Evil Dealers and the Slaughter of the Innocents

[Mat Koenig (blog)]

Joe,

I love your passion which I am guessing you convey with the CAPS-LOCK on. The beauty of this dialogue is that there is room for many opinions.

While I fully agree that consumers feel the need to negotiate I disagree when you say they want to.

Dropping price isn't a "reward", it's either an admission that we don't believe out product is worth the price (which isn't always bad if the market justifies a price adjustment) or it's a lazy salesperson/managers way of 'moving iron' to get to the next deal.

Agreeing with Jeff, people want to feel good about their purchase and 90% of that happens in the earlier stages of the sales process.

One last thing, I wouldn't use Real Estate salespeople as an example of "sales" anything. 90% (I left room for the ones who really are good because there are some) of Real Estate 'Professionals' are nothing more than people who list houses and come to work to wait.

If you watch the home sales shows on HGTV you'll see that most of those people are horrible at presenting a home.

Perhaps the reason we have to drop our prices so often is because we, like the folks on HGTV, have limited product knowledge and our presentation also sounds like "whattya think?"

Tune up the skill and service to our clients an our profits will climb. That's my 2 cents.

 

[Scott Hengtgen]

Joe point will taken (and here comes the but), but research shows that the younger generation does not want to play that game anymore. They just want a fair price, no games and let me buy the car so I can get on with my life. The economy has changed, so has the consumer and the way they want to do business or better yet how they do not want to do business. Everything is changing at a very fast pace. The one's that do not want to change will feel the pain. If you really want to know what your customers are feeling just ask them. Have the dealer principal, not the management call the customer from the day before that choose not to do business with you and ask them why. Ask them how their visit was and what you can do as the owner to make the experiance better. It just might open one's eyes.

 

[Jerry Thibeau (blog)]

Awesome Stuff Uncle Joe!

 

[Joe Pistell]

Scott writes:
"...They just want a fair price, no games and let me buy the car so I can get on with my life."

Scott, your right, but your bias is preventing you from seeing both sides.

Think about it.
Shopper makes a 20-200 mile digital search, they land on YOUR car, they stop in to see you and drive it... they like it... and to our utter surprise the shopper offers a lower price don't they?

Stop right there! This is irrefutable. Isolate that lower offer and assign responsibility! We're at this juncture where the real culprit shows up. Whom is it that begins this evil web of negotiations? I ask you, do WE EVIL DEALERS ASK FOR MORE than the advertised price, or, does the SHOPPER WANT IT FOR LESS?

Do you see who is negotiating here? The BUYER is. The dealer has posted a fair price and wants no games.

Simple isn't it.
Shoppers drive the haggle. Shoppers ask the dealer to reduce his price (profit), so, to make the sale the dealer caves. Dealer replaces the sold unit, rent is still due, taxes need to be paid, payroll needs to be met. Fixed costs are everywhere, so the dealer needs more profit to keep the beast alive. He raises his price. And guess what... if he does, what happens. THE PHONE STOPS RINGING.

The mission of this post was a challenge. A challenge to recognize that the shopper is no innocent lamb being led to slaughter.

I challenge you to GET THAT BLACK CLOUD OF GUILT OFF YOUR HEAD. Its a new internet age, the shopper has every tool needed to find and buy without ever haggling. Period.

They haggle because they want to.

 

[mo_radji]

The failure of this post occurs with the assumption that the customer engages in a one-time transaction.

Loyalty is the key driver to any successful venture.

That said it was pretty funny.

 

[Alex Jefferson]

When I buy anything over $1000 bucks I always negotiate because I know I usually can. I'm not an "innocent lamb" at all. In the end I would say it's the classic "ME" syndrome. If I am honest with myself, I know I always want the best product I can get for the cheapest I can get it with the best service I can get. Sometimes I will sacrifice one for the other depending on the relative difference. I'd run if I saw me coming because I know I'm a pain. I think the 10% number that is always quoted for the "tough customers" is increasing. Just because a person does not have a type 'A' personality and is polite does not remove this from this so called 10% number. The "nicest" most unassuming person with a push over personality can now hide behind a keyboard and take on a whole new persona.

 

[Joe Pistell]

Scott writes: "..research shows that the younger generation does not want to play that game anymore."

Scott, Research made in ANY decade you choose would produce the same results. My generation was unique too! We were all about love, peace, free music and give a guy your shirt. We all HATED negotiating way back in the day. Scott, EVERY young buck hates this! There is a ton of performance anxiety made worse because we don't negotiate very often, the stress can make some people go mad.

Negotiating is a "rite of passage" for ALL of us AND negotiating will be with our biz for as far as my eye can see. Try not to get sucked into the buyers whirlpool of self-doubt. Give them a firm hand to hold onto. Someone is going to make a profit from them, but, can anyone take care of them better than you!??! FIGHT FOR THAT SALE!

Just a lil advice from your ol Uncle Joe

 

[sena smh10]

If car shoppers have all the tools needed to find the car at the best price, then why do they WANT TO NEGOTIATE before they buy? People grind (negotiate) for price discovery from the seller. Yes, there are market prices out there but don’t think that market prices from other sellers is ONLY what the buyer is fishing for.

 

[Scott Hengtgen]

Joe I did a little research for myself. I called 200 people all over the U.S., big cities and small cities. I asked if when buying a car do they like to negotiate? 147 of the people said no. I then ased if they bought their last car at a one price store. Only 17 said they did. Of the people that did not buy from a one price store that said they do not like to negotiate I asked them why. They all said that the one thing that they disliked more then negotiating was paying to much. What I gathered from this is that the pain of paying to much is more then the pain of negotiating. If I had not done this myself I would not of believed it.

 

[Donald Pelton]

When I bought my Dodge Neon, I had five thousand dollars to spend. Period. I found the dealer trying to add as much as a thousand dollars worth of extra stuff (Stereo, GPS, Etc., Etc.) to the car's price after I settled on it, and I had to keep telling him that I had FIVE THOUSAND, NO MORE THAN FIVE THOUSAND, TO SPEND ON THAT CAR. I didn't need all the additional stuff, nor could I afford all the additional stuff he wanted to add. Right now, there is a hole in the dash where the radio should go, with some wires hanging out of it.