Budget for Internet Department.

[V. Towne]

Good afternoon refreshers!

I oversee of a 5 man internet department in a city with a population of 100,000. I have been here a year. I came from a store of with a 15 man internet department with a population of 10,000,000,000.00 plus population. I had an unlimited budget from where I came.

Now my challenge is getting 70 deliveries from my 5 man crew and a budget of 10k per month. Our best month is 50 from last year in June. We receive about 600 leads per month. We average about 41 which is frustrating. Any suggestion to improve the numbers?

 

[craigh]

Where are most of your leads coming from?

You are averaging 600 leads, closing 41 of those? How many of the 41 are not from "leads"?

What are the job titles for the 5 people? Are they sales people or is their goal to bring them in to be closed by someone else?

 

[V. Towne]

Sadly enough half of those are 'actual internet leads' the rest are floor or referrals. We have one Director and 5 dedicated internet sales professionals.

True/Car, Cars Direct, Autobytel, Autoalert, Dealer Website, and variety of others. Our sales professionals can close by themselves and have help closing if needed.

 

[Martin_Bluecar]

Sadly enough half of those are 'actual internet leads' the rest are floor or referrals. We have one Director and 5 dedicated internet sales professionals.

True/Car, Cars Direct, Autobytel, Autoalert, Dealer Website, and variety of others. Our sales professionals can close by themselves and have help closing if needed.

Do you also use Google AdWords? While it's true lot of people use websites like TrueCar, there are still lot of Google-only searchers - do they find your dealership when they Google for your brand and location, like Mercedes dealer Dallas? Also, population of 100.000 isn't that much, there could be lot of word of mouth sales you can generate online (they're difficult to measure, though) like by using social networks to reach people from your area? Not by classic here's-the-car-buy-it posts when you put there a photo of a car you sell, but posts that can actually get people interested in your dealership, or at least stick in their memory and leave a good impression