facebook box and how the weight in the Facebook box slowly increases.

Watch the video of the like challenge here:

The first car carried by likes
Renault fans shared their passion for the new Renault Clio. In two weeks more than 16.000 like thumbs were placed in the Facebook box and there was enough passion gathered to carry the new Renault Clio.

For the first time a car was carried by the likes of a Facebook community. At that final moment the live stream had already over 60.000 views and even reached the homepage of Ustream.

During the campaign Renault welcomed more than 12.000 new fans.

My Opinion?
Our frequent readers know that I am not a big fan of buying likes.

But this approach by agency Dorst & Lesser gives a special turn to the course of “buying” likes.

One: the like challenge is more entertaining than buying likes through a Facebook campaign.

Two: One of the fans will win a car that will give extra buzz and shares around the like challenge.

Three: Giving away a car of around 14.000 EURO makes the price per paid-for like more than reasonable.

What About You?
How do you rate this like challenge by Renault Netherlands? I’d love to read your opinion in the comments below.

Source:Viralblog

Also Check Out: 

Facebook to Introduce #Hashtags — And That’s a Double-Edged Sword for Twitter!

• Work towards success with other non-competing dealerships
• Learn what works and what doesn’t work
• Compare and share information with Internet Sales Professionals and experts
• Receive guidance on everything and anything Internet Sales related.
• Learn to sell MORE CARS, MORE OFTEN, MORE PROFITABLY 

2013 Internet Sales 20 Group March 19th 20th and 21st Dallas TX

Can Facebook come up with one original idea! OMG, like seriously!

Facebook has always wanted to edge in on Twitter’s Interest Graph.

The idea is, it’s a boon for ad dollars, as Twitter’s real-time stream taps into the immediate sentiment of the crowd. Facebook’s Friend Graph, while powerful, isn’t designed for immediacy.

At least, not yet. As was previously reported by The Wall Street Journal, and as I’ve verified through sources of my own, Facebook plans to launch its own Linkify’d version of the hashtag, allowing users to connect common themes and trending topics around the social network by adding the simple hashtag symbol to a status update. Clicking through sends a reader down a rabbit hole of information, all connected to the hashtag being followed.

“We don’t comment on rumors and speculation,” Facebook told AllThingsD.

Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Facebook already hinted at something like this at its News Feed redesign event last week. Breaking up the entire feed into separate verticals — like photos, music, and the entiresharing stream instead of only some shares — was the most Twitter-y thing Facebook has done yet. I’m surprised they didn’t introduce the linked hashtags throughout the service at the News Feed event.

But drilling down on the hashtag specifically is a direct affront to Twitter, potentially dipping into Twitter’s valuable ad dollar territory.

Look at it this way: Imagine the power, Twitter would say, of an advertiser sticking an ad in a user’s face at the exact time they want to see it. If a user follows a hashtag about, say, #desserts, a company like Hostess could sell ads against anyone who searches that hashtag, sticking a promoted tweet for their delightful pink Sno-Balls in front of everyone following the hashtag. It’s a practice that’s slowly catching on for the advertisers who can understand it (but not every brand is totally up to speed on how to best advertise on Twitter).

Facebook, on the other hand, can’t tap into that trending sentiment quite as effectively. While the company does attempt to place relevant ads in the News Feed and lower-right-rail to reach its users, it would do better to let people dig deeper into trends across categories. So blatantly ripping off Twitter makes some sense here.

And Facebook has hinted that this could be a reality for the site. In January, the company debuted Graph Search, the nascent way of digging deep into Facebook by making connections through the Friend Graph. Also, Instagram has used hashtags for some time, though that seems to have grown out of the language of Twitter.

Essentially, edging in on Twitter’s advertising territory by offering a better way to connect ads to users could spell trouble for Twitter.

But there’s a glass-half-full way of looking at this.

One of Twitter’s largest issues has been its difficulty translating just how normal people are supposed to use the hashtag in the first place. When on-boarding new users, they’re faced with a litany of “at symbols” and hashtags, a language of Twitter’s own that isn’t immediately clear. Not to mention the difficulty of letting users know how to use hashtags effectively in search and discovery; right now, Twitter’s search and discovery tab has improved, but it has long been terrible.

So Facebook’s widespread adoption of this language could actually bring the lexicon to the masses, essentially introducing a billion newbies to a gnarly language — one which Twitter is still trying to figure out how to introduce to users.

Remember, Twitter: Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Just hope that this rip-off is to your advantage.

Source:allthingsd.com

Check Out Also:

How Social Media Impacts SEO ~ "Tweeting Cuts Indexation By 50%"

• Work towards success with other non-competing dealerships
• Learn what works and what doesn’t work
• Compare and share information with Internet Sales Professionals and experts
• Receive guidance on everything and anything Internet Sales related.
• Learn to sell MORE CARS, MORE OFTEN, MORE PROFITABLY 

Internet Sales 20 Group March 19th 20th and 21st Dallas TX

Click Here To REGISTER NOW!

