One of my weekly routines is to mystery shop the internet departments of my dealers, their local competition, and other dealerships that claim to “do it best”.  This is something I do, not just to ensure my clients are following the processes I’ve put in place, but to keep their neighboring dealers honest.  Follow-up best practices and templates are stolen regularly from one area to the next so you must constantly stay innovative.

What surprises me most while mystery shopping, though, is how often it is that dealers don’t respond.  Shocking.  In today’s time, there should be more focus on taking care of customers than a decision to simply not respond to an inquiry.

Leads are not contacted back by our Internet staff for two reasons.  Sometimes it is just that the staff is cherry picking, looking for the easiest sale and disregarding the other.  Other times it is simply because their only response would have to be a negative one.  Instead of letting the customer know the vehicle isn’t in stock and offering similar vehicles, it is just as easy to blow the lead off and not follow up.  Our staff asks themselves “why waste my breath and tell the prospect the disappointing news?”

What I urge Internet Sales Managers to do is to take the extra minute to offer back a reply letting them know that, due to the popularity of the model (or – if used – the great value of the vehicles on the lot), “this particular vehicle is no longer in stock/available.  However, I’ve done some additional research on your behalf and found some other great vehicles that is sure to meet your needs.”  Then, depending on your technology, you can decide to either insert details/pictures of those specific vehicles into the email or wait for a response back.  I recommend the former.

So don’t get scared that you are going to disappoint a customer or hurt their feelings by telling them the bad news.  It is better to be upfront and offer alternative options than go without answering the customer’s questions.  You and I both know that they are likely to purchase a different vehicle anyway so why not approach the possibility sooner rather than later… or never.  Your prospects may not thank you for it, but, at the very least, they will keep you in the running because you didn’t completely ignore their inquiry.  So as Florence + the Machine likes to sing, sometimes “a kiss with a fist is better than none.”

At the 9th Digital Dealer Conference in Las Vegas, automotive ecommerce experts Joe Webb and Bill Playford will be debating the two ways eDealerships come into existence.

Each one of our dealerships are their own separate little planet.  As you move from department to department, you pick up life experiences.  Each different department has its own language, its own lifestyle, its own pulse, its own personality.  As it is with most successful GM’s and owners, the more understanding they have about the functions and functionality of each department, the more well-rounded they become in their thinking.  However, to get to know the departments, it takes a little travel. 

Since we are always grooming each individual in our store to be better, it is imperative that you give employees the opportunity to experience life in other departments, if only for a day.  Make it a requirement.  All new hire orientation programs, regardless of the department for which you hired, should insist each candidate spends time in the dealership’s other departments.  Allow your employees (new and current) to witness what it takes to perform the daily duties required of their coworkers from other departments. 

Dedicate one spokesperson (Department Liason) from each department (Sales, Service, Body Shop, Aftermarket, Marketing, Internet, Management, Finance, Parts) and create an internal ‘Study Abroad’ programs where they can see what goes on behind the curtain.  And for dedicating some of their valuable time to the greater good, the Department Liaisons that are taking the shadows under their wing can be promised the first look when a promotion/opportunity comes up in their department.

Not only does it help build organizational rapport, but it gives your employees the chance to see all the work that goes into operating the whole rather than just the section.  If you do right, you hire everyone with the hopes of them being the General Manager of the future.  If this is true, then you must let them travel throughout the other departments  even if just for a few hours a month or a day a quarter.  The understanding of the dealership on an organizational level will be a true benefit to every employee.

You don’t have to distract them from their focus… just let them see through someone else’s eyes.  Their area of concentration will always be their own department, but if you are an employee looking to grow, or a dealer looking to have your employees love the dealership as much as they love their team, then it’s good to do the ‘Get Around’.

From what I’ve seen during my limited time training dealers, most that believe they have a BDC have a team of individuals dedicated to answering the phones and sending emails. Well someone would have to do that no matter what, so in this instance, you have a Business Communication Center. You’ve created one place where the basic back-and-forth with customers is handled.
The Merriam-Webster definition of Communication is “a process in which information is exchanged between two individuals”.

