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CFrentzen

CFrentzen

Boss
Apr 24, 2009
172
0
First Name
Chris
#1
Hey everyone!

I was just hired at what I perceive to be a mid-volume Chrysler/Jeep/Dodge dealership as their Internet Manager. Let me give you some background so you know where I'm coming from.

When I came to the first interview, the President and VP were expecting to hire someone for managing their detailing technicians. After meeting with me they came to the conclusion that they needed to increase their internet presence (which was minimal, neglected, underfunded, etc). 3 interviews later, I'm hired as Internet Sales Manager. It has been 2 weeks now and there's plenty to do, but I am hoping some people here could help by giving me some pointers on direction and maybe some help with nailing down what exactly my job description should be because at the moment, my bosses and I agree, what my job "is" exactly is not set in stone.

A big project my boss wants is an eBay presence. This is part of my focus, as well as updating our website's specials pages, and trying to determine how best to improve our ranking with search engines. I have also made a Page on Facebook - trying to market it to the local college crowd with limited success as of yet. Another thing I want to focus on is online reviews - these seem critical.

Like I said, I'm new to the industry. I'm new to the job. I'm a newborn. :)

Every week there seems to be 3 more things to get moving and working on in order to increase internet presence and start getting more leads into the dealership through that medium. This is all fine - I'm a hard worker, I have no problem putting in the time. It would help me greatly, however, if anyone has any pointers or tips on what to focus on first for a dealership that isn't utilizing its internet department (which consists of me at this point in time) to its fullest.

Thanks guys - looking forward to talking with you.

Chris
 
#2
Chris - glad you found DealerRefresh :thumbup: there is a lot here that can help you. There are 3 other good sites for sharing ideas in this side of the business: Drivingsales.com, ismtraining.com, and Ralph Paglia's ADM site (you may need to Google that one).

You definitely have a long road ahead of you. The best advice I can give you is to move slow. It is very easy to push buttons and make big changes, but fast isn't always best - most people can't handle it - they don't like change.

If I were in your shoes, I would start with a strategy. Forget eBay and your website for a minute and think about what you want to accomplish. Of course you want to sell more cars, get more people in the service department, or even get more people using your detailing services - those are obvious goals. But how are you going to get those done?

Do you become a CRM guru and teach your sales staff how to better organize their day and stay in contact with their customers? Do you concentrate on making your inventory the best looking stuff on the Internet? Do you create a fancy website and crazy SEO presense to spark 1st party leads? Do you concentrate on the social medias (like faceBook) to garner business from? Do you become the Steven Spielberg of dealership videos?

There are tons of areas to go after. Even the best people can't tackle them all, so you have to choose your strategy and approach it slow. Once you're comfortable with that one thing, then it is time to move to the next thing. Don't allow the sales staff to get your thinking in a month to month mentality - that doesn't work here. You have to be planning for 1 year or 5 years down the road. Something like this:

Months 1-2: observe practices in store and get to know personnel while doing little things like putting cars on eBay to keep the executives happy

Month 3: plan what you want out of your website. Read everything on DealerRefresh! Then think of ways to combine what is happening on the website to what is happening in the stores - read Seth Godin's Purple Cow and Meatball Sundae

Month 4-6 (and forever): get to know the CRM like it is the back of your hand. Figure out how to connect the dots between the things you're doing and the traditional store stuff

Considering you have successfully launched a good website and been able to effectively make strong moves through the CRM then you can start developing processes for inventory control and looking at solutions like vAuto....Cars.com, AutoTrader, and other solutions to help you move them. People will disagree with my ordering of things, but if I could do it all over again, I'd create the infrastructure before unleasing things to the public - perceptions will be better and you won't have as many setbacks.

And keep asking away in here - we're all happy to help :)
 
#3
Chris,

You're definitely doing the right thing by introducing yourself to the group within this forum...

Alex gave a nice overview of an example plan; that's the key - developing a plan w/specific, measurable metrics that will be followed through and not altered just for the sake of taking on a new task - for task sake.

Its not how much your take on, rather how much you accomplish that will measure your success.

Remain consistent with your message and be sure to evangelize that message throughout your store(s). Eventually people you gain buy-in.

Best of luck.
 
#4
Chris,

Some practical questions 1st.


How are you paid?
  • Salary?
  • Commission on YOUR sales?
  • Commission on TOTAL store sales?
  • A Mix of all of the above?
I don't need specifics, but an overiew of your pay plan will tell us where your managers head is at. Speaking about your managers, howinthehell did you go from Detail Manager to a "we always wanted an internet manager... now we got one".

Chris, tell us what experiences and skills that you bring to the table (related to the internet and not related too) that helped you get this new position.
 
