Does a good CRM exist?

[ddavis]

Paul, salespeople take the direction of least resistance. This will never change.

DealerSocket is a very good CRM.

I always watched the trade line. When I saw a really nice used car, I would identify customers that expressed an interest in that type of car to fire off a short email. I can't tell you how many of these that we sold before it was priced and on the web. We "upgraded" from a CRM that made this very fast and easy.

 

[Eley Duke]

I just went through 6-8 months of really looking hard at CRM systems before making my decision. I agree with Jerry and many others, you really need to do your home work, compare, test drive, go to other stores to see it in use and ask a ton of questions. No two dealerships are the same so you got to figure out what is best for you.

I did a lot of research in the forums here and at Driving Sales, including Alex's CRM multi-post on here that is very informative. I talked to vendors who had experience with different CRM’s, that was very helpful. I read Driving Sales vendor ratings, they were valuable, and while there are pros and cons, I looked for patterns that might be reoccurring cons. I did demo’s on about 5-6, then I narrowed it down to 3. Taking tame to demo it not once, but several times within each module and building a bank of questions along the way. I got down to 2 and that is when I brought in our management team and some key sales and service people for demo's. After all, they are the real super users, and you better have their buy-in.

In the end we had a meeting and everyone gave their pros and cons for each. Then we put it to a vote and it was a unanimous decision by all. In the end our team picked the CRM they felt was the best for our store as a whole. They made their decisions based on ease of use, data entry processes, support, etc. I of course was most interested in all of it, most of all it had to be solid and have good support. I wanted a CRM that was focused on the whole store, and we got it.

Its also not about the money, we choose the more expensive CRM in the end because we felt it was the best for our needs. My advice, don’t get caught up in everyone’s recommendations, sure they are good, but you need to do your research, determine your stores needs, demo, ask tons of questions. And let your team be involved.

 

[Jerry Thibeau]

And the million dollar question Eley, don't keep us guessing.

 

[Jeff Kershner]

I did a lot of research in the forums here and at Driving Sales, including Alex's CRM multi-post on here that is very informative.

For the noobs that are not aware of Alex's series of posts over on the blog- here are the links to each article. I'm sure with some time, Alex will be updating and adding to these posts time.

Until then - Enjoy! If and when you see Alex, be sure to thank him for one of the most informational series of articles around Dealership CRM's.

How to buy a CRM. An introduction to CRM for dealers.
How to buy a car dealership CRM. Reports and Decisions.
How to buy a car dealership CRM. Understanding the costs.
How to buy a CRM. How to pick the Marketing features.
How to buy a car dealership CRM. How to look at CRM Process.

 

[yagoparamo]

The questions is:

Is there a dealer good enough to use a CRM?!

With a smile and without trying to be a smart ass the truth is that many CRM systems in the market are fantastic; implementation and continuous use of it as well as training by the dealer's revolving sales force is what usually fails.

I don't sell CRM systems nor I understand how they work since when I sold cars we didn't have one at the dealers I worked but I'm amazed to go see my clients and within the same street/area one dealer would tell me the DealerSocket (for example) sucks and the next tells me that is the greatest thing ever.

Let me tell you what I found about DealerSocket:

That the dealer using it is looking at Dealer.com's new CRM.
That the dealer using VIN's CRM is looking at DealerSocket.
That the dealer using Dealer.com's CRM is looking at Imagiclab.
That when WE call any of the guys above for help with a feed they all respond right away (including DealerSocket's fantastic support).
That DealerSocket and iMagiclab has reps that gratefully came to my office and showed us their stuff (even though we were not buyers) just to understand how they work so we can help our mutual clients (so they took their time to support us).
That most dealers take time to complain but little effort to understand.

So I think that:

Every CRM has good things and bad things.
That you should not change CRM systems because of some trivial new little thing you think you need (you really don't need that little one thing to sell more cars).
Don't change CRM systems because of that new works full of untruthful statements: Integration.
That support should start by you devoting effort and time.

Which one should I use?

The one that you think your sales team will use.
The one that has a committed rep on the ground willing to work with you over the bumps (there will be some).
The one that has less features but it is easier to use from day one (like your iPhone was).
The one that focuses on what you need the most (sales).

 

[Eley Duke]

And the million dollar question Eley, don't keep us guessing.

Dealer Socket! It was a hands down unanimous decision by our team! Our DS sales rep had a lot of experience in dealerships and DMS as well, so his understanding of the 10,000 foot view of a dealership was valuable.

We all felt DS was the far best choice for our entire dealership from sales to fixed opps. The word "solid" kept coming up in our conversations.