While I was last on the retail side of the dealership world, I was running a true Business Development Center. The definition of Development is “the act of improving, expanding, or refining.” My BDC team had responsibilities that far exceeded the realm of basic email and phone unsold follow up communication that is so customary in many other dealerships.

A BDC must do more. They must develop business… on their own… on behalf of the dealership… by being proactive… with sales AND service customers. A Business Development Center creates their own opportunities while a Business Communication Center simply handles the normal dealership interaction that others within the store can handle themselves.

Your typical BCC team will handle inbound calls, manage inbound leads, respond to those leads, make outbound internet calls, and set appointments from each of those avenues. A BDC team should do everything above and more. They should follow up on behalf of the floor’s salespeople with calls to their unsold customers. This call can be done under the veil of a “customer satisfaction manager” call, asking questions about the customer’s in-store experience just a few days prior with the attempt to bring them back in for an appointment.

A BDC should also make post-sale follow up on behalf of each individual salesperson. Know that this doesn’t exclude the salesperson from making their own thank you call, but it should be done in addition to so as to ensure no customer is unhappy with their experience. You can’t rely on your sales team, not only to make the call, but to be truthful about what the customer stated. A second voice on the phone is always a good idea.

At the same time, I feel it is the salesperson’s responsibility to ask for referrals. Provided the salesperson has built the rapport they should have with their sold customer, it is easier to extract referrals if the customer trusts the person they are talking to rather than someone they haven’t met.

You should be actively marketing to your database through both phone and email communication. There is no better way to do this than having your team handle upcoming loan and lease expiration calls. Calls to lease and loan ending clients of the dealership were very prevalent several years ago, but I think they have gone away over time. And that is unfortunate. There is no better client to earn than a loyal one you are keeping. Make sure that you have a team and process in place to make calls to these valuable customers.

Not only is your Business Development Center your first line of defense when a prospect calls or emails in, but it should also be the backstop of the dealership. No customer should ever be marked “lost”, “inactive”, “upside down in trade”, “unable to finance”, or “bought elsewhere” unless another member from your dealership, namely someone from your BDC, has reached out and tried one last time. You need your team to play the role of first and last person to touch each opportunity when possible.

Recognizing that a real Business Development Center is the voice of the dealership on every inbound/most outbound calls, make sure you use them in such a way. While I was managing my BDC, we didn’t only manage the customer relationships inside the dealership, but managed the dealership’s brand outside it as well. I’m a firm believer in investing your time in the local community. We executed many grassroots marketing campaigns where I sent out my staff out into the public (and usually accompanied) to work events. From shaking hands, giving out litte give-aways and tchotchkes, running contests, setting up booths at fairs, and attending multiple chamber of commerce meetings, there was not much my BDC team wasn’t able to handle. If they can be the voice of the dealership and are trained, not only on scripts, but product knowledge and customer service initiatives, there is nothing they cannot handle. This is what I consider true business development.

So either require more from your Business Development Center personnel or start calling them a Business Communication Center. Don’t overpay for someone just because they can handle a script, send out well-worded emails, or exchange information between two parties. If you are going to pay a premium for “development”, make it worth the dealership’s while. Make them sound in the art of improving, expanding, and refining. THAT is development.

To ensure a lead reaches its full potential (sale = adulthood), multiple people within your dealership have to get involved. At different points of every lead’s existence there comes a time where different influences must help it along its way to sale.

Simply put, it cannot just be the Internet Sales Manager’s sole responsibility to manage every lead. This is why a Business Development Center is of such importance to so many dealerships. It gives dealers the ability to have multiple hands on each individual lead. If you do not have the benefit of a BDC, you must bring your management team into the mix. However, with a BDC team in place, you are creating both a front line of defense for your dealership as well as a backstop.

If the initial correspondence with an e-lead is handled by the Internet Sales Manager, then I believe you should have a second stage of communication where a representative from the BDC/management team reach out to the customer under the guise of Customer Relations Manager. If a consumer feels as if they are valued and have the attention of multiple people in the store, they may feel better taken care of. At the same time, the second stage calls made from the BDC/management team will alert you to shortcomings the prospect may have felt they had with the original ISM. Much like a BDC call to an unsold walk-in on behalf of the sales floor, a second ear open to a customer’s needs usually yields eye-opening results.

