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You would be very lucky if you (currently) do have a manager that provides your staff with adequate training. But it’s rare.

What am I talking about?

There are many reasons why your managers are not providing the proper training:

1. How did they get promoted in the first place?
   Usually, it’s because they are the top salesperson.
2. Are they qualified to be a trainer and a coach?
   Usually no, as they often say they do not have the time to work with their team.

Now more than ever, your team needs motivation, morale, support and encouragement on a daily basis. If you have observed any sales meetings, they are usually not very inspirational and can be the opposite. It is imperative to ask for real, good feedback from your staff to provide the right training they need.

It’s Adrian Law here from Automotive Stars.

In this blog, I’m going to share with you, how your sales people form their bad habits that ultimately cost you deals, but most importantly how to create great sales habits.

Currently, I’m reading a book called the “Power of Focus.”

In this book, the author shares after their extensive research, that at least 47% of what we do each and everyday is habitual. Now, if you really think about that, it’s pure habits. That means what you and I do each and every day; at least half is on auto pilot.

If your individual sales people aren’t selling you at least 20 cars per month, that means that themselves and/or their sales manager simply have some poor habits. In the Automotive Stars brand new online academy, we teach in depth how to go to from poor habits to empowering habits. For now though, here’s a couple of excellent habits the top performers in the industry have.

Number 1: is what I called ‘Showtime.’

Showtime is where all guns are blazing. It’s lights, camera, action. Basically it’s when you are on. For a salesperson, they often think it’s when they say hello to a customer, that showtime begins; It’s not. It’s when they first see a customer or when the customer sees them. It’s making sure you are presented well, your attitude is good and you are on.

For myself, running things like ‘Road to a Sale’ is something that I do each and every month and have presented it thousands of times now. I don’t always feel like it just like a salesperson may not feel like dealing with a customer. However, when it’s time for me to perform, showtime! I’m ON and will give 100% to the presentation and to the attendees. If your salesperson is a bit depressed or little bit down before they meet a customer, when it’s showtime, they switch the switch and are on. After the customer leaves, they can get back to being depressed or down if they choose to.

For sales managers, when is ‘showtime?’

Showtime for them is any time their staff are around plus when customers are in the showroom. If the sales manager’s energy is low or their attitude is bad, what happens to the sales people? Of course, they get dragged down as well. The same goes if the sales manager’s energy is good and their attitude is good, it picks everybody up.

The second great habit is where sales people in this industry ‘know their why.’

What do I mean by know their why? It’s the reason they go to work. They know what that is. It might be for their family. It might be that they love going on holidays overseas so they are saving up for that. This could be what drives them.

It’s different for different people but you’ve got to know what your WHY is.

What gets you up in the morning? What keeps you going? What motivates you? What inspires you? What keeps you wanting to go back asking for more money? What makes you pick up the phone and make those follow-up calls? What is your WHY?

If you’d like some help discovering what the WHY of your sales team is or you’d like to join some of the elite dealerships in Australia and create great new sales habits through the brand new, online training. Simply click on this link and I’ll see you on the inside.

Hello and welcome to the 2nd part in selling to customer 2.0.

In part 1, we looked at who is Customer 2.0, what attributes they have, what makes them tick and why you need to adapt to get this type of customer onside.

We looked at how Customer 2.0 processes information and how as a dealership you can use negative online comments to your advantage.

In part 2 we will be focusing on meeting Customer 2.0 face to face and how your salespeople can keep control of the process whilst engaging this new breed of customer.

If you haven’t seen part one yet, I urge you to look at that first. You can do so by clicking here

If you have seen it, what’s next?

The Road to a Sale is still as important as it has ever been and needs to evolve. You could say it plays an even bigger role in selling to Customer 2.0 as building rapport, gaining a good understanding of who your customer is, what their circumstances are, and what they really need and want in a vehicle needs to be done with great expertise.

With Customer 2.0 only visiting 2.4 dealerships on average, it’s important to tailor your presentation so you need to ask lots of good, quality questions to be able to do so.

Having visited a dozen or more ‘non client’ dealerships with my partner recently, the quality of qualifying we received was very disappointing and it effected where she ultimately bought from.

You may think that your sales guys are really good at this pivotal step in the process.

What if they are not?

I guarantee sales are being lost if this step isn’t done well. On a more positive note, just recently I overheard a 2.0 customer taking great pleasure in telling a sales person that they had done all their research online.

Luckily, Mark (the sales person) has been well trained and was able to respond positively to this whilst taking control of the conversation.

It’s vital as a sales person selling cars that you are leading the process. I.e. You are in control, not the customer.

If the customer is in control you’ll either not make the sale or if you do, generally you won’t make any gross and probably won’t get their finance etc.