#5
Chris,

One more comment. You're in the honeymoon phase, where everything is aok. From what I've read, I am very concerned you're dealing with a manager that dosen't understand the complexity of the road ahead of you and neither do you! That's ok, every single one of us here have been EXACTLY where you are right now. But, what concerns me, as time rolls along, YOU can become the problem, because THEY dont give you the tools & training (read: cash) you need.

In what ever you do, remember these words...

WHAT CAN'T BE MEASURED, CAN'T BE PAID.
Keep good records, give the boss monthly reports and keep pushing for change!
 
#6
JoePistell said:
Chris,

Some practical questions 1st.


How are you paid?
  • Salary?
  • Commission on YOUR sales?
  • Commission on TOTAL store sales?
  • A Mix of all of the above?
I don't need specifics, but an overiew of your pay plan will tell us where your managers head is at. Speaking about your managers, howinthehell did you go from Detail Manager to a "we always wanted an internet manager... now we got one".

Chris, tell us what experiences and skills that you bring to the table (related to the internet and not related too) that helped you get this new position.
Click to expand...

Right now I'm salaried. What my managers and I decided during the interviews was to start salaried and after ~a month (not set in stone) take a pay decrease in salary, then start handling internet leads and get paid bonuses for making appointments for other salesmen, then take another pay decrease in salary and start handling internet leads beginning to end and making sales. Their mindset is they want someone to handle everything-internet and I suppose be another salesman. I've been here roughly 45 days now and I am still salaried at my original amount.

I don't think they know how to pay me and that is another thing (among so many) that I'm trying to figure out. Nothing is really set in stone- it's an entirely new position for the dealership but they understand the concept that the internet has potential, if not the fact that without it you are seriously hindered in this day and age.

The ad for the job was "Internet / eBay Sales Manager". At that point they were also looking for someone to run their detailing department - I wasn't aware of this, so I did my homework and presented my ideas on how to go about starting an eBay presence (researched Stores, fees, pricing policies, etc), what CRM/ILM tools to use, researched Cars.com / AutoTrader (told them Cars.com would be better for our market as it seemed that's what a majority of the demographic in the norhteastern US uses)...

My father also ran an eBay business for a number of years out of his house - niche market product but it got me familiar with handling large amounts of inventory, tracking, payments, how to speak to people via the internet - got me familiar with the whole scene. My assumption going into this job was an already set-in-place Internet Department and they simply needed someone to post to eBay and make sales that way - boy was I off! :D

I'm very well versed in most areas of computers - from troubleshooting to typing speed/accuracy to learning new programs. I am not a programmer but I have taught myself some HTML coding in order to make our website more professional.

I have been teaching myself the key concepts of SEO and implementing them into our website and also becoming well versed in editing the website via Dealer.com's back-end tool, as well as reading the reports that they generate for us in order to reduce bounce rate, increase unique visitors, etc.

One major issue (to me) is that our salesmen are not using the Dealer.com tool in that they aren't going to it to input customer information. I would say half of our salesmen (there are 7 if you include the sales manager, 8 with me, 10 including VP and president) are not well versed in computers (hence another reason why I was hired).

At this moment I'm turning my focus on the eBay store but I understand that I need an overall gameplan (as Alex mentioned and certainly most people would agree) - tactics without a strategy will not give you what you want.

I do not come from the Car industry in any way shape or form. I graduated from a state college with a BA in Management minor in Economics. I have a long background in Martial Arts training which gave me a strong sense of discipline and interpersonal communication. This is my first 9-5 job (I also check my email at home and respond to customers when I have the information to do so). I personally view my job as improving the business as a whole - if the business thrives, so do we all. The fact that I am dealing with cars and trucks means little to me - it's an industry. My job is to increase efficiency, productivity and overall success. Selling more cars is a byproduct of that.

Whew.
 
#7
Reading between the lines it looks like you have a Chrysler Digital Dealer.com site? Can you post any info on current traffic such as visits or contacts? I would also check with dealer.com and see what they can do to help- Attend their Wed. training session which is more of a question/answer session that will help you familiarize yourself with the tools they provide and grow from there. Man this sounds familiar :itsok:but on the positive side you have the chance to become the new hero on the block.
 
#10
Brian Tucker said:
Reading between the lines it looks like you have a Chrysler Digital Dealer.com site? Can you post any info on current traffic such as visits or contacts? I would also check with dealer.com and see what they can do to help- Attend their Wed. training session which is more of a question/answer session that will help you familiarize yourself with the tools they provide and grow from there. Man this sounds familiar :itsok:but on the positive side you have the chance to become the new hero on the block.
Click to expand...

Yeah, we have the Chrysler Digital site and our own site through Dealer.com - they're great. I attend their training sessions every week. I keep forgetting about the Wednesday Q&A session.

And Joe - thanks for the comment...excellent advice to keep track of everything. I do what I can to do just that.
 
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