Critique Our Sales Process

[benstewart]

Hi all,

I've been a lurker more than a few times here and made a few posts about videos, but I have a more complicated question to ask here.

I started as the Internet Manager (Digital Marketing Specialist, more specifically) at a dealership in the midwest about three years ago.They hardly used the Internet before my arrival and had zero process for reaching out to engage customers who emailed, called, or whichever method even three days ago. We also invested in more online advertising and are on multiple classified sites like Cars.com, Carsoup, etc. Our dealership has experience significant growth over the last couple years.

Yes. our process has improved. But now the competition is getting more intense and we are selling fewer cars. While there could be a million reasons why we are selling fewer cars, our location between two states behind among them, we seriously wonder if we could improve our follow up process.

So here is our process:

Internet/email leads are delivered in a round robin format to sales consultants who are currently available. The salesperson is expected to send out an initial email and make an initial phone call. Honestly the quality of the email varies based on the salesperson and some 'coaching' is needed.

A sales manager follows up with all sales consultants after their arrival every morning to get an update on the previous day's deals.

I pull emails from our previous prospects and send out emails, especially to those who have not yet responded at all. Honestly, most people who are currently engaged with a salesperson tend to email me back stating so.

We have one BDC rep who makes both service calls and sales calls. We have a sizable service department so we feel she is stretched to do service AND sales, especially considering the following flaws.

And here is where I need advice:
We sell a good number of cars, documented, through email per month. We are talking 40+ when our average volume is around 150. This is does not include sales cited as being "from the Internet".

Using a system like Reynolds, my issue is that I don't feel our salespeople are sending out all that high quality of emails. Stating what time you are open, your phone number and asking if a customer has questions is not quite acceptable. Doing so via text is a better method of communication, but still not good.

So... could you tell me more about your sales process?

To sum it up: We have a salesfloor with 15 people who receive Internet leads from me, the Internet manager. I need them to write higher quality emails, but I also wonder if our current BDC structure really works. How would you do it?

 

[jamierat]

Couldn't you create some templates for them to copy and paste and then they just go change the info needed to personalize it?

 

[joe.pistell]

To sum it up: We have a salesfloor with 15 people who receive Internet leads from me, the Internet manager. I need them to write higher quality emails, but I also wonder if our current BDC structure really works. How would you do it?

I feel your pain, I've been there, done that.

Try as you may, your reps will never raise their game unless YOU change "The Game"... IOW, you have to change the rules to get them to give a sh*t.

1st, I totally get your plan, but, Think about it a lil' bit. you don't want higher quality emails (as defined by your standards), you want MORE sales... right? .

Email is a form of personal expression and you want to set up guidelines aimed to please your beliefs (don't take this personally, I tried this over and over and over and I FAILED!!!)

Here's how I fixed it.
Run a report in reynolds to find each reps 'email closing performance'. Sort the list from highest to lowest and draw a bright red line at the half-way mark. Find the average closing ratio of the TOP performers and the avg. closing ratio of the BOTTOM performers. In my case it was ALARMING.

Next, present this to leadership and ask "if we simply give emails to top producers, then we'd would have sold XX more cars last month, PLUS, these extra sales would not have cost you a penny in ad spending".

If leadership likes that, NOW you've got sales reps that give a sh*t about your quality ideas.

If leadership wants a softer, more friendly way to improve the entire teams email performance, then get them to set a 'min acceptable closing rate' and give everyone 60 days to get there. Anyone below the min closing rate is put on probation for 30 days. If they fail probation, they're taken off the list for xx months.

HTH
Joe

 

[Steven Buesink]

Great point - if you want change to occur, build a bridge (using actual metrics) between sales and the change you want to see. In this case, using the @JoePistell approach mentioned above, it's likely that upper management cannot argue against your suggestions. Make sure the bridge is simple and it is easy to see the relationship between sales and the issue.

 

[benstewart]

First of all, a huge thanks for your responses. While some may seem obvious, executing them is another story. I am going to start by reviewing their metrics.

The good news is that I am allowed to decide who does NOT get email leads based on the performance I see, and management is prepared to back me if anyone fights.

I also want to spread the wealth in a way, and generally the confidence and ability in our sales force to write something worth reading. I am going to coach each person individually on how/what to write. Honestly, some of our salespeople have problems and some do a great job. Everyone could do better though.

As for punishments, people know they WILL be removed at least temporarily if they aren't doing what is asked. I would prefer however to have a whole team performing well, obviously.

 

[Rick Buffkin]

If their email is your concern, why not just have the reps to BCC you on the initial outbound email??

The other thing you have to keep in mind is how many reps you had last year compared to this year. Their overall skill levels. And, take a look at your lead providers as well and inspect the quality of the leads year over year.

Look at the response times, and also look at the geo loc of the leads year over year. Maybe there was a slight shift there.

Sending a quality response is important but it's not the only thing that would contribute to sales being way off. Have you measured your lead closing ratio's yet? How about the reps overall opportunity closing ratio (web, phone and floor). Do you have a benchmark for the overall closing ratio for total opportunity's?