You're struggling to sell cars. How can you use innovation to improve your automotive sales skills?
If you're in the automotive sales industry, you know how competitive and challenging it can be to sell cars. You need to stand out from the crowd, build trust with your customers, and showcase the value of your products. But how can you do that in a changing and uncertain market? The answer is innovation. Innovation is not just about creating new products or services, but also about finding new ways to solve problems, meet needs, and deliver value. In this article, we'll show you how you can use innovation to improve your automotive sales skills and boost your performance.
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Maurizio Sala汽车专家 | अंतरराष्ट्रीय मोटर वाहन में दक्षता | Automotive | Fractional Manager | Digitalization | CRM, Sales, Service, P&A…
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Syed Asif RiazSenior Automotive Parts Professional/General Manager/Manager Parts
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Eddie CampbellParts and Service Director/Service Department Social Media Spokesman/Problem Solver
The first step to innovation is to understand your customers. What are their pain points, preferences, goals, and motivations? How do they make decisions and what influences them? How do they use and experience your products or services? You can use various tools and methods to gather customer insights, such as surveys, interviews, observations, feedback, personas, and journey maps. By understanding your customers, you can identify their unmet needs, expectations, and desires, and tailor your solutions and communication to them.
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Hahahahaha... knowing and understanding customers is not innovation: it's the A-B-C of every commercial company! I believe that the mantra of a serious commercial company should be: 1) know your customers, 2) try to understand them, 3) offer customized solutions: one-size-fits-all does NOT work in sales! But if I look at the automotive sector, I see that many car dealers (in Europe) don't even have their own CRM system, they don't use it correctly or they use the one that the manufacturer has made available to them (and thanks to which carmakers takes over all the dealer's customers)... Obviously I'm generalizing, and that's not good, but that's the norm. Bad to work in 2024 as like in the 70s! Where is the innovation?
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Examine closer to your back door. Everyone always wants to reach out too far, and I get it. Why reach out further that you have at least a 50/50 chance at service? If you have to negotiate the price, you must consider service as well. Most sales managers know and should teach the staff, more repeat, more service, family. There are a lot of reasons to consider bringing your area in on all of your sources.
The next step to innovation is to offer value propositions. A value proposition is a clear and compelling statement that explains how your product or service solves a customer's problem, satisfies a need, or provides a benefit. It also differentiates you from your competitors and shows why customers should choose you. You can use frameworks such as the value proposition canvas or the lean canvas to craft your value propositions, and test them with your customers to validate them. By offering value propositions, you can communicate your unique selling points and persuade your customers to buy from you.
The third step to innovation is to experiment with new approaches. Innovation is not a one-time event, but a continuous process of learning and improvement. You can use techniques such as prototyping, testing, iterating, and scaling to try out new ideas, products, or services, and see how they work in the real world. You can also use tools such as the business model canvas or the lean startup method to design and validate your business assumptions and hypotheses. By experimenting with new approaches, you can discover new opportunities, overcome challenges, and adapt to changing conditions.
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Experiment? New approaches? Before implementing changes we have always been taught that we should collect data, analyze it, define objectives and then 'experiment' with new solutions by monitoring the results with suitable KPIs. But this requires time and resources. And as everyone knows, in the automotive there is NO time and resources are scarce: end-of-month objectives stress out employees, salesforces and the entrepreneurs themselves who -in order to achieve results in a very short period- 'forget' to experiment. Bad to work in 2024 as in the 70s! When will the automotive evolve? Only when the Chinese have asphalted us? These my 2 cents...
The fourth step to innovation is to leverage technology. Technology can help you enhance your products or services, streamline your processes, and reach more customers. You can use platforms such as social media, websites, apps, or CRM systems to market your products or services, generate leads, nurture relationships, and provide after-sales support. You can also use tools such as analytics, AI, or VR to collect and analyze data, automate tasks, and create immersive experiences. By leveraging technology, you can increase your efficiency, effectiveness, and engagement.
The fifth step to innovation is to foster a culture of innovation. Innovation is not only about what you do, but also about how you think and act. You need to cultivate a mindset and an environment that encourages creativity, curiosity, collaboration, and risk-taking. You can do that by setting clear goals and expectations, providing feedback and recognition, rewarding failures and successes, and promoting learning and growth. You can also involve your customers, colleagues, and partners in your innovation process, and seek their input, feedback, and support. By fostering a culture of innovation, you can motivate yourself and others to embrace change and innovation.
The sixth step to innovation is to learn from best practices. Innovation is not something you have to do alone or from scratch. You can learn from other people and organizations who have successfully innovated in the automotive sales industry or in other fields. You can research, observe, or interview them, and find out what they did, how they did it, and what results they achieved. You can also benchmark, copy, or adapt their strategies, methods, or solutions, and apply them to your own situation. By learning from best practices, you can gain inspiration, insights, and guidance for your own innovation journey.
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Even if to "copy" by imitating the best practices of the best performers could seem the best way to grab results in a fast (and unexpensive) way, it is very real the contrary! We've been talking about it for years: whatever you want to do, whatever tool you want to introduce with the sales Team, the A-B-C is the study of a serious and customized process, based on the reality of the company, on the Human Resources available, on the technological tools used, on the investments that the entrepreneur is willing to do, on the reality of the market, on the characteristics of local prospects and customers. As usual: "one-size-fits-all" NEVER works! (even if you copy the best practices of the best performers). These my 2 cents...
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One thing I’ve found is missing in the article which is very important and essential for car sales which is an effective and vibrant Aftersales services. There is a saying in auto industry that “the first car sold by salesman and the rest are sold by the after-sales service “. This saying highlights the importance of providing excellent customer service and support after the initial sales of car. While a salesperson primary role is to sell the car , success of car or repeat sales heavily depend on customer satisfaction and loyalty which develops through positive experiences with aftersales . This includes services such as parts availability at competitive prices, reasonable repair cost, warranty and customer support .