Everybody Wins with Alternative Purchase Options w/ DigniFi’s LeeAnn Radonski

Welcome, everybody, to Service Drive Revolution. We hope you're having a great week. I'm Chris Collins. This is Christian Lafferty, who is back from a long road trip with his girlfriend, Annette.

Yes.

And I really only date her for the halibut. Did I get that right?

And I tried to set him up for a joke and he. It didn't work. That wasn't the joke. But, hey, today we have an exciting show for you. We are going to talk to somebody, a guest that our crack team upstairs ferreted out on social media that has a tool that. That not only will help you increase your sales, but your retention and, I would say, morale of your customers.

Yeah. You're helping them to live better lives is what I would say, is if they do it right.

For sure. She's a great guest, really sweet, and so we're gonna talk to her and explain that. But I have missed you dearly around the office. I don't know if you've been gone for, like, three months. How long have you been gone?

It's been two weeks. Two weeks?

You were going longer than that.

It's funny that it feels like that. It does feel like forever. Like, I came back in on Sunday and I was looking around the office like, it's crazy when you're gone for a little bit, everything looks different. It doesn't take long for that feeling. But, yeah, this is home. It's nice.

You were barely back when you were back, so what do you mean? You were gone for like a month. You were back for like half a week, and then you were gone again. Because you left and went. Didn't you go to Florida or something? Anyways, he's been gone a lot. Things are falling apart around here.

It's time to glue them back together.

Yeah. And, you know, I'd have a special guest. Mia had to sit in for you. Did you listen to the ones with Mia?

I did. I felt like she was trying to write me out of the show. It was really funny to listen to.

Why would you think that?

She was like, christian's not here. He doesn't need to come back. That was awesome. She's funny. Yeah, me too.

She. She the reason why she was here. And I just asked her to come on the show, and she's sweet enough to do. It was. She was here doing BDC training. So we're creating BDC training for anybody that doesn't know what BDC is. Business development. It's, you know, it's kind of extra credit for loading the shop, making appointments Outbound calls. You know, it's a phone center that creates revenue.

Yeah.

Is what it is. And so we, we played a little bit of the stuff that she created, but there's no accident that she has 230,000 followers on TikTok. So funny. So the BDC training is incredible content, but it's really entertaining, which is, you know what, what we've been going for here with, with our training is understanding that the younger kids that would be consuming this BDC training, they. They want to be entertained and taught and they're not that interested in just a talking head telling them what to do and why to do it, but actually like, you know, engaging them and showing some appreciation for their time while they're training. And Mia definitely accomplished that with our team here to collaborating. But I'm really excited about that. But yeah, she, she was, she was good.

Yeah, I think way better than good. I think she did a phenomenal job. I also.

Jokes aren't as bad as you, but.

No, I mean, but that takes years of practice. So I couldn't expect her to get that bad in just that short of a time. The one thing I would say is I like about like this new content that we're creating is it's forcing us out of our normal realm too. But it's way more fun, isn't it? Like, it's a little bit, it's a little bit lighter. We're definitely thinking so much about the end user that I think that the people that hop on and view this like they're gonna learn almost in a sneaky way because the entertainment takes over so much. The learning just kind of stuffs into their head while they're being entertained.

We definitely, in the last.

Well, I wanna say this has been coming for a year, but in the last four months.

Especially with the leadership stuff we've been doing in the leadership workshop, we've flipped. Flipped a switch in the sense that, I don't know, we can read to the audience. The thing I came up with. But did I come up with this last. Was it last November? By the way, if you hear those helicopters going over, that's our military just buzzing downtown la. Because they do that all the time.

Do you know why they do that?

Well, there was a man armed with a drill on fifth street just a little while ago, so it could be for that.

Oh, you have a citizen on. Yeah, I turned citizen off a long time ago.

Because it's all bad news on there.

While you're looking it up, do you want to, want to Hear too short?

Go ahead.

Yeah, you want to hear, you want to hear two short jokes and a long joke?