Information V’s Knowledge

Customer 2.0 may know a lot of INFORMATION. But there is a big difference between information and KNOWLEDGE.

A simple way to describe the difference is – Information can be the features of what the car has. (This is what most sales people blurt out.) Knowledge is explaining how the features benefit the customer and showing the customer how they work. 

Provide knowledge as it helps in getting Customer 2.0 to follow you and your game plan.

Another great thing to do is to emotionally involve the customer: With a big-ticket item like a car, most people buy with emotion and justify logically, (logic usually being the $$$.)

Up until this point Customer 2.0 has been looking at pictures and reading user reviews. All this is using the conscious and analytical parts of their brain. The information that Customer 2.0 has are the cold hard facts.

If you can give an engaging presentation and test drive Customer 2.0, do you think that could give you an advantage over the other 1.4 dealerships he or she has or is going to visit?

You bet it does!

If you are not sure how to do any of these things, don’t worry we can easily help you. Learn More Here 

OK, so you’ve done a fantastic presentation and test drive. Customer 2.0 has spent his or her 3.5hrs in 2.4 dealerships and now they want to sit down and talk turkey with you.

Customer 2.0 can often feel like they have the advantage. Why? Because they have a world of information, a whole computer tucked away in their back pocket. If they are looking at buying a car, how can they not get the best price when they can show you evidence of cheaper cars from down the road or anywhere else in the whole country for that matter?

The price is important but if you make it personal, have fun, build value, and be transparent with Customer 2.0. If they like you and trust you, they will buy from you.

Let’s See Entertaining Selling in Action Click Here to View

At Automotive Stars we have the solutions to empower your staffs performance. It will cost you NOTHING to to find how we can take your staff to the next level. Contact us TODAY to find out how.

Dealer Principals from around Australia keep asking me the same question. That question is this – “How do we add value and keep gross with today’s ultra informed customer?”

In this edition I am going to address this important point for you.

The Problem:

The biggest challenge dealerships have faced in recent years is the advancement of the internet. These days we all carry a very powerful computer around in our pockets. This has led to a new breed of customer, who I like to call Customer 2.0.

The question is does Customer 2.0 need a dealer at all? Is Customer 2.0 happy to research, email and buy by pressing the ‘add to cart’ button? With an ever increasing online culture are dealers getting squeezed by more informed, more savvy customers who have researched the ‘best’ price and know the specifications and model lines before they set foot in a car or a dealership?

The good news is YES the customer still needs you!

We are going to look at why this is so and also how to engage Customer 2.0. We will also put forward strategies to empower dealerships like yours and deliver strategies to give sales people back the control.

So who is Customer 2.0?

Lets look at a few characteristics.

• Customer 2.0 Loves posting his or her meals on social media
• We have to know they smashed it at the gym or it does’t count.
• They spend more time online than they do watching TV.
• They prefer emails and text messages to phone calls.
• Customer 2.0 doesn’t trust traditional marketing or advertising and seeks out user reviews.
• They expect you have a significant online presence.
• With small attention spans websites better be quick, there is no patience for lag.
• Expects higher level of customer experience

The good news is the majority of Customer 2.0’s will still purchase by visiting a dealership. Why is that? Could it be for all the web based information they still want a good human experience when purchasing a big ticket item? Or does it mean that they still want to see, hear and feel the product. Or it might be as simple as they want to trade their car in.

Customer 2.0: It could any one of these points, it doesn’t matter which. Just know that either way it still gives your sales people an opportunity to engage them and influence their decision whist getting them emotional about the car.

Website: Customer 2.0’s first contact with your dealership will be via your online presence.Your website must be spot on and that means it looks good and is running efficiently. As I mentioned before, Customer 2.0 will not wait long for a page to load. Maybe you experienced this yourself and thought forget it and moved on to the next website. I know I have!

Social media: Customer 2.0 uses many different social media sites and this plays a big part in his or her decision making process. Having a strong presence on social media sites is an important tool. Especially for this new breed of customer

Embrace your negative comments: This may sound strange but embrace your negative comments, both on and offline. Realise that every company has them but how you respond to these comments can say more about your company than the negative comment itself. Customer 2.0 will trawl the internet for user reviews about your products and business. The simple truth is this, if a company has comments that are all from 100% satisfied customers, nobody would believe it. Customer 2.0 would be skeptical and could form a negative opinion of your company being deceitful.

Right to reply: The solution to bad reviews, is your right to reply. If you can reply in a calm helpful manner by asking the customer to contact you personally so you can get to the bottom of their problem and is a very powerful signal that you take people and their problems seriously.

We hope you enjoyed this blog. Please leave a comment below and click the like button.

Happy Selling!