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Welcome to Fixed Operations!

Steve Finell

Refresh Team
Apr 7, 2009
18
0
First Name
Steve
Afterthought? To some. But, to others (like me) fixed operations is a way of life. Just as internet sales and ecommerce is to most of you. You're just jealous - go ahead, admit it! Service just has to open its doors every morning and the line of customers starts almost immediately. Cars break. Oil needs to be changed. Customers keep coming back for more. Yeah, you're jealous. Service gets all the traffic!

Oh, how wrong you would be to really envy service. Keeping most service drives busy all day takes a lot of work. Buying a car at a dealership doesn't mean a customer has to use your service department. Quite the opposite. Depending on how the customer feels about the initial purchase determines, in large part, how that customer feels about the dealership. In and of itself, that's not enough to get the customer back for service.

The service customer is not attracted by glamorous showrooms. They want loaner cars. They want 2 minute oil changes for a buck. They want their car to be cleaner than when they brought it in. And, when they pick it up after you've serviced it, they want it to run perfectly - forever.

All sales has to do is sell a car. Service is where the real work happens. Ah, the misguided notions of the old-school.

The more connected sales is with service is with parts, the more connected the customer will be to the dealership.

Our objectives aren't any different. We're all trying to woo customers for life. Sales has CRM software and skilled people. Service has CRM software and skilled people. Everything's separate but, the same.

Welcome to the Fixed Operations portal! Let's connect! Let's make the separate parts of our business work as one!
:hello:
 

✨ AI Highlights

Steve Finell argues that fixed operations deserves more respect than it typically receives, positioning service as the dealership's real revenue driver since customers inevitably return for maintenance and repairs, while Alex Snyder agrees that service involves more complex, faster-paced work than sales. The thread suggests tension between sales and service departments, with the underlying insight that customer satisfaction during the initial purchase experience directly impacts their willingness to use the dealership's service department long-term.

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