It’s no secret that prices are certainly a focus of customers who come into your dealership. Amongst many other parts of car shopping that make customers happy about their experience, paying less than full price can be a powerful motivator in driving a purchase and one that the customer is satisfied with. We’ll talk about handling a customer who is fixated mainly on price.
Active Listening
While the price may be something that customers talk about a lot, they have other thoughts and needs that take a higher priority. This is why listening to your customer actively and uncovering hidden needs is very important. Hidden needs and preferences can be innumerable and range from the car’s color to the garage door’s height or seat’s comfort. Some of these might even show up as the customer tries the vehicle, so keep your eyes and ears wide open for signs that the customer is looking for something different.
We’ll be honest, unless there is a massive discount on a vehicle, $500 probably won’t make much of a difference in the customer’s life, especially with five years of loan payments. It’s all the feeling that they won. If you can solve other needs and uncover desires, you are on the path to discussing something else besides price.
Highlighting Value
The best salespeople develop rapport with the customer and help the customer understand the vehicle’s value without talking about price. Talking about the reliable nature of the car, or the lower long-term costs of a good warranty helps the customer understand that the price today is reasonable and worth it in the long run.
In many ways, highlighting value is something you should do regardless of whether or not the customer wants to talk price.
Find Solutions
Discussing a budget is different from talking price, partly because you can be more flexible with a monthly payment. Offer different solutions, including different trim levels of the same vehicle, that might help get the customer in the range they want to be in.
Customers with good credit also can extend loan terms to lower their monthly payments.
Be an Expert
Part of the reason why you are a salesperson is to establish yourself as an expert that the customer can rely on to answer questions about most anything automotive-related, including finance and even competitive vehicles and how they compare to what’s on your show floor.
Showing you are an expert and demonstrating your willingness to be transparent with the customer shows that you empathize with them and are an expert on the subject. People value experts enough to potentially pay slightly more, or at least, talk about pricing less.
Exceptional customer service
When coming into a car dealership, most people prefer to work with an attentive, polite, relatable salesperson. They also want the salesperson to respond to inquiries quickly and know a lot about the vehicles.
Doing well at simply helping the customer buy a car also reduces talk about price because they will feel that your service is worth their money.
Conclusion
The price point doesn’t have to be a featured part of the discussion when it comes to auto sales. Being an auto salesperson means actively listening to customers and uncovering hidden needs that the customer might not know are relevant to a car. In the end, presenting information about the vehicle and creating a rapport built on trust can lead to conversations on different topics about the car besides the price.
