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AutoUSA June 2013 Interview
2013-06-13 15:29:16| AutomotiveDigest.com - Automotive Industry News
Kevin Buler BDC Director Daytona Toyota Scion Daytona Beach, Florida AutoUSA: Can you tell me a little bit about your dealership and your background in the industry? Kevin: Daytona Toyota - Scion is family owned and operated for more than 15 years. My background in the industry is a lifetime car guy. My father was a Chevrolet dealer and I purchased the dealership from him in 2000. I was the dealer until 2005 when we sold the dealership. After that I became very interested in the mechanics of automobile internet marketing. I experimented with a great deal of different online endeavors which helped give me a much clearer idea of how online car sales should be generated aside from the normal processes and procedures traditionally used by dealership internet departments. AutoUSA: What is the size and structure of your Internet Department? Kevin: We currently have 6 full time internet salespeople that handle 100% of our internet traffic and close consistently over 10% of our leads. AutoUSA: What do you do that is different from your competition? Kevin: We have done extensive testing with direct mail and data mining and when using the ShowPro reward card to drive traffic as an incentive and to control our data base we get incredible results. Integrating that with leads from AutoUSA gives us a boost of 15 to 25% in appointment setting for our prospects. AutoUSA: What types of marketing and advertising do you do to increase web traffic? Kevin: The ShowPro product was on our dealership website but was not being promoted. We integrated a simple template program online and connected it to our CRM tool. We didnt want to just wait for prospects to find it on our site so we take the link to them in direct mail and email programs. Remember not everyone uses the Internet in the same fashion, so making the offering of a reward to set the appointment via off-line marketing allowed us to cast a broader net for auto shoppers. Our biggest fear was that we would have too many people redeeming the ShowPro incentive, but our General Manager was supportive. We also made sure to implement a redemption process that was easy for customers and a process to help us keep the data base clean and current. AutoUSA: What do you do to create a great customer experience? Kevin: More effective and productive Internet promotions that gives our customer a more realistic buying experience, instead of marketing with promotions that over promise and under deliver. The ShowPro reward card provides us a great tool to negotiate creating an appointment as well as increasing our appointment show rate. Customer arrives at the dealership in a good frame of mind because they are focused on the reward for showing up and not thinking about the dealership sales process. Our sales team keeps that tone by being helpful, friendly and highlighting our great attitude about the buying experience and the terrific Toyota vehicles. Our Internet Department Sales increased over 40% since changes to this program. Additionally we offer a Lifetime Non-Factory Warranty on every new vehicle purchased at no additional charge, and that is also a real game changer for us. Buyers like having that peace of mind and it provides an assurance about keeping their vehicle on the road in an ever changing world. http://daytonatoyota.comThe Article AutoUSA June 2013 Interview appeared first on Automotive Digest.
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