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Internet Lead Follow-up

Regarding the decrease in lead volume, I would suggest, if this is true, it has a lot more to do with the abysmal follow up of some dealers and the lack of transparency of so many others. They have driven the consumer deeper into their computer.

DealerRefresh has no shortage of digital marketing geniuses, but so much of this is wasted on passive salespeople who are more concerned with upsetting a customer because they are calling once a day rather than looking at it as their duty to each customer to make the process of buying a new car an enjoyable experience.
 
Joe, I read the study and have a few questions pertaining to the value of this information in TODAY'S market. The Automobile industry has made a huge recovery since the 2010 Sales Year. Do you feel that this study would change given today's climate?
Grant, if you read the article that Joe supplied, you learn that we suck as a group. Looking at individual dealerships marketing efforts, I haven't seen any improvement. Every year, we see the same studies and they say the same thing ...we suck!

I'm obviously interested in the information that pertains to the brand that I was selling. According to the study, 82% of Nissan customers shop online. 24% submit leads but only 12% purchase from the dealership that they submit a lead to. During the same period, my store was delivering over 20% of our leads. Averages remain the best of the worst or worst of the best.
 
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@Grant...month in month out our clients find well over 90% of their sold internet leads are contacted in the first 5 days. Once contact is made its all about urgency and giving the customer the reason to use one of those 1.8 visits with you.

Don't get me wrong - I love the low hanging fruit and think that many dealers do a crappy job converting leads to sales in the initial 5 days. Here's the thing, cherry picking is only going to net you X number of sales. Truth be told, most dealerships are profitable and happy with cherry picking because they don't know any better.

Think about what you said....90% of the customer who purchase are contacted within 5 days. If this were accurate, dealerships would devote 100% of their resources into getting ahold of that customer immediately. Don't get me wrong - early contact is the best way to sell a car, hence the push for lead response times. What happens to the customers your clients do not reach. Are they deemed less important.

Only a small few dealers do what it takes to sell the customers that other dealers stop contacting. The long term process involving customer cultivation and relationship building will add the incremental sales that sets a dealership apart and earns them the success they are after.
 
Examine how much work is required for adequate follow up. I did a chart, similar to the one below, a few years ago. It got a lot of play but not much enthusiasm by many of those that responded to it. The ones that wanted to justify the cherry picking were not fond of my conclusions. I have since altered it in a couple of ways. I had the closing ratio at 10% but have changed it to 20% because I have attained it. I lowered the bad leads to 10% from 15.

New ISM leads/Month First Month

Assumptions:


  • 80 New Leads
  • 10% are Bad
  • 20% are Sold

If we make contact every day, this requires 56 phone calls per day by the end of the month. 56 Leads will carry over to the next month.

New ISM leads/Month (Month #2)

Assumptions:


  • 80 New Leads
  • 10% are Bad
  • 20% are Sold
  • 56 Carry Overs (25% Buy elsewhere, 5% Sold, 20% No Response)

If we make contact every day, by months end this requires 85 calls per day.

You can change my assumptions, anyway that you want, but this is the work load for just two months. Any change just postpones the inevitable conclusion that the work load snowballs. Not subject to debate: the number of calls will increase your sales. How many are your stores making?
 
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Don't get me wrong - I love the low hanging fruit and think that many dealers do a crappy job converting leads to sales in the initial 5 days. Here's the thing, cherry picking is only going to net you X number of sales. Truth be told, most dealerships are profitable and happy with cherry picking because they don't know any better.

Think about what you said....90% of the customer who purchase are contacted within 5 days. If this were accurate, dealerships would devote 100% of their resources into getting ahold of that customer immediately. Don't get me wrong - early contact is the best way to sell a car, hence the push for lead response times. What happens to the customers your clients do not reach. Are they deemed less important.

Only a small few dealers do what it takes to sell the customers that other dealers stop contacting. The long term process involving customer cultivation and relationship building will add the incremental sales that sets a dealership apart and earns them the success they are after.

Cherry Picking? Hardly!