This is part 1 in a series about building brand ambassadors at the dealership. I'll be adding more parts later, but here is the series so far:

• Turn Social Media into a Brand Ambassador Factory
• The Importance of Brand Ambassadors
• How to Identify Potential Brand Ambassadors
• How to Approach a Potential Brand Ambassador About Social Media
• The Actions Needed to Build True Brand Ambassadors

_______

It isn’t what you’re saying on social media that has the biggest effect on your business. It’s what others are saying about you that makes the true impact.

I’ve used those words in various forms since 2008. It’s become a cliche in my own mind because I have to say it so often; many businesses we talk to haven’t gained that understanding by the time we have our consultation even today in 2013. It’s not their fault. The social media marketing industry is challenged with laziness in many ways. Building brand ambassadors is hard work so many “gurus” prefer to stick with what they can do easily, namely posting random things and pushing for likes, retweets, +1s, repins, and other components of social media promotions that are useful but that aren’t as important as they lead their clients to believe.

There are three truths that need to be understood about social media marketing:

• It’s a communication tool more than it’s a broadcasting tool.
• Getting others to talk about your business in a positive manner is the most powerful thing that can happen to influence your business through social media.
• It isn’t as hard as most think but it takes more effort than most are willing to allocate.

The easy road is to post interesting or entertaining images, text, video, or links. The more fulfilling road is to play outside of your own profiles, to make your social profiles a conduit rather than a hub, and to do the things that encourage the customers or clients who love your products, services, or ways of doing business to advocate for you online.

It’s about building ambassadors, and as inhumane as this may sound, you should be building a brand ambassador factory. Sounds creepy. Almost makes it seem like an allusion to Soylent Green. Thankfully, we don’t have to turn our customers into feed in order to make this work. We simply have to make them happy and give them the opportunities and prompting to tell the world that they love you.

The processes to do this differ from business to business. There are too many moving parts from one industry to another and from one store to another within the same industry to be able to post a roadmap or guide that would do justice to the topic, but over the next week I will be posting articles that give some general concepts to help you develop your own plan. The best way to stay on top of this (there will be much more written on this specific topic) and other social media marketing concepts is to subscribe to Soshable by Email.

More to come on this important topic very soon…

Topic:

Top 20 Things You Can Do To Fix Your BDC

Description:

Tom Stuker may be the most famous person you’ve never heard of — unless, of course, you’re in auto sales. Stuker is to car dealerships as Tabatha Coffey is to hair salons: a highly sought-after consultant with the plainspoken, proven power to get stalled businesses moving again.

Now, Stuker may be giving Coffey a run for her money in her adopted milieu of reality television: Spike TV has commissioned six episodes of Car Lot Rescue, a reality show centered around Stuker, who is billed as “the greatest car salesman of our time”. Though Stuker’s website offers online training, we assume that the bulk of the action on Car Lot Rescue will involve Stuker’s nearly nonstop travel to right wrongs at dealerships around the globe.

• Work towards success with other non-competing dealerships
• Learn what works and what doesn’t work
• Compare and share information with Internet Sales Professionals and experts
• Receive guidance on everything and anything Internet Sales related.
• Learn to sell MORE CARS, MORE OFTEN, MORE PROFITABLY

 Jeff Gordon and Pepsi MAX go to a car dealership where a disguised Jeff Gordon takes an unsuspecting car salesman on the test drive of his life. #GordonTestDrive

• Work towards success with other non-competing dealerships
• Learn what works and what doesn’t work
• Compare and share information with Internet Sales Professionals and experts
• Receive guidance on everything and anything Internet Sales related.
• Learn to sell MORE CARS, MORE OFTEN, MORE PROFITABLY 

Internet Sales 20 Group March 19th 20th and 21st Dallas TX

Click Here To REGISTER NOW!

Fresh off another successful week, putting good people together with great Dealerships.

I had a blog post request (felt nice, my first one), how when do we call back Unsold Showroom Traffic?  Best answer URGENTLY, but seriously here is my game-plan.

Let' start with what to say, and then when to call.  We need to use the most motivating factors we have, the 4 major components of paying for a car; Payment, Down Payment, Trading Value, and Price.  The highest motivational factor for a client is movement on one of the four ends.  In that light the schedule below is going to roll through incentives on each area, until one hits the client's hot button and brings them in.

First call:

This is a two-part.  When the client's taillights are on the driveway, leave a message on either their home phone, a text, or an email.  This is going to be a "Great News" message.  "Thank you Mr & Mrs Client for allowing me to try and earn your business.  I have some great news for you, and will give you a call in a few hours."

Get off the phone and ask your Management if it is okay to have the client revisit the store to have a secondary appraisal done.  Once you get the go-ahead call the client (in about 2 hours) and say, "As I mentioned I have great news, I have a second Manager here at ABC Motors that is willing to take a second look at your vehicle and try and enhance your trade value.  We would really love to see you and your car again.  We are sincerely eager to earn your business.".