Yeah.

Joke, joke, joke.

Okay, here's the thing that, that I came up with last year.

And this has really been the heart and soul of what we've been doing, is that most training only exists while a person is taking it. But just like someone enjoy, would enjoy a specific piece of art in an art gallery, most of the time when they leave, the art becomes past tense. It only was real when present and is hard to recreate in its entirety in one's memory. Our training will have the opposite effect. When someone is taking it, ingesting it, it should be delivered in a way that has a lasting effect. It should inspire ambitions and it should make the impossible obtainable. Pull off the veil and reveal the recipe for the desired outcome. It should leave them and change. It should leave with them and it should change them. It should anoint them and empower them. Hence, every tool available should be used appropriately. Manipulation at the highest level. Psychological magic and then once understanding life changing, empowering knowledge is contagious to other aspects of life. When someone takes a new tool, implements it and gets positive results, they gain confidence and believe. We all have witnessed a manager have success, then become a better father, better husband, better citizen, no longer feeling left behind or irrelevant. And it's not just training. So the very first thing that we did from this is the short film for customer service called the Review. And that was our first step into that. And now our team is, is working on sales training with my friend Chase Hughes. That literally is like going to be born identity of Born Identity in the Matrix, kind of. Is that how you would explain it, Kosh?

So really fun. But it, it is going to have a more impactful results and effect on who's taking it. And they're going to feel like we appreciated their time. They're not going to feel like it's a talking head in training. So we're trying to advance the idea of training with, you know, real results, but packaging it in different ways. That isn't just the normal, you know, unless you took notes or watched it 10 times, you're not going to retain it. The things that we're doing are going to help it be retained. And so kind of like with leadership is the two times I've done that leadership workshop, the results have been incredible after. And I told you when we, when we did it the first time, I, because everybody was saying like, oh that was so great and they were calling you and telling you and I said we'll know that it's great when we see their financial statements. And their financial statements.

Were great. And I'm not saying it was just the leadership training, but it did have a positive effect.

Yeah. And amazingly enough with that one group that I was thinking of is they did better the second month after the training than the first month because they saw the results and they got the momentum and then they started to, to go on forward. And I would say that like as a, is a team, our whole, like we changed that focus. Like I will tell you before you start, before you wrote that, we were really focused on like in store results. Right. Like what are the numbers, what are the metrics, what are the results? But now when we're working with clients, we're really trying to make better citizens and it's making our training way better.

Yeah. And so one thing that I think is, is a big key to our training getting better is, is we need to learn comedy. And so I wanted to sign us up for a comedy class, but tell everybody why we couldn't take this five week long in depth. Like, should we name some of the names of the people that took this class?

I feel like you're going to. Yeah.

Famous people that are very successful in the realm of comedy. Not our little show here, like we're talking about, you know, not these like half assed jokes that we tell here. Like real comedy.

There are some of these jokes that are three quarter ass, not just half ass. No.

But why can't we do it? Because I travel too much.

Yes.

We have to fix that. If anybody has any ideas, please reach out to Christian. His cell phone number is 818.

That would be great.

I don't want, I don't want to take the class without you. I feel like I need you there because you're funnier and you understand it more than I do. I feel like I would get lost and I feel like we would feed off of each other because at the end of this comedy, it's a five week thing. You have to go do stand up.

Yeah.

And so I also am probably afraid to do the stand up on my own.

Yeah. I think that that's probably what it is. And we've talked about that before, but I do.

Christian has done, in our morning meetings, he's done stand up. He like, he can go. We could put Christian in front of an audience right now and he could do five minutes of stand up comedy and it would be very funny. I don't feel like I could do that yet.

I think you probably be better than you would imagine. Because the one thing I know about you is you'd practice.

Not as good. Not as good as you are because you've practiced and you've taken classes.

I have. Yeah, that's true. But I think the practice is way more important than the class. Not that I don't really appreciate the information I got from the class, but the thing that I've learned about comedy is it's work. Like, you have to hone it. You have to practice, you have to test.

