Let’s face it: automotive sales are becoming increasingly competitive and impersonal with the growth of the online industry. Customers are savvier than ever about getting the best deal, and traditional dealerships are looking to offer greater value through personalized service and better customer experiences.
Between COVID and pressure from digital brokers, dealerships are keeping 33% fewer cars on the lot than they did a decade ago. 1 in 3 customers know exactly what they want by the time they make contact, and they are willing to wait for the car they want to be ordered. However, for purchases this important, they still want to talk to a human being. Phone leads generate 10-15 times more revenue than web leads, and having an excellent phone game is vital to maximizing your opportunities.
Automotive phone training is a key part of any plan to ensure your sales team presents a unified, deep, and high-quality experience for customers no matter which employee picks up the phone. We’ll take you through some of the most important ways phone training can boost your sales goals and the advantages it can deliver for your business.
Phone Contacts Offer Better Communication in the Digital Age
Dealership walk-in rates in the internet age are steadily declining. It used to be that 70% of leads came from walk-ins. Today, 70-80% of leads come from phone calls and the internet. If you want to develop better personal relationships with your clients to close sales and generate referrals, the statistics show that you can’t wait for them to show up at your doorstep. Times are changing, and a solid phone game is a vital part of creating a winning sales equation.
Unfortunately, there’s a lot of evidence to show employee phone skills have not kept pace with evolving trends. This represents a huge competitive opportunity for dealerships and one that cannot be ignored as shopping habits continue to shift. High-quality automotive phone training can be a critical differentiator that maximizes revenue in this modern, remote-communication economy.
Deep, Adaptive Scripts Unify Brand Message and Improve Lead Conversion
When customers pick up the phone, they are looking for answers to specific questions and help with important concerns. This can be challenging for a sales team, especially when it comes to delivering clear, consistent messaging no matter who takes the call.
Phone scripts are the best way to take advantage of modern sales dynamics in the industry. They keep everyone on brand, provide support for challenging interactions, and guide your team through every path to revenue. When scripts are written properly and supported with one-on-one automotive phone training, they offer a number of valuable advantages:
- Customers get the same experience regardless of which employee they connect with.
- They provide your team with branching, adaptive scripts that use proven techniques to overcome common objections and answer complicated questions.
- Scripts keep associates on message and moving efficiently toward closing while minimizing the chances they’ll inadvertently kill a potential sale.
Active Coaching Allows Your Team to Interact Naturally and Efficiently
Once you’ve got a great script, employees must be coached to deliver it organically. Everyone knows how off-putting it can be to listen to a customer service agent robotically delivering a pre-written script. But the very best, most helpful calls you’ve ever had were probably also supported by a script—you just didn’t know it because they were so professionally presented!
Employees who are coached to deliver scripts over time with effective automotive phone training are able to integrate their individual sales skills with optimized sales content. Coaching agencies who understand the industry and deliver active coaching can:
- Ensure your team sounds natural and engaged.
- Deliver scripts tailored to individual sales styles.
- Empower associates to improvise as they get comfortable so they can personalize customer experiences.
- Identify effective phrases and techniques and share them with the team.
Finally, active coaching is all about growing and developing over time—especially as the industry continues evolving. A great automotive phone training agency gives you the flexibility to update your scripts and make your entire sales floor aware of changing trends. Your team will just keep getting better and better, and they’ll be ahead of the curve when change rolls around.
Get the Best Training from Industry Experts.
Car sales strategies and tactics are constantly adapting to keep up with changing customer dynamics. The dealerships that will stand out tomorrow are the ones that embrace effective automotive phone training today.
Unfortunately, increased competition online has made developing a competitive phone game chess, not checkers, and most dealers don’t have the time or expertise to create effective scripts or train their people to use them well. It takes a dedicated industry expert to get your phone game on point, and Phone Ninjas is the best in the business.
We’re a world-class automotive phone training coaching agency founded and staffed by legendary industry professionals with over five decades of combined automotive selling experience. We personally craft scripts for your dealership and provide ongoing active coaching to get your employees comfortable and confident.
And unlike some programs, we make sure they’re working while learning. After a 90-minute introductory session, we keep individual training short and constructive so your people can get right back on the phone to meet their sales goals. We also follow up with mystery shops (we’ll throw in two for free!) to give them real-world tips that can make a difference in their numbers today.
If you think Phone Ninjas can help perfect and streamline your phone service so your team can take revenues to new heights, contact us today to schedule a free demo!
As the COO | Partner of Phone Ninjas, Chris delivers leadership, coaching, and mentorship to 55 team members providing software sales and phone skills coaching. He fosters powerful partnerships and collaborations with leaders across various business sectors, establishing expectations, communicating vision, and escalating performance to maximize productivity and effectiveness.
Chris is an innovation-driven business executive with over 25 years of experience delivering leadership to teams of up to 75 overseeing development, launch, and sale of website lead acquisition, reconditioning process software systems, and technology that support automotive dealerships across the U.S., Canada, and Europe.
