Stan Ramirez
General Manager
San Jose, California
I have a traditional approach to running a dealership. In the car business nobody sells anything on the phone. You sell cars on the lot; you sell services in the drive. You sell nothing on the phone. My service advisors are here to sell, which is why I don't want them on the phone scheduling appointments.
You want to sell services? Pay attention to your customers. Give them good service. Customers don't want to wait in the service drive while the advisor runs inside to answer the phone for somebody else's oil change. You have your customer standing in the service drive ready to spend money, not on the phone trying to set an appointment that they might not show up to. Remember this important rule: when a customer is in your service drive, give them your undivided attention.
Customers don't give up on servicing their car at the dealership because of price. They start looking around for other service providers when you're not available to them, because you've put them on hold or it's after hours. Don't give customers a reason to start shopping around: get the appointment and get them into your service drive.
I might be "old school," but eScheduling really fits my idea of how to run a service department. It eases the phone congestion and it gets service advisors valuable time with the customers in the service drive - where they should be. You want to sell more? You won't do it over the phone. Step up and learn to use some basic technology, and you'll satisfy and sell more services.
Customer Search Performance Improvements
