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"Cardinal Sins" of the Past...and Present (from Need Help in Deep East Texas)

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eddyshaf

eddyshaf

Hat Trick
Jun 12, 2009
91
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First Name
Edward
#1
Good Wednesday Morning!!

While the progressive thinkers and thought leaders in our space are at #DSES learning, teaching and networking, the rest of us are back here at the dealership - some of us dealing with owners and managers who are not as digitally aware as we might like :(

A phone call from our owner got me to thinking - we have a spot in our front line where there is a fire hydrant, so it constantly looks like there is a "hole" in the line. The statement he made is "we all know it is a Cardinal Sin in the Automotive Business to have a HOLE in your Front Line".

I 100% agree with his statement despite the fact that I have ZERO empirical evidence to back up this claim...it is just something we all KNOW to be TRUE...but I wondered...WHY?? HOW do we KNOW this??

So, that got me to thinking...it is very easy to spot a hole in the line of vehicles displayed on your lot...any new hire porter should be able to make the same assessment with minimal training. BUT - how do you spot the "HOLES" in your Digital Front Line??!!??

So, that got me to thinking...what do the Industry Experts - all those really smart people at #DSES and beyond - identify as the DIGITAL CARDINAL SINS?

How can a guy like me, at a less than digitally aware dealership, begin to make some meaningful progress educating our leadership/management on what they can look for and very easily spot - like a HOLE in the FRONT LINE - DIGITALLY??

I would love to create a list from your feedback and post a poll to identify the top three or five items.

Gratefully and Eagerly awaiting your expert input.

- signed -

Need Help in Deep East Texas :lol:
 
#5
craigh said:
3. Lack of reputation management strategy
Click to expand...

Means responding to bad reviews and the promotion of receiving reviews. I just wanted to clarify as some lurkers might not understand that (one asked me what it meant).

The most glaring holes, for sales, are:

1. Vehicle without photo (this is starting to be the case with new cars too)
2. Vehicle without price

As Craigh pointed out, one cannot forget service:

1. No phone number posted (rarely the case). However a disconnected or wrongly-configured 800/888/866 call tracking number happens often.
2. No answer when the phone rings

I would love to fully get onboard with the service scheduler being present, but the national utilization of those things is less than 10%. There are all kinds of reasons why, but the phone is really the front line of service.
 
#6
Alex Snyder said:
Means responding to bad reviews and the promotion of receiving reviews.
Click to expand...

Absolutely. The dealers that don't have this under control usually only have a majority of negative reviews.
Customers don't typically think to leave positive feedback digitally in all my experiences. We had to build specific strategies, traditional assets, processes and incentives (for employees, not consumers) just to get this process moving. Now all those problematic stores have 4.7+ on DealerRater and 4+ on Google Reviews. Makes a huge difference.

Google reviews especially are a cardinal sin if not taken care of.
https://plus.google.com/100768785856634585678/about

Reviews like this are devastating because Google throws them in the consumer's face everywhere.
 
#7
As others have said,: call for price, inventory without pictures.

Personally:

1) Annoying chat operator pop-up windows every time the user opens a new page. As a user, if I say no once... I don't want to see it again. I don't like pushy sales people, why would I want a website that is equally as "pushy".

2) No email addresses for sales manager/team

3) Forcing the user to give a phone number when filling out a lead.

4) Autoplay anything.

5) Non color-blind-friendly websites
 
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#8
I tried checking with the Holy See, but I didn't get an answer. Outside of Cardinal Sins, I’d classify these five items as my pet-peeves:

1. Lack of management clarity (e.g. weekly strategic changes, empty leadership, hollow commitment, etc.)
2. Complete absence of differentiators (e.g. no mission statements, value propositions, etc.)
3. Inconsistent process (e.g. lack of follow-up, over-zealous follow-up, wrong staff following-up, etc.)
4. Barriers to pricing (e.g. get quote, get e-price, send blood sample for price, etc.)
5. Egregious spending on vendors (e.g. hardware based solutions, 100 year contracts, buying shortcuts, etc.)
 
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#9
Bill Playford said:
I tried checking with the Holy See, but I didn't get an answer. Outside of Cardinal Sins, I’d classify these five items as my pet-peeves:
Click to expand...
:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

Greatness, Bill - thanks for the feedback.

Jeff - Perhaps I should clarify what I am looking for - Super Easy to Spot items which are as obvious as a car missing from the front line on the lot...items that a General Manager or Owner could Very Easily see while Virtually Driving By on the website...Top 4 or 5 items that they could Easily check and how often - daily, weekly etc...
 
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