Automotive News Canada - December 2022 - S11

BEST PRACTICES 2022
11
FROM THE
dealers
vehicle deliveries, customer endorsements
and vehicle spotlights. Rarely seen are " buy
now " pitches, said Holtz.
SALES PITCHES ARE TABOO
TikTok users " can smell an ad coming
from a million clicks away, " he said.
Instead, content focuses on what viewers
care about, such as a vehicle's computing
power and sustainability. Sometimes, TikTok
users just want to be entertained, Holtz said.
There's no right or wrong approach, but " you
have to have fun on TikTok. "
At Medicine Hat Nissan in Alberta, sales
associate Taylor Hockley produces and
appears in TikTok videos, including one in
which she shows off her " ladies " - various
vehicles - while lip-syncing to a seductive
male voice.
" Taylor has been a great representative
for us, " said Sales Manager Jastej Arora.
" We're being very progressive in how we
market. "
Hockley pitches ideas, and management
ensures that the content stays within the
dealership's community standards of good
taste, Arora said.
" We've seen [dealership] traffic coming in
through [Hockley's TikTok] account. "
BUILD THE BRAND AND A BOND
Tsai said TikTok is most likely to succeed
when the vehicle is the type a typical user of
the medium might buy - such as an affordable
entry-level vehicle.
" If I'm a Mercedes dealer, I might want
to stick with more traditional media, " Tsai
said. " If I'm selling Kia, then I'm likely to be
after a younger audience. "
Kasparian notes that TikTok is a long
play; dealers should not expect instant sales
results. HGregoire uses it to " focus on brand
notoriety and relationship-building " with
young people who are either buying their
first vehicle or soon will be.
" The goal behind our social media strategy
is to build more of an in-depth and meaningful
relationship with our end consumer, "
Kasparian said. " It's not necessarily to sell
directly or drive customers to the dealership. "
Tsai
said regular postings - at least weekly
- help build audience. But he has one key
piece of advice for dealerships.
" Comedy is great, but make sure it
works, " he said.
" There's a billion of those videos out
there, and only one per cent will go viral. "
- ANC
FEBRUARY
EDITION
FROM THE
MARCH
EDITION
FROM THE
The days of buying cars off the
lot could be over, permanently
'Get used to it. This
APRIL
EDITION
By DOUG FIRBY
CALGARY CORRESPONDENT
EDITION
FROM THE
MAY
EDITION
FROM THE
EDITION
FROM THE
JUNE
JULY
ORDER-AND-WAIT PRACTICES
have become the norm during the
current vehicle-supply crunch and
will become the way
most people buy vehicles
in the future, auto
retailing analysts say.
Automakers have
been forced to restructure
inventory management as customers
wait weeks, months and even
years for their preferred vehicle. In
the process, companies have learned
that having a leaner inventory can
be more profitable than the old
norm, they said.
FROM THE
AUGUST
EDITION
FROM THE
SEPTEMBER
EDITION
FROM THE
OCTOBER
EDITION
FROM THE
" Get used to it, " said John
Bardwell, an automotive product
strategist at Bond Brand Loyalty
in Toronto. " This is not going to go
away. This is how
Apple and Tesla
have become so
profitable.
" [Dealers] are
selling maybe a
few less vehicles,
but they're making
full margin on
every one. "
NOVEMBER
EDITION
Buyers have
learned from
industry disrupters
such as
Tesla, Rivian
and Lucid that
they should
expect to wait
Bardwell: What
dealers lose in
volume they
make up for with
greater profit.
FILE PHOTO
for their vehicle, said Jeff Williams,
president of Absolute Results
Productions Ltd., an automotive
sales training and mar keting company.
Once the inventory shortage
has eased, dealers of legacy automakers
should plan to have a sixmonth
backlog of orders in the pipeis
not going to go away.
This is how Apple and
Tesla have become
so profitable'
line, Williams said on the June 24
Automotive News Canada podcast.
Every order ensures a future sale
and that the customer will not defect,
he said.
Williams: Tesla,
Rivian and Lucid
have trained
buyers to expect
to wait for their
vehicles.
FILE PHOTO
" If you don't
have a pipeline
of orders,
you are failing
for tomorrow, "
Williams said.
Dealers can
expect to benefit
from smaller,
less expensive
dealership
buildings and
from reduced
carrying costs
by having a
much smaller
inventory,
Bardwell said.
The trick, he said, will be to find the
sweet spot of smaller supplies while
being able to deliver a vehicle for
customers who can't wait.
A FRIEND, NOT A CLOSER
Bardwell and Williams both said
the key skill for sales staff has shifted
from the ability to close a sale to
nurturing long-term relationships
through gaining and retaining the
trust of every buyer.
" Now, it really becomes about
relationship management, " Bardwell
said.
Although order-and-wait is a
" completely new experience " for
automotive retailing, he said, it
is common in other sectors of the
economy. " Think about what people
do [when they buy] condominiums,
what they do for sofas [when
they choose fabrics and then wait], "
he said. " The ordering becomes an
event. "
" The thing you want to do is to
keep the excitement high. "
A digitized ordering process opens
the door to greater transparency,
Bardwell said. Buyers could be given
the ability to track their order rather
than call the sales consultant - perhaps
even enabling the buyer to see
the status in real time, he said.
- ANC
Automotive News Canada - December 2022

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