Rey Rey - Bad email remove

[mattwatson81]

Doesn't it not have an HTML WYSIWYG editor when sending emails either? If you want to send an HTML email you have to know HTML?

 

[joe.pistell]

God help ReyRey if the equivelent of "DealerRater" pops up. I won't get any work done! hahaha

 

[Jeff Kershner]

Joe, you're killing me.

I need to roll through my business cards. I met someone at the last Wards Dealer Conference and the dude was from I believe AIM Data and I guess Reynold bought. He seemed really knowledge on Contact Management. Of course it would not surprise me if you don't already know him.

 

[DrewAment]

Joe, thanks for the good laugh, but also good information. I have liked what little I have seen with Rey-CM, and I love that is is DMS integrated! But, as you pointed out there are still a few pitfalls. However, is that not the case with all CRM's? They each have their pros and cons.

I swear we could take a little from each and develop the most kick-ass CRM. VinSolutiuons is the closest I have seen in terms of working with and developing based on dealer needs/wants - my hats off to Matt and his team.

Doesn't it not have an HTML WYSIWYG editor when sending emails either? If you want to send an HTML email you have to know HTML?

They do offer a little HTML editor now. They used to recommend to create the email in MS-Word then paste, then "stripe" the Word code (they had a button). What a screwed-up workaround. I cringe at the thought of what the emails looked like.

 

[mattwatson81]

I swear we could take a little from each and develop the most kick-ass CRM. VinSolutiuons is the closest I have seen in terms of working with and developing based on dealer needs/wants - my hats off to Matt and his team.

Thanks Drew, that is what I'm working on every day. We have signed up some of the largest dealers there are and everyone of them makes our system just a little better. I look at our customers as partners, not as customers. Perhaps this is why we have grown 50% in the last 6 months. :thumbup:

 

[Jeff Kershner]

If anyone has any issues or questions on Contact Management I would give Larry Bruce a call at Reynolds. He's Vice President of Managed Marketing Solutions and seemed to know his stuff, well some of it at least. He was a speaker at the last Wards Dealer Conference. He gave me the impression that Contact Management was the shit...

His office number is 713.718.1405. I won't publish his cell or email here but if someone needs it, PM and I will share.

 

[andwrig]

Fellas:

We use Contact Management. We have challenges from time to time but nothing like we used to. I know Larry Bruce and the MMS product is pretty darn good. Joe - I have a guy in Dayton, a CM support staffer, that I'd be happy to put you in touch with that helps me out whenever we have an issue. Like any software system, CM has its bugs, but I think it does basics very well. It is extremely effective at tracking all lead types (email, phone, walk in) as well as simple things like Be Backs, Negotiations, TO's, etc. Sounds like an automatic in any system of this nature but trust me when I tell you that I've seen and used other systems that claim to be the cat's meow and thaey can't do the basics. All sizzle and no steak. Plus the survey creation functionality in CM is the best I've seen especially for dealers that have robust follow up processes in place and want to be able to track results and quickly respond to customer complaints.

I've written on DR Forums before that Reynolds biggest problem is communication with their dealers. They come up with fixes, updates and best practice suggestions all of the time but then fail to communicate them to their dealers. I have been telling them for a long time that they need a customer forum section and a blog on my.reyrey.com so customers can share best practices and troubleshoot problems.

As for the problems you are having with your reps, shoot me an email [andy (at) vinart (dot) com] and I will get you in touch with the right people in Dayton. You shouldn't have to put up with that crap.

I have been lobbying big time for CM to be the future GUI interface for ERA but I think I'm losing that battle. CRM systems are the future of car dealership customer interactions. Desking, Communication, RO Generation, Email, Parts Ticket creation, etc. ERA should be nothing more than an accounting and payroll management system. To use it for anything more would be counterproductive with the way technology is changing.

Either way, I share in your frustrations on certain things. It sounds to me like you are not getting the right feedback from the right people.

Andy

 

[joe.pistell]

ReyRey Support is 1st class. They have no equal. Period.

