Blog
Short, practical notes on running service, parts and body shop departments that customers come back to.
Appointments
Regardless what business you’re in the reason we make appointments is to save time. In the dealership world technician time is extremely valuable. However, if you want to grow your business and have consistent customer satisfaction and profits you had better understand the value of your customers time. If your customer shows up for an…
“Fix It”
It’s interesting to me that the focus of day-to-day business operations in the dealership cover so many topics. The focus might be on customer satisfaction, parts loyalty programs, repair order performance, and the list could go on forever. What I find intriguing about this is that many times we lose the focus on the primary concern…
Communication
The TeamMany years ago I did a training exercise that handed each participant an envelope. Inside the envelope was a thimble, paperclip, thumbtack, rubber band, and a golfer scoring pencil. The task was to use these items to make an object that could power itself across the desk. The instructor took out a timer and began…
“Advertising for Growth”
There are many forms of advertising dealerships use to generate growth in their fixed operations. There are newspapers, mailers, open safety campaign processors, handouts, and the list goes on. There are many ways to measure the results of these using the dealership DMS program as a source of information. The DMS is an accurate source…
Treat them like family
It always amazes me how much time and money we tend to spend on everything, but what really matters. It is very understandable that money must be spent on marketing for programs that will bring in new customers and keep them coming back over and over again. I also understand how important it is to…
Hard Work…Together
There’s a Nike commercial on television that has such a positive uplifting point it should be a part of every one of our companies themes. It is Lebron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers in the huddle prior to the game. Every professional sports team has a session similar to this where the spokesperson attempts to…
Do You Want Success?
If I took the time to ask 1000 people if they wanted success, I have no doubts that far more than 900 would answer absolutely. However, if we listed several things that were requirements of potentially achieving success without any guarantees the results might be substantially less. There are some common threads or requirements of…
Using Recalls to Build Loyal Customers
Many dealerships struggle through the winter months with reduced repair order counts. Most are fed up with manufacturer safety recalls however it remains the single largest opportunity to build profitability into your service departments. We looked at some different approaches to build your repair order counts; one might be to advertise low cost labor operations such as…
Raising Your Standards
A common thread you’ll find with any individual or company that has achieved success is very high standards. A set of standards that never accepts poor performance as ordinary and is always being evaluated for areas of opportunity for improvement develops a path of success. Raising your standards should be as common as setting objectives…
Becoming Your Best
If I took a survey of individuals and ask them if they were the best they could possibly be, most would answer yes. If I asked the same individuals a second question, are you perfect? Most would answer certainly not. When we accept these principles we understand the importance of always trying to improve or…