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CRMs w/ Enterprise Data for Dealer Groups

jon.berna

D.R. Truth
Nov 14, 2011
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Jon
After seeing this article from Brian Pasch LINK, I wanted to see what CRMs are doing to handle this need.

I think most of us can be enamored from time to time by pretty reports but I find the most important need with enterprise information is how it can be used by the "Boots on the ground." The individuals that rely on the complete picture of a consumer profile with all of the information available in one spot in my mind trumps how CRMs can report on this information.

Don't get me wrong the reports are important and a must have, but the way in which the sales people, internet managers, managers and BDC staff actually use it is simply more important. The fact is most front-end users rarely even run the reports, instead they are going from profile to profile all day trying to make that connection that creates the next car deal by managing their portfolio.

I will start with my example from Dealerpeak with a customer that has submitted multiple leads over the course of about 2 years. In the most recent 2 leads in the last few weeks 1 was submitted to our Mazda store and the other was submitted to one of our Chevrolet stores via our negotiate online website. From the profile screen depending on their permissions everyone can see as much or as little as we want. Our centralized BDC staff can see everything, where as the sales people can only see leads for their store. In our group, the managers can see all interactions from the centralized BDC to the customer to maintain transparency of the BDC's actions.

All of the leads, calls (inbound and outbound recorded), notes, tasks, emails, value, campaigns, automated task tracks (called Auto-Pilots) and website activity are all on one screen for all of our stores. The CRM has an enterprise customer profile with all of the leads assigned to the locations. The leads drive all of the reporting, tasks etc. This reduces duplicate profiles and keeps the data clean.

When you start to see this over time you will be surprised how customer cross-shop you. We have profiles that have leads for every store in our 10 location group!

How do other CRMs organize this information in the profile screen?

Dealerpeak.jpg