How To : Surviving The Dealer Snow Day / Season

[Josh Knutson]

Don't we all wish we could have back our youth, when "Snow Days" were actually fun.

For the dealer however a "snow day" is definitely not a word associated with fun... I have cleared off my fair share of vehicles back when I sold cars and understand not only the amount of work and time associated with inclement weather but also the effects it has on all dealer activities from sales to service.

Now working in the dealer app sphere I connect with a lot of dealerships daily and have derived this 4 step guide based on their recommendations:



4 Steps To Transform Your Dealership From A Dreary Snow Covered Lot Into A Winter Wonderland.



1. Off Work and Online:

• With tons of people staying at home this is the perfect time for you to connect with your customers online. Utilize your social media and special online offers to keep your dealership on the top of shoppers minds. People get cabin fever, make sure to let your customers know if you are open or not and if so, offer them something special to make their trek through the snow worth it.
  

2. Big Snow,Big Vehicles: SELL SIZE

• Huge snow storms will help you persuade shoppers with smaller vehicles that it may be time for an upgrade. Their little compact may get good gas mileage, but it sure isn’t going to get them through the snow to work or to pick their kids up from hockey practice. Sell the necessity of these larger vehicles and give customers multiple reasons on why a larger automobile will make their winter much more manageable.
  4/All Wheel drive becomes your winter hero. Show customers that these vehicles mean business, post pictures, videos and examples online that prove to customers that the added cost of these systems and vehicles is well worth it in these snow ridden climates.

3. After Snow Accidents:

• Terrible road conditions lead to lots of accidents and where do people bring their car after its been all banged up…to your service department of course!
  
• This is the perfect time to create a great relationship with your customers, accidents are traumatic experiences and couple that with cold weather makes for an even more irritated client. Make sure you are on top of your customer service and turn customers bad on-road accidents to great in-store experiences that will create a great memory and keep them coming back to you
  

4. Empower Employees:

• The last thing your sales team wants to be doing is spending all day clearing off your entire inventory with your “foam brooms” that seem to take endless pushes and pulls to clear off each car. If you are requiring your employees to fight through the snow to get to work and then spend all day outside make sure you are rewarding them. Happy employees are productive employees. Keep it fun and use the time outside as a team building exercise and make sure you stay warm, nobody wants to work with a salesman who is frozen literally and emotionally.
  

​

Make the most of every season and play your demographic strengths to your advantage. No one wants tons of snow burring your profits so come up with creative and beneficial ways to heat up your dealership all year long.

What specific marketing and sales techniques are you using to draw consumers to your dealership during the harsh seasons?

How are you utilizing the winter months to your advantage?

How do you keep employees motivated during these times?

 

[ddavis]

5. Move south

 

[crmsales]

Hey Josh, great topic as we've had so much weather (for us) here in the Mid-Atl. I like all your ideas, but think you could add this one:

How many people logged into their data mining tool on one of the many snow days they had? You're absolutely right that the dealers best customers were sitting home checking FB and the like. How many of those same customers that purchased their 1 owner 1-2-3 year old car and were in a position to trade it for a newer one with similar payments got a call form the store? I promise you they would've appreciated the call. Snow days are about filling the funnel with future opportunities.

20 years ago as internet depts were becoming the "hot topic" for dealers, I watched so many dealers take a "tech guy", or a parts manager, or a salesperson that wasn't really doing that great of a job and "give em a try" in the internet dept. Nobody would ever do that today as we all understand the value of the communications we have with those prospects. I provide this analogy relative to today's data mining tools that are available to all. Since we see fewer and fewer customers coming through the front door we have to replace those opportunities by mining our database for our absolute best opportunities. I work for AutoAlert (sorry if I'm not supposed to say that). What i know from looking at my dealers stats every day is that when a repeat customer is brought back to the store on the dealers timeline, not when they decide to start looking, the most amount of gross is generated. When they happen in on their own, those same stores make less. And we all know what our average fresh up gross is. Why then would a dealer not make database marketing a way of life in their store, not just a piece of software that they try? Today's data mining tools are easily accessible by rookie sales staff all the way to the DP. The smartest dealers realized long ago what I'm trying to say here. During last weeks snow days they cleaned cars and then went inside and hit the phones to set appointments for days like today. thanks