Over the last few years we have noticed that many car dealers from a broad cross section of the motor industry are finding it increasingly difficult to achieve their goals. This has meant that target achievement and other measurements have become harder to satisfy thus resulting in lower bonuses and ultimately lower dealership profitability.
What is the causing the decline?
• Is it because we are seeing less prospective clients?
• Are our marketing campaigns generating enough enquiry?
• Are our sales staff able to do their jobs effectively?
• Is there too much competition / desperation to sell our cars?
Perhaps it is not one of these things but a little of all of them and there are certainly even more reasons that may be market, dealer or manufacturer specific. The question is, do we let these issues dictate our results or do we strive harder to overcome them? It’s a silly question, isn’t it?
Obviously, we pushed back, we prospected harder, marketed in new ways, trained our staff substantially and dealt with our customers admirably. We may have also made some necessary cut backs in staff levels or funding for certain activities that didn’t generate short term sales improvement, but has it all worked? There will be some successes but in most cases the answer has been no, and in some cases, it has got even worse. In recent times we have all been working much harder for a lower result and an unwanted increase in stress.
Interestingly, these fixes have proved successful in the past so why not now, what is different? Let’s look at this over coming months and explore these questions plus more. Perhaps we can gain some insight into today’s market to improve our results and decrease the stress.
