“Just looking.” is the response of 80% of car buyers when approached by sales people at your dealership. What they’re really saying is, “Thanks, but I just want to shop your inventory by myself right now.” So what is the sales staff to do? Thats the subject of age old debate and strategy, but what if there was a way to give the customer what they want (pressure free easy shopping experience) but at the same time getting what the sales/dealership team wants (meaningful sales opportunity)?
The data shows us that 20% will engage and you’ll get a meaningful opportunity from their visit. The other 80% – you’ll be lucky if your staff presses a business card to them and they’ll hope they’ll call.
Hope ins’t a sales strategy.
Converting visits to opportunity is.
Instead of continuing to be with the customer, who just told you they DONT want you to be with them, your sales staff said this…
“Great! My name is Dave. Thanks for coming to our dealership, we’re so happy to have you! We offer a better shopping experience here at Dave’s Auto – all of our cars have QR codes on them so you can scan to get current market pricing, check out the specs and options, look at the history report and more. They’re simple to use, and you’ll appreciate the easy access to the info you need to decide which car you’re interested in. When you’re ready, I’ll be inside waiting to help you. Can I get you a bottle of water or anything while you are shopping?”
First – you’ll surprise and delight the customer with your reply. A hassle and pressure free engagement. We’ve all seen the endless surveys about how customers dread dealing with car sales, so lets give them an unexpected experience and delight them with our amazing customer service! They’ll be pleasantly surprised with your engagement as they were expecting something completely different and sets a positive tone for their visit and dealership experience.
Secondly, you set the expectation that they should scan the QR codes on the vehicles. If you don’t set the expectation, they’ll have to discover that on their own. Setting expectations leads to higher code engagement rates, which is what you want.
Thirdly, if you have Konect Auto CarCodez on your vehicles, when they scan the code, their VIN specific sales opportunity with verified customer data, including their mobile phone number, will be waiting for you in your CRM or inbox. You’ll have everything you need in terms of opportunity engagement.
Of course, now that you have their number, this next move might surprise you. DO NOT CALL THEM. No really, don’t call them. They already told you they didn’t want to engage with you, so don’t break that trust with a call. Honesty, you’ll most likely just go to voicemail anyways given that they have “block unknown callers” turned on in their phone and you’re an unknown number. People don’t answer calls from unknown numbers. However, they are open to getting a text message from you.
95% of car buyers will read your text, whereas less than 10% will listen to your voicemail.
From Dave : “Hey Lisa. Dave from Dave’s Auto. So nice to meet you yesterday! If you have any questions or want to test drive any of the vehicles you looked at, let me know. Also – if you have a trade in, I’d love to have the opportunity to get you the best value for your vehicle.”
The more helpful you are, the better the experience will be for the customer.
In summary – if you want to dramatically change your sales results and deal flow, you will need to change your engagement strategy.
Remember, hope isn’t a sales strategy. Converting visits to opportunity is.
