Newbie ISM needs lots of advice!

[madtownart]

Thanks again for all the input. It's greatly appreciated.

Can anyone recommend a service to help manage GM One Source response times?

 

[Jeff Kershner]

Thanks again for all the input. It's greatly appreciated.

Can anyone recommend a service to help manage GM One Source response times?

Several CRM's have and are working on solutions but there are of course some initiates that need to manually happen on the dealers side.

In a few posts before this one, CatherineEdwards from responselogix so kindly plugged her companies product, though I'm not sure they are working with GM at the moment.

Dealer e-Process offers a response solution - Dealer e-Process: Rapid Response Stop the Clock - again, not sure of this will work with GM.

Overnight BDC is another service that I believe is working with the GM response times.

There might be a few more that I have missed if/when I remember these I will edit this post to include.

Also be sure to check out these threads on different GM One Source issues as well....

http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f5/gm-onesource-changes-coming-anyone-know-anything-727.html
http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f5/after-hour-lead-response-vendors-547.html
http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f5/gm-1-source-leads-254.html

AND for ANY Newbie just finding DealerRefresh, if you have a detailed question please feel free to make use of the Search Box - - it actually works quit well (sometimes I find it to be a little buggy)

 

[ghen]

GM has their own lead management tool, if you want a quick solution that is extremely short term, go for it.

GM Certified Internet Dealer support: 1-888-462-8976 option 4

 

[Craig]

Art,
I'm not an ISM, but here's my advice......
1. Get your GM or at least GSM (maybe same person?) engaged in at least learning about the "why" of internet sales.
Without their understanding of what it is you are doing you will end up spinning your wheels. They don't need to do the actual work part but the more they understand the why the better off you are.

2. Keep reading the vast amount of information here on this forum and on the DR blog. I hit up other forums here and there, but IMO this is the best internet marketing forum in the space.

3. Write out a game plan and build a goal sheet, hopefully with the GM. Have some budgets,expectations of you and your department as well as short and longterm goals. The last thing you want to be is a guy who does lots of work for little recognition or less than your share of the deals because you have a combined role with a lack of upper management support.

4. When choosing vendors look for real partners, lots of vendors have people that can help you tons......lots of vendors have very inexperienced "experts" that know some general terms and have a decent pitch, then leave you hanging with a support staff that doesn't back up there claims. Don't buy in to the "you gotta have some SEO and you need a facebook" salesperson. Research and read online reviews....just read through the lines.

I hope this helps get you pointed in the right direction,Good Luck and Good Selling!
Craig

 

[Eric Hippen]

Craig is right. Have a plan put together of what to do first second and so on. Keep the owner and everyone else involved with what you are doing and the numbers that it gives. The great thing online is the tractability. You are able to show the exact results for most of the things that you do. When I started my focus was on the inventory because the pay was commission only. Used cars seamed the easiest to show impact. We are 30 miles from a major metro. SEO is important facebook is when you have your feet under you.

Have some fun and good selling!

 

[Mitchell Brenner]

I've been at the Internet Game for over ten years so if you need someone to help you with anything, call me. I'll be off Thursday but you can call me tomorrow. Always want good people in the Internet Space (as long as they're not at Acura dealers in my region)

I was recently tasked with taking over our new car "internet department". We are a smaller franchise dealer. We've got Chevy, GMC and Buick. We sell about 450 new cars per year and about 600 used. We have a 15 mile proximity to a metro market with a population of 300,000 (Madison, WI) but we're rural. We get about 90 new car leads per month. My job is to organize and develop the department. Right now its me just responding to leads. No ILM tool, I'm tasked with finding one. Our General Manager's computer literacy level is less than novice and no, I'm not exagerating. Management basically knows nothing about internet sales.

I've been in the business for 21 years. I've got sales, used car manager and F&I experience.

I have a couple of questions:

1. I'm still getting paid like a sales person. How do ISM's get paid? I know it's generally salary + commission. What kind of compensation should I be askng for? My thoughts are at least $2k + comm.

2. I got a list of ILM tools from our SFE facilitator. Any recommendations would be appreciated.

3. General guidance and advice is welcomed.

Thanks in advance!