When are you going to start doing that?

Very soon.

Toupee jokes or whatever.

You didn't like the toupee jokes?

I'm just joking.

Yeah, fair enough.

So the other thing Christian does is he books a bunch of clients to go all over the world, and then he takes a vacation, an off the grid vacation where I tried to talk him out of this. Did I not try to talk you out of it? Was I. Was I right or was I right?

I don't know. I.

If you would have flown in to where I said to fly in. No, you. You liked the experience.

I liked the experience even when, even in some of its tragedy, it was still, like, neat.

He had no patience for the tragedy.

Right. And I think that that would have.

Been a nightmare for me.

Yeah.

And I think that I'm a little bit different than you with that because I can laugh at that in the tragedy part. And, like, I just really remember the fun bonding with my son. And, like, he's up there. He's like, fix it, dad. You gotta fix it. You need more duct tape. Those are things that I'll remember forever, and I hope he will, too. But the road trip is something I think that everybody needs to do once.

So here was Christian's idea, and he just did it is he rented an RV here in California, and then he drove God knows where all over the place for just like a week.

Yeah, I went to Yellowstone up in, like, the Montana. The west entrance is where we ended up.

So you went through Nevada, Utah.

Yep.

Up to Montana. Yep. And then down to Wyoming.

Yep.

How beautiful is Wyoming?

So I think that. That part of Idaho. Montana, Wyoming. So gorgeous. We actually. Well, one of my things that I got for my birthday was to do a. What they called a wildlife safari in the Wyoming part.

We went to tie cheese to your neck and you get chased by bears.

Or all for it. But yeah, so we got within a few feet of some bison and, like, the land up there is just like that majestic. Oh, my Gosh, this is the earth kind of thing.

And America.

Yeah, it's definitely America for sure. And the people were so sweet up there. It was really, really cool. A great experience.

People there are more like Canadians. They're just really genuinely nice. Like when they ask you how's your day? They genuinely want to know how your day is.

Yeah. Like when, when they're in the road and you're about to walk across, like they literally say go that way but they're not revving up. It's really cool. It's very different than Los Angeles.

You would rev your engine like, hurry.

Up, come on, I'm going to nail you.

Hey, plans drive behavior.

But yeah, that, that RV rent, that RV thing was a.

So yeah. So tell everybody about that. Which would be an absolute nightmare for me. But my, my first job.

When I was 16.

My mom had an old mail car. So she used to deliver mail for the United States post office. And she had an old Chevy Citation because it had the bench seat. So she. Because you know when you're delivering mail the. You either have a right hand drive car or you have a car that has a bench seat. You sit in the middle.

Yeah. And then you left foot gas brake and hold the left wheel.

So she drove the Citation into the ground and the transmission was gone in it. And she said, you're turning 16, you're gonna get your license. If you know, if you want a car, you can have that. It was like literally sitting in a lot of grass growing.

There's grass growing out of the.

Yeah. And so I got a job at an RV place when I was 16.

And I worked for the mechanics as an assistant. And basically what they had me do that summer is be on top of the RVs. Besides washing all the RVs all the time. I had to seal the roofs. And so the. There's like this black tar stuff. I don't know what it's called but literally you go around and you're on these alum. They're made out of aluminum. So the sun. Yeah, the sun shining down and you're up there sealing the roofs. I did that. And the thing that I noticed and I don't know if it's still the same is one. There were two technicians at that place. One was more the engine, suspension, mechanical stuff. The other technician was the interior of the RVs and more of a carpenter.

Because a lot of the stuff in. In RVs is just wood framing.

Yeah.

And so there was more of that and still like old school wires. Like where the wires Go through the couch. Like, you know, they're wiring stuff.

So tell us about your, your RV experience.

Yeah, so I would say first off, that, like that second person that you described, that carpenter type one is they could probably build houses really easily because I would say that that's how complex some of the insides of that.

