As February 2016 is upon us, I would like to make a few recommendations that will logically assist your improved bottom-line. My goal is to give you as many examples as possible, so you can see why making certain adjustments will drive success. I would love your feedback, and am always available to communicate with you. Let’s begin with our three ideas.
- Responsive Website: If your web vender has not converted to a responsive website, it is time for you to insist on the improvement. My company is designed to be small, and I personally invested in my own website to be responsive. What this means is that the site works on phones, tablets, and computers. The screen resizes itself so you don’t lose the information on your site. Some organizations had to have two websites maintained in the past: one for computers, and one for phones and tablets. This is twice as expensive and causes two updates a month when your manufacturer updates their incentives. For your information, more customers review your offerings on phone and tablet instead of computers. Be ahead of the curve and make the change now. Example of a Responsive Website: www.GaryTilkin.com.
- Warranty and Incentive Team Members: The manufacturers are looking to add to their bottom line by auditing your warranty claims and incentives paid. Have you or a fellow dealer been audited lately? The answer: Yep. The best way to not have to pay this hard earned cash back to the manufacturer is to play by their rules. The person in your dealership in charge of these activities is worth their weight in gold. They need to be smart, focused, hardworking and extremely well paid. As a matter of fact, over-pay them. These team members need to literally study the manufacturers rules, know them by heart and educate your managers on the rules, especially as it relates to the incentives in the sales department. The goal is that every administrative team member should want this person’s job. Want more incentive to find, train and educate this team member? How much did you pay on your last audit? Enough said.
- Training Your Culture: Stop investing in standardized training (often used by your competitors) that is not in complete alignment with your organization. Instead, start today developing your own written approach, even if it takes a while to capture it all, and then translate your own system into a customized training process, unique to your organization’s culture, vision, processes, and procedures. Take the written material and publish it on your own company’s online university, yes just like the manufacturer utilizes. Invest in consistency like you invested in franchises or real estate. Remember, you can’t hold your team accountable to something that is not in writing or published online. Example of an Online eLearning University: www.GaryTilkinU.com. I would be happy to give you and your team members a tour.
Thank you for your time in reviewing these three business points. I wish you the greatest year in your company’s history. Let me know how I can help or support you.