The typical car dealership does not engage on the phone. Nationwide you'd be lucky to receive 1 call in the first 5 days. With this kind of follow up it's no wonder people think internet customers are on a 90 day buying cycle.

Furthermore, for the dealers who do call and make contact, what's the result of many of these calls? Is there a manager on the end of every one that doesn't result in an appointment? Are the salespeople making the decisions themselves on what the next steps should be?

You want to pick up incremental sales throughout the month, just force your staff to turn every unsuccessful first time contact to you, and watch what happens. Unless you're staffed with a team of outliers(in which case you're not necessary) you will typically find your salespeople are not working with the same urgency you do.

This takes us back to a very basic principle. If the customer is visiting 20 sites before they contact, why do you think this is happening? They don't want to waste their time. Think about what they are doing when they submit a lead. They are giving their name, phone number and email address...TO A CAR DEALER. They know our reputation. If more than half your deals are coming 30+ days out, then I need to sign up your closest competitor. There's opportunity in your market.
 
Grant, if you read the article that Joe supplied, you learn that we suck as a group. Looking at individual dealerships marketing efforts, I haven't seen any improvement. Every year, we see the same studies and they say the same thing ...we suck!

Upon reflection, looking around at other industries, I see a lot of sales people falling short of expectations.

I am coming to the opinion that what's wrong is not the people, but management's expectations of them.

Before anyone fires off a reply, consider that for generations, management has never had visibility into what happens between rep and shopper. Technology has changed this... forever.

IMO, the core problem is management's "PRESUMPTIONS OF YOUR SKILLS BASED ON ME".
Managers all got to the top based on a great amount of skills, and, we all "assume" that our sales reps (who's performance we are now responsible for) all have skill sets and the raw hunger that we all possess... just a little less so.

NOT.

I ask all managers, is there an epidemic of clueless sales people, or, is what we're seeing the product of YOUR WORK (or lack there of)?

IMO, clueless sales people are really the hallmark of a poorly prepared team leader.

I said it here nearly 2 years ago: http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f40/black-hole-sales-training-1848.html

"...After we spend $$ on training reps, weeks later we are back to where we started.

Question.
Who's training the managers to be leaders?"

 
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Question.
Who's training the managers to be leaders?"


p.s. it's funny how many managers will sign a check to train their staff, but how few think they can profit from training themselves.

In the first of twelve steps, I'll get this meeting started.

:hello: my name is Alex and I'm guilty....
 
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Don't get me wrong - I love the low hanging fruit and think that many dealers do a crappy job converting leads to sales in the initial 5 days. Here's the thing, cherry picking is only going to net you X number of sales. Truth be told, most dealerships are profitable and happy with cherry picking because they don't know any better.

Placing a different spin on this logic...

We as humans cherry pick. It's in our DNA. The problem is, humans have no statistical method or data to cherry pick the right leads!

But what if you had this data available to you - would you then consider "cherry picking" the leads that statistically had a higher chance/intent to purchase or would you continue giving each lead the exact same attention?

I know what I would do...what would you do?
 
Placing a different spin on this logic...

We as humans cherry pick. It's in our DNA. The problem is, humans have no statistical method or data to cherry pick the right leads!

But what if you had this data available to you - would you then consider "cherry picking" the leads that statistically had a higher chance/intent to purchase or would you continue giving each lead the exact same attention?

I know what I would do...what would you do?

Ahhh, the $64,000 questions. I have a couple of thoughts with this.

First off, not all leads are created equal. This is a fact of life and the car business. Leads are judged in CRM much like a customer is when he pulls up to the lot. Leads are quickly qualified and dismissed much like that same customer on the lot. Due to this, a successful Internet Department needs to have a rock solid process in place and treat all customers the same. You never know who is going to purchase and when until the customer signs on the bottom line or tells you they bought elsewhere.

Let's be real though - if I had that magic crystal ball to qualify leads I would cherry pick all day long AND put in a solid process to deal with the rest (incremental sales).

So, Jeff - are you referring to Polk lead scoring?