Digital Dealer - December 2017 - 12

DDW

// Ownership

FEATURED SPEAKER
By Sean V. Bradley, CSP
Founder & President,
Dealer Synergy

The Internet &
Phones Are the
NEW "Showroom"... Your
Cheese Has
Been Moved
When I first entered
the automotive sales
industry in 1999, my sales
manager at the time gave
me a copy of the New
York Times Best Seller,
"Who Moved My Cheese,"
written by Spencer
Johnson, M.D. This
motivational fable centers
around navigating through
unexpected twists in your
journey to find "cheese" (a
metaphor for what you
want in life). It was this
book that inspired me to
think outside of the box.
I entered the automotive industry at an
interesting time. The
"internet" had just started
to become something. We
were receiving internet
purchase requests from
our OEM via fax! Our
"CRM" was a paper desk
log and a highlighter.
Our data mining / equity
mining and customer
12

DECEMBER 2017

FEB. 13-14
CHICAGO

retention was done from
a little box filled with index
cards.
When I got into the
business, the vast majority
of dealers and managers
didn't like or understand
the internet. Most thought
(incorrectly) that the
internet was merely a fad.
Many in the industry had
negative feelings surrounding internet prospects and internet sales.
After I read "Who
Moved my Cheese," I
was determined to avoid
getting sucked into this
negativity, and instead, I
embraced the internet and
took an active role in overcoming the challenges
that came with it. I studied
as much as I could on my
own, taking classes on
everything from website
design, to SEO, etc. I
earned certifications in
this new field so I could

D I G I TA L D E A L E R . C O M

evolve with the world in
my new career. All of this
paid off beyond belief.
I went from averaging
30+ units per month on
the showroom floor (I
was a sales consultant
but "handled" all the
internet leads because
no one else wanted to),
to becoming a manager
and getting recruited to
a dealer group in Central
New Jersey (Pine Belt).
By 2002, I was delivering
110 units per month online
at a Nissan Kia Cadillac
dealership and holding
gross!
Fast forward 16 years
later to today, where I am
blessed with perspective. I've trained more
than 25,000 automotive
sales professionals, and
worked with 1,100 roof
tops, everything from single-point "mom-and-pop"
dealerships on the brink of

bankruptcy to billion-dollar
and publicly-traded dealer
groups. I've learned so
much about what works
and what doesn't.
I'm sad to report that despite increased tools to aid
sales efforts, a vast majority
of dealers today are not
even close to delivering 110
units per month online -what I was doing 16 years
ago! And NO, it's not just
because of opportunity or
location. There are dealers today that have better
franchises, better location,
better inventory, more inventory, more money, more
people, and still do not even
come close to what we
were doing in New Jersey,
16 years ago. It has to do
with infrastructure, philosophy and strategy.
NADA says:
 92-99% of Americans
go online before they step
foot into a dealership.
 The average car shopper spends over 11 hours
conducting research.
 The average prospect
is visiting 10 dealerships
or websites (online) before
they ever visit a dealer
onsite.
 The average in-market buyer ONLY visits 1.2
dealerships.
 The average closing ratio for an internet
prospect or phone prospect
once they show up to an
appointment is 45 - 52%!
What this means is that
if you get them to the dealership as an appointment,
they will buy from you unless something goes wrong
http://www.DIGITALDEALER.COM
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Digital Dealer - December 2017