We are 1 month in with DS, so far everything is great, training went well, our entire staff loves the system. I am working on a lot of custom campaigns and business rules that we had been missing. Support so far has been fantastic and very helpful! We are just scratching the surface and getting started, but its solid and going to serve us very well.

 

[ra6209]

Our dealership reviewed multiple CRMs and it came down to DealerSocket and VinSolutions. We don't have much of a retail service department, and our need to drive our follow up and marketing to narrow bands was low to nothing. We liked integrated website, inventory and CRM in one login and integration with Arkona DMS, and we liked the advanced functioning of a wish list and call detail records integrated with an Asterisk based system with only software and no hardware.

You can guess which CRM we chose - VinSolutions. But I will say I was impressed with DealerSocket's CRM and I thought hard about our choice. I agree it is a marriage, and I dated the companies like I was getting married. I really understood strengths and weaknesses of the systems and analyzed how we would use each before I chose. (We are very happy with VinSolutions)

None of them will be perfect. It is software, and there are lots of moving parts in this type of software. Also, these are customized packages serving a niche (sizable niche, true) area. You want rock solid CRM? Get SugarCRM, salesforce, or one of these types of companies with massive customer bases and scale to afford the software engineers that design stuff for large scale robustness but also want you to conform to a basic software structure. But then they may not handle the peculiar aspects of the car business in a way that a niche company writing customized software for that industry can do. You may lose a lot of features.

It is hard to obtain large scale level software robustness while serving a narrow niche. You have to remember that dealerships are a feisty group of negotiators and often small in scale themselves and unable/unwilling to pay the higher cost of robustness. These companies aren't selling CRM to commercial banks with a small group of players dominating the industry - at least not yet (look out for the large dealer groups and consolidation).

The AutoTrader purchase of VinSolutions is interesting. Can they help VinSolutions reach a new level of robustness while also making a good return and providing a competitive price that creates an ROI dealerships like? Time will tell.

I think the most important thing is knowing your dealership's culture, your type of people you hire, your budget and your most important needs from the CRM. Then go find the CRM that fits that best.

These are just my thoughts.

 

[dwagner]

As everyone here has said. all CRM's have good and bad points. When I shopped last year for my old store, we went with Elead. Very Robust product for the caos. Not bits and pieces but a whole CRM. I heard ADP was not so great, so of course, my new store uses ADP. I really would never like to bash a product, but from being so very basic to our system crashing at least once a day. ADP CRM is the worst product I have ever used. I have been in this store just over a month, and have had the same crash issue, and it has not been fixed. At least 1-5 calls a day to have the server reset. No point is having this system. I am on hold right now, for the last hour. Do your research, a lot of great CRM's out there. ADP is not one.

 

[ddavis]

Rob,
Procuring a CRM is like getting married.

So you better pray for a long honeymoon before everything shuts down.

 

[William Bryant]

The never-ending question keeps going...

Let's face it, software breaks. Windows breaks, Facebook breaks, DealerTrack breaks... but good software doesn't break all the time. Or even often. So minor issues aside, you mentioned integration. A never ending moving target all its own from a vendor's position. But integrating inventory should be fairly easy, depending on your definition of that...

I think you should look at the links Jeff presented, no one on this forum is going to be able to tell you "This CRM will solve all your woes!" because we all have different tastes and different woes. I drive XYZ car and love it, while others hate it and prefer ABC car. You will find that good union for your crew but not without much deliberation. You should think about:

- Will this be easy for the dumbest of my staff (not that anyone on your staff is dumb) to use?
- Will the reporting from it benefit me in order to sell more/gross more?
- Can this product grow as my needs grow (your needs will grow)?
- Will everything talk/integrate that I need to talk/integrate?
- Will my managers use it and manage their processes by it?

I train CRM usage week after week and these are the questions and problems I see most often have arisen and determined that they should change from the old CRM to their new CRM. We have a long reference list (Asbury, Sonic, AMSI, MileOne, Paragon...) but don't take anyone's word for it! I used three CRMs in the store before I fell in love with one. It's hard to get a grasp from a demo.

It's kind of like this: I prefer you find a CRM you can live with and manage your sales processes from to help improve usability (garbage in, garbage out), incremental sales, and daily processes to increase over sales and gross-- than choose ours and not feel at home. You have to find the fit that you feel will deliver that without, as you alluded to, giving you the woes of having to fix the software all the time. But just know there is no silver bullet! With so many vendors and integration parties on the market, those who have the most clients in common with other vendors will probably have the best integration with them. It's a dollars and cents thing.

At the end of the day, your managers have to manage their day from the CRM. If they don't, you can forget about the rest of the store. That's what I see every week. And if I can help in any other way, independently, let me know.

Good luck!