A pandemic silver lining: the return of telephone

In a year where the pandemic brought the economy to its knees, dealers were forced into survival mode. Many dealers implemented strategies to stay afloat as the unimagined crisis struck, others might say the crisis was averted, and a small faction might say the virus was good for business. 

Through pensive and decisive action, dealers made moves to reduce staffing, abate advertising spends, and modified terms with vendors. As the pandemic unfolded, the industry learned that more could be accomplished with less, if done the right way. This sentiment rings true for call management.

Why proper call handling is critical to your dealership 

• • The telephone ranks 2nd behind walk-ins as the dealership’s highest communication touchpoint. 
  • Prospective car buyers that ping your dealership are the lowest in funnel in the car buying cycle. 
  • Phone calls convert to revenue 10-15x more than web leads. 

• Callers convert 30% faster than web leads; yet only 25% of bookable sales prospect calls and 60% of bookable service prospects convert to appointments. 

10 Tips for successful call management

• Centralize Tracking Efforts: find an objective service provider capable of being a true one-stop-shop.

• Track ALL Calls: Cherry picking calls for samples can provide false positives and makes benchmarking performance imprecise.

• CRM Integration: ensure ALL qualified sales leads are parsed into CRM in real-time for nurturing.

• Outbound Call Tracking: Manage sales and BDC follow up productivity and performance.

• Track Appointment Conversion: Celebrate and incentivize quality phone performance and identify training needs.

• Confirm Appointment: Prospective car buyers are 2x likely to show with a confirmation call. 

• Phone Skills Coaching: Ongoing call coaching has proven more effective than a once-a-year training.

• Implement Deal Saving Alerts: Tom Brady throws interceptions and Lebron James misses dunks, have a safety net in place.

• Assign Champion(s): Every team has a captain or two to call the plays. Alert champions are typically your star players that are directly impacted by revenues generated in respective departments. 

• Process is King: Work with industry pros to implement best practices with internal phone processes and. 

Actionable phone insights equal increased revenues 

As we have all been told, nothing worth having comes easy. This includes strong phone performance. With the right partner and requisite data, it has been proven time after time that you will add significant gains to your bottom-line. In fact, according to a recent CallSource study, dealers found that a solid phone process focused on quick follow up on missed opportunities resulted in 20% more sales for the dealership each month.

So be prepared to play the long game by making the time and fiscal investment to ensure that proper call handling is woven into the cultural fabric of your dealership. Be patient, stick with it, and set your dealership up for long-term success. 

In summary, increase the efficiency and effectiveness with your phone analytics and call management process and the outcome is more appointments set across departments and more revenue for your store.

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