Top tips to help car dealers supercharge their business as they prepare for the reopening

11:28 am, December 1, 2020

Car dealers preparing for the reopening tomorrow should not only focus on making their physical sites look great – they need to concentrate on their digital propositions too.

As car dealers across the country prepare to reopen their showrooms, Car Dealer caught up with Sentience Automotive Solutions MD Ali May-Khalil.

In the third instalment of our Problem Solver series, the automotive consultant gives a series of top tips for dealers to focus on as they reopen their doors and during the quieter winter days.

You can watch the video above where the following points are discussed:

Become a retailer not a dealer

Dealers should think about how they build their business into one that can retail 24 hours a day. How do you retail 24 hours a day and build the trust needed to do that? Think about how you react online to customers and make sure you are set up for ecommerce. If your customers can’t book a service on MOT online, now is the time to work out how to make that happen.

Treat digital leads the same

Make sure you don’t treat digital customers any differently. When a customer walks on to your forecourt you roll out the red carpet and offer them a test drive, but do you do the same for your digital leads? Whether its social media, your website or an email do you treat them with the same importance? Ensure you have a digital sales process which times your speed of response and perhaps offers a video walk around of your cars.

Get serious about social media

Don’t just add a couple of posts about a car with a price – because that won’t work. As you reopen your showrooms promise yourself to invest proper time in social media. In the last Problem Solver episode we focussed on this topic in detail, but May-Khalil reminds dealers it’s a long game that builds your brand. It’s about targeting passive buyers and getting them to know your business – social media can build trust in your brand.

Are you asking for the business?

It might be old school, but with the rise of digital sales it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that this is still a car sales game. Online it’s very hard to actually ask for the business and talk like you’re going to end up with the deal – and it’s even harder to work in upsales to a digital process. Whether it’s online or in the showroom make sure you introduce the likes of GAP, extended warranties and paint protection early in the sales process – it’ll give you a far better chance of selling it.

Set yourself some targets

Many businesses fail when it comes to measuring. They think they measure, but they don’t. Set yourself and your team targets and hold yourself accountable to them. Do you measure how much you are making on up-sales on every deal, every week, every month – and are you tracking it? If you’re not, do it. Work on your cost per sale and try to better it all the time. Do you know where your leads come from and importantly which ones convert the best? If you don’t, you really should.

Car Dealer Problem Solver 1: Use your website to buy cars

Car Dealer Problem Solver 2: Should dealers do social media?