In another instance, when an appointment is set by an Internet Sales Manager, it is only good business to have an additional person reach out and confirm the appointment. Let’s face it…. Doctors are not the ones calling you back to confirm your appointment, it’s the nurse receptionists.

That is the power of the BDC. More than one person making multiple touches to maximize results. It is a team environment. We must make back-up calls for the sales team to unsold customers, to all sold customers, to all set appointments, to all missed appointments, to all potential customers, to all active leads, to all impending lost customers, and to all lease return customers.
And it isn’t just calls that should be made to these consumers, but emails too. Fit yourself with a strong CRM that allows several people to be prompted/triggered to contact each customer (via phone and email) without the lead changing hands. That is a very important trait to have in any good CRM.

A lead cannot and should not be handled by one. It must be handled by multiple. Don’t let the youthful leads of our generation slip through the cracks of our dealership society by letting them fall by the wayside. Guide the leads using different role models at different times through their life to help them blossom into the sale they deserve the chance to be. To raise a customer from lead to sale, it takes a village.

By now, you’ve been monitoring the performance of your store for the past several years.  With the abundance of internet initiatives sweeping through dealerships, the amount of trackable figures has risen and risen.  My good friend, Gilbert Chavez – Director of Operations for Automotive Avenues – always says

“The best thing about the Internet is that it’s quantifiable.  The worst thing about the internet is that it’s quantifiable.”

Basically, that means dealers have been given the ability, for the first time, to truly track the results from their advertising spends and their performance growth.   However, with so many new metrics that can be tracked (click-thrus, time on site, conversion ratios, geo-targeting keyword searches, social media R.O.E., etc), the job of the dealer has become more difficult.  More dedicated to numbers than ever.   So much so, that you may drive yourself a little batty.

If you’ve witnessed constant growth through your internet initiatives and you are doing things right, you may have hit a bit of a plateau.  Your metrics eventually level off and then seesaw a little up and a little down every month.  I beg of you… don’t suffer from analysis paralysis.  Not that a strong focus can’t get every leveled-off metric to increase slightly, but don’t dedicate all of your time to one measurement that has come to a stand-still.  Turn your attention to the end goal: A happy customer. 

Metrics can’t always measure the happiness of a customer (despite CSI scores and dealership ratings).  Trust your gut, pull your eyes away from the teeter-tottering, roller-coaster ride of performance metrics (if just for a little while) and focus on some basic salesmanship and customer service training.

This way, you won’t have a coronary every time one of your numbers dips a fraction.  You’ll be too focused on the good of the store by measuring the smiles on the faces.  Analysis paralysis can cause blindness to what is truly important:  Your customers.

My advice to you? Stick with it. You are not alone. All experts were once where you are today. Often you feel like, no matter how much you want to grow your knowledge or your store’s online presence, it will go unnoticed. In some cases, you may even have your hands tied from improving your dealership’s online profitability. I repeat myself. Stick with it.

Keep reading the blogs/forums/magazines/e-newsletters. If you must, pay your own way to a conference or seminar. Employ the strategies that you feel will be most effective, even if you haven’t been given the green light. (I’m not trying to get you in trouble, but you and I both know that your boss at the top doesn’t have the know-how to monitor your activity in the CRM so your results will be the only indicator that something is different. If you’re right, you win.)

Stick-to-it-ivness is an art. A fine art. It is the Mona Lisa of resilience. In this industry, as brain damage is thrust upon you and more work is laid in your lap than necessary, staying determined to improve yourself and your store is a tall order. We know how easy it would be to follow the orders from the top… phone it in, essentially. It would be easy to follow their antiquated orders on how to connect with internet customers. You could continue to hit mediocre metrics and be safe. The people in power and not “in-the-know” will let you do (what you know is) the wrong things. You can listen to their old-school demands, turn in an average performance and make them think you are doing your job.

Don’t. Fight the urge. Stick to growing. Stick to improving. Stick to experimenting. Stick to enhancing everything you do and then learning more.

It may put you in the sights of management, which can be an uncomfortable place to be, but if you are as passionate about this automotive Internet landscape as the rest of us, you’ll only end up happier by following the path to improvement. No matter if “the man” has got you down, I urge you to master the fine art of stick-to-it-ivness. It will define you.