Oh yeah.

Kitchen, bathrooms, like everything. And the way the electrical goes and everything like that, like those are. I have so much respect for anyone that's working on and fixing those things. It's, it's, it's a pretty impressive piece of machinery. Right. So. So the RV that we got was a 2022. It had 9,000 miles on it when we took it off the, off the lot.

So it's a 2022. Brand spanking new.

Brand new. So we drive off the lot and.

You'Re renting it for a week.

Renting it for how much a day? Like 250 a day or something like that. Realistically, like the whole week cost me about 2,500 bucks. Not including gas, which is really expensive, by the way, but. So it's about like 2,500. All. All in, all said and done, you understand why gas.

Can anybody post in comments if you're watching this on YouTube and explain to us in a paragraph, not a book, why when Democrats take office, as in the White House, gas goes up and Republicans.

It doesn't make any sense, right?

No. Like when Trump was in, there was like under two. I don't understand. It's not a political question. I don't have a dog in that fight. I just don't understand, like gas is like almost five bucks.

Yeah, it's about doubled. Right. So there were places on the 15 that were over.

How much will it cost to fill up the RV?

It was 200 bucks. And here's the other thing too, is like my debit card would shut off after a while and I'd have to go back and do it again. Cause they would put either like a 75 or $100 limit on it. But literally out here, like right at the Nevada, California border, there were gas stations that were 509 for regular gas.

Wow. Okay, so you drive off the lot. 20, 22 RV. How many feet?

25Ft.

25Ft.

So class? No, I don't think so. Class C motorhome. But it's a, it's nothing. You need a fancy license for anything like that. But it feels a lot like if you've ever driven a U haul truck is how I would say. It drives like you Got the big mirrors on the side and everything like that. It's. It's really doable, I think. But so we're headed down the road. Before we even get out of California, my son starts to hear this noise coming from the roof. And they have like these little square roof vents that you kind of like. I don't know how to describe it. I mean, like turn a little knob and then the thing goes up. It's supposed to vent when you're parked or something like that. By golly, if it's 75 miles an hour, that thing doesn't start flapping in the breeze. So we pull over just out of Barstow, and I'm trying to work it, get it down, everything like that. So I call the number and she's like, well, can you go get any duct tape? I'm like, okay, I can duct tape. So I climbed onto the roof that you're talking about, which, if you can imagine what it's like in the middle of the Mojave Desert. And you know, about 6 o', clock, 200 degrees. Yeah. So I feel like it's like a reflector. Yeah. I don't have any handprints anymore because they melted. But so I duct taped that thing and off we went. So went there. And then the rest of day one was pretty easy. Day two, the microwave stops working, which sinks because we had a whole bunch of like stuff in the refrigerator that we would microwave because of. My plan was like to eat while we moved and everything, like while we were driving. But microwave stopped working on day two. And then on day four, like day three was a great day. Cause nothing bad happened to the rv. Day four, there was a trim piece underneath the side door that you go in and out of that started flapping down in the breeze. So I duct taped that. Like, I literally.

How many rolls of duct tape did you go through?

Almost a full roll on this thing. And the scariest thing that happened was coming back through Nevada again. There's like. Instead of that black tar stuff now they've got weather strips that go along the front. They kind of go around that little overhang on the cab and then they kind of come down underneath the side doors. And I don't know what happened, but they must have gotten really warm. They got loose. And then they started flapping around. It was the scariest noise. Cause I'm driving. And then they start banging on the side. It literally sounded like there was a pile of monkeys on the RV trying to knock, getting in. So guess what I did. I Pulled over, pulled up my trusty roll of duct tape. But, like, when I turned that thing in, literally 13% was duct tape. I'm like, here's your RV.

Wow.

But, yeah, that was.

I'm glad he made it back.

I am very glad I made it back.

Also, tell everybody what my advice was.

