Why Lead Management Should Be Dealers’ Number 1 Priority!

Generating leads can be expensive business. What’s worse is that not managing them effectively could prove critical to the overall performance of a dealership. To truly maximise lead generation, dealerships need full visibility of all enquiry methods. Not only does it give power to dealers to understand which advertising is the most cost effective but full visibility provides the best opportunity to action enquiries quickly and effectively.

With Brexit now looming large on the horizon and penciled in for March 29^th, 2019 without any extension period for further negotiation currently agreed, it’s time dealerships started preparing themselves for the climate of post Brexit Britain.

 Nobody really knows what’s going to happen, many have made predictions but it’s far from an exact science and the future is filled with way too many unknowns for anybody to accurately hazard a guess at the likely outcomes for the automotive industry.

Focus on What You Can Affect

Uncertainty doesn’t mean that dealerships should be unprepared though. Quite the opposite in fact. Dealers should work to define a foolproof lead management strategy to capitalise on all sales opportunities and plug their leaky leads buckets up completely, after all the best way to safeguard a business during a period of unpredictability is to be shrewd and make the most of all enquiries received.

Ensuring that an effective CRM system is in place, is a fantastic way of making sure that all leads are accounted for, logged and followed-up in the correct manner. Dealers shouldn’t underestimate the power of aggregating prospect and lead data into one central location for easy management, and the difference it can make to maintaining a steady flow of sales.

Without an effective strategy for generating, managing and converting leads, dealerships could be missing out on a lot of business and in what could be a challenging year for the industry, it’s essential that dealers don’t leave any cash on the table.

Define Your Processes

A dealership’s lead management process should be comprehensive, incorporating stages prompting the relevant staff members to act from first contact to the point of sale, or the point at which the lead is conclusively not worth pursuing any longer.

Communication is key within the lead process, both from a dealership’s point of view and the customer’s. Systems should alert staff to activity going on in the dealership and also keep the customer informed, timely actions and responses are vital to maintaining a successful sales process. This in turn will increase dealer’s performance with regards to stock turn, product sales and customer satisfaction. To this end, Click Dealer believes that software can be pro-active when it comes to lead management rather than just reactive.

Tracking Is Everything

Tracking can provide invaluable business insights. As soon as an enquiry is made, it should be logged in a CRM system, spreadsheet or database dedicated to lead tracking, along with the date of arrival and the lead source. With the technical advancements that we have at our fingertips today there is no reason why this process can’t be automated, saving dealers time and missed opportunities.

This doesn’t just help dealers see where leads are coming from, but also how valuable each source is, how many leads have converted into sales, how much customers have spent and gives added visibility on all-important sales margins.

Efficiency Can Separate Dealers from Their Competition

One major issue that dealers face is that more and more enquiries are now coming through after hours. While some customers will understand that dealerships cannot be on hand to answer calls and emails 24/7, others will not be as patient.

To combat this, setting up an automatic message which informs enquirers that they’ll be contacted as soon as the dealership re-opens for business is a great idea. Dealers can then make responding to the previous night’s queries a priority for the day ahead.

With potentially challenging times ahead, it’s more important now than ever before that your technology partners can support the overall management of performance, from staff KPI’s to overall business efficiency. Task management and understanding the bigger picture of overall dealership performance is essential for those who want to thrive in 2019 and beyond.

For more information on Click Dealer’s lead management capabilities and to find out if we can be a performance partner for your dealership, get in touch today via marketing@clickdealer.co.uk or 01782 478220!