Andy, how do you generate, print and track an smail mail campaign thats NOT printed internally? 3+ years this has been going on.

Reminds me of a campaign that I built a few years ago. Lets see... it was past customers X months ago, but, DID NOT lease. Did they fix that one?

You like the UI? I don't. I'd bet that 90% of the managers don't use 5% of the platforms horsepower. Just add a rep to the system and wrestle with flip floping "reverse visibilty" in your mind for 10 mins, or, how about that mind-numbing "privacy opt out yes or no" cluster f*.

If all this is simple stuff to you, you must be MENSA.

Joe

 

[andwrig]

Joe:

I hear you on the snail mail tracking. They only snail mail marketing campaigns I do are direct thru Honda and Acura and they give me fabulous reporting similar to what you are asking Reynolds for. I agree with you that they should be able to track outside mail campaigns thru the list importing functionality but for whatever reason they can't. They thing i don't like about list importing though is that it creates duplicates but they are only duplicates in CM but not ERA so it confuses the sales guys but F&I using ERA is fine. That was a big cluster and we stopped that. You really ought to talk to the guys at Managed Marketing Solutions Joe, they are on the ball and have a pretty darn good product. They will do a lot of the stuff you are asking for and frees up your time to do other things.

The UI is nothing fancy but I've used fancy UI systems and all they are is a fancy UI. Reynolds has been working on the UI and a dashboard feature for about two years now but they keep running into system slowness issues. I think they've corrected a lot of the slowness issues they had before and i think they are reluctant to release anything new that would jeopardize that given what they went thru to correct the problem the first time.

CM is the same as ERA or any DMS or CRM for that fact. Utilization is the number one issue. They just did an analysis of our utilization and I think we were around 55% which they said is high.

I hear you on all the gripes but on balance the system works pretty well even though it doesn't have all the flash and dash of other systems. At the end of the day its about managing your data and accountability, at least for me. Before I used to think the CM wasn't getting it done for me. After a brief hiatus, I discovered that it actually works pretty well.

I still think Reynolds should create and advertise a best practices forum for CM users because we stumble on more things then they do sometimes.

 

[DrewAment]

Reynolds just told me that they do not remove bad email addresses from the database when you do an email blast in contact management.

They made mention that if enough dealers requested, they might add the feature.

I am thinking of other CRM's now, and can't think of one that does not remove a bad email address (or at least "opt-out" the email) when a bad email bounce happens.

Anyone on ReyRey - please click the HELP button in the upper right and "Send Feedback"

Thanks!

Sorry to beat a dead horse (mine is on life support), but if any of you on ReyRey CM can please submit a trouble ticket for this, might get the ball rolling a little faster.

Also - I just found out that you cannot send out an eBlast to over 10,000 people at a time. Correct that, it won't let you BUILD a list with over 10,000 people. Complete BS. Esp at this one dealer I am consulting for that has over 1mil email addresses!

So I get on the phone with ReyRey help desk, who proceeds to tell me it is so we won't get blacklisted by sending out to many emails at once...but then proceeds to tell me that we can create each list based on a last name filter (a-e, e-j, etc) to keep each list down below 10k. I also informed her that CRM was supposed to make a dealer's life easier, and not a time waster. And this, IMO, is a huge time waster. Why not just "throttle"/limit the amount and timing of each email?

Funny thing is that I took the time to create each list, and then process each one, and it sent out the emails - just like it would have if it let me process all 50k at once!

I proceed to tell the help desk that also used to blacklist IP's. etc - is the amount of BOUNCES a server sends in a short amount of time...see point above, and that they should really be focusing on removing bad email address.

So, IMO - ReyRey should focus on removing bad/bounced email address. It is NOT that hard. And, allow dealers to create lists over 10,000 in size - there should really be NO size limit.

Anyone have any contact info for a higher up at ReyRey?? - would love to explain this and have an open 2 way intelligent conversation with someone.

Thanks!

--Drew