If that doesn't get an appointment for you next step is to set up the call for the next day.  "I am really motivated to help you, so I am going to ask our Finance Manager tomorrow morning what he can do to sweeten the finance package.  I will call you at ____"

Call Two:

The following morning, corner your Manager and ask what can be done about getting a better interest rate, or term to lower the payments.  Call the client and say, "I had a productive talk with Management about your deal, and I feel we have everything in line to get this done.  Your new payment is ______, it is a significant savings because we really care about where you buy your next car."

If that doesn't motivate an appointment, time to move on to Price.  Set up your next call with, "I never mind rolling up my sleeves and putting in the extra work to save my clients a few bucks.  I am going to bug the General Manager tomorrow morning, and see what can be done to really WOW you.  I'll give you a call at _____"

Call Three:

First thing in the morning, go to Management.  Tell them you have had a client floating for 72 hours now, and need to give them a jolt to get in the door.  This can be done through a coupon, incentive, or discount.  The important part to understand here is that the odds of retaining this client are now getting to a critical stage.  This person has now been shopping for 72 hours and has more than enough information to make a decision.  

"Mr & Mrs Client, this is fantastic!  I really feel like I have a winner here for both you and I.  Your purchase price will be ______.  Would like to come here to finish this, or should I just head over to you with a Buyer's Order?  (if no)  You don't need to do this today do you?  (Almost everyone says no, why?)  This might not be the only car for you, in order to give us both a little flexibility why don't I check not only what I have on the ground, but what I have coming in the next few days.  What time tomorrow are you available for me to go over the results?"

The last portion is a take-away close.  Either the client bites back on the car you are selling, by telling you the car is perfect, he just has some other objection, or the client backs off and tells you to research inventory.  That tells you the client wasn't sold on the car.

If you treat every client that leaves like a Five Alarm Fire when they leave, you will get more back.

Next blog post, objections, why you should love them!

(Informal) FREE Webinar On "How To Properly Optimize Your Videos For Your Dealership" - (LIVE) Video SEO from Dealer Synergy on Vimeo.

http://www.internetsales20group.com

(Informal) FREE Webinar On "How To Properly Optimize Your Videos For Your Dealership" - (LIVE) Video SEO

This is part 2 in a series about building brand ambassadors at the dealership. I'll be adding more parts later, but here is the series so far:

• Turn Social Media into a Brand Ambassador Factory
• The Importance of Brand Ambassadors
• How to Identify Potential Brand Ambassadors
• How to Approach a Potential Brand Ambassador About Social Media
• The Actions Needed to Build True Brand Ambassadors

_______

We’ve all heard the cliches.

• “Build raving fans!”
• “Word of mouth is the best form of advertising!”
• “Delight your customers!”

These sayings would start to get really annoying if they weren’t 100% correct.

As I said in part 1 of this series, it isn’t what you’re saying about your brand on social media as much as it’s about what other people say. Unfortunately, many people only talk about a brand if they have something bad to say. To counter this from both a reputation perspective as well as an exposure perspective, brand ambassadors are the most important people in your public relations world as it pertains to social media.

Everyone already knows that you love your brand, that you believe in your product, and that you have the best of everything to offer your customers in your opinion. If you didn’t believe that, you wouldn’t be in business, so most claims by a company are not believed. Not every brand can be the best, but every brand claims to be the best. As a result, people go to two forms of outside sources to confirm or deny claims. They go to experts in many opinions – Roger Ebert has made and broken many movies with his words over the decades. The other place they go thanks to the power of social media and review sites is to their peers. What are other people who have already tried your brand, product, or services saying about you?

The presence of brand ambassadors is not just a matter of encouraging happy customers to write reviews. Reviews are great and extremely important, but there’s no real “skin in the game” when they post to these sites. They’re one within a group. If a company has 100 Google Local reviews, what’s one more added to the mix, at least from a customer’s perspective. It’s not a personal thing when someone posts to review sites.

Social media, on the other hand, is a personal thing. Those who take their social media seriously are much less likely to say something good about a brand. When they do, it actually means something. Their friends and family who already have an opinion about the person will take their recommendations on social media more seriously. This isn’t even taking into account Facebook Graph Search which has the potential to amplify this even more (we’ll see). This is simply looking at the state of social media today. If someone’s willing to say that they love your brand, product, or service on social media in general and Facebook in particular, it’s the most powerful review anyone can give you.

It’s the “skin in the game” that isn’t present on review sites.

If your company is actively building brand ambassadors, you’re  already seeing the amazing results. You’re hearing from your customers either through social media itself (“You were right, Bob. ABC Motors took great care of me, too!) or at the store itself. If you aren’t hearing about people coming to your store because they heard about your from a friend, you’re not building brand ambassadors. I’m not trying to use circular reasoning here. Just stating a fact. If you build brand ambassadors regularly on social media, you will hear about it at the store. It’s that simple.

In the next story, we will go into detail about how to identify potential brand ambassadors. In the meantime, be sure to subscribe to Soshable by Email to get the full scoop on how to make the most out of your social media marketing efforts.