He, Chris had suggested again, Yellowstone park is mostly in Wyoming. He had suggested that I fly into Jackson Hole, Wyoming, which is just outside of Yellowstone, there, rent an RV where maybe I would go a couple of hundred miles over the time and as opposed to the 2,500 miles that I drove in six days and that I would have more quality time in the park.

But that's a bad idea.

Yeah, I, yeah, you're right.

Oh, I was right.

Yeah.

You don't have to say that.

Like, No, I, I, I, in hindsight, like, I do think that some of the, like, some of the stuff that went on, it was almost comical. Right. Like, when things started to break on the rv. It's a great story, but really, I could have had more quality time in the park.

Well, and just like fly fishing, like, you could take a fly fishing lesson. There's so many things you can do in Wyoming. It's so beautiful. Like, oh, we did. I love Jackson Hole. It's one of my favorite places.

We did, we horseback, Did a horseback riding tour in the mountains and everything like that. And like, they got us to this place, they called it the top of the World. And literally you looked out and you felt like you're.

Is that the top of the ski slope?

No. So it wasn't on a ski slope, but I would say it was probably at the same level of height that mountain was.

I'm going to tell you something. That ski slope there in Jackson Hole, the best bison I've ever had.

Oh, it's so tasty, isn't it? Yeah, it's great. But did you, I sent you a picture. Did you see how close we were to that thing?

I love that. I think that's great. Well, everybody's glad that you're back and safe. And so I think we should talk to our guests today. What do you think?

That's a great idea.

Leanne. Red Donski is the district manager for Dignify, and we caught on to her on LinkedIn. She's fun to follow on there, but they are helping dealerships, service departments, shops, marine motorcycle, they work with Harley Davidson, AutoNation and everybody in between increase their sales and retention through offering financing for everything from, you know, actual repairs to accessories and parts welcome Leanne, to the show. How are you doing today?

I'm doing awesome. Thank you for having me. How are you?

Good. I love your last name. Rad on ski, right?

How do you get better than that?

People probably don't pronounce it right. Everywhere you go, they're probably like, it's Radonsky. No, it's Rad on ski.

Rad on skis. Although I'm not. I suck on skis, but my kids are okay on skis.

It's safer not to be good on skis. A lot of people get hurt or die skiing. Sonny Bono.

Sonny Bono.

Yeah. It's dangerous. So we're, we're fans of yours on social media and I think you follow us too and maybe watch the show a little bit just to kind of tell our audience you help.

Dealerships, motorcycle dealerships, Marine just. I think you're probably an equal opportunity helper in the sense that you're helping them create sales and retention. Right. Would that be a good way to describe it?

For sure, yeah. We, yeah, like you said, we are in dealerships. We are in the service department. We are in the parts department, accessories. We're in F and I sales collision. So we're in all profit centers of the dealership. We are also now in RV shops front and back. We're in Harley Davidson Power Sports now Marine and boat. I also saw a tractor dealership come through the other day. So we were everywhere. We help to generate more sales and revenue and profit.

By giving the dealerships and these shops a revolving line of credit that their customer can come back and use over and over again. And it does. It creates retention, it creates customer loyalty. It's convenient for them to just come in and pay for these things on their, you know, their dealership loyalty card.

So the thing that I love about your approach and your thinking is a lot of times in these different industries, but, you know, we're kind of in all of those industries is we tend to become kind of tribal and territorial in the sense that something we would, we would both hear quite often is, oh, well, my industry is different, or that won't work here. Or Marine is different than motorcycle. And the thing that I found working in motorcycle dealerships, Marine and auto and truck, heavy truck, is they're way more similar than they are different. Like when somebody will say to me, like, oh, my market's different, I'm always like, oh, so people don't want to feel liked and get a fair deal and not be inconvenienced. Like, what's so different about people in the Midwest versus, you know, Oregon or whatever. It's like we're all human at the end of the day.

Right.

And so you have the advantage of seeing what's working in different industries. And I was wondering if maybe, and I know I'm kind of putting you on the spot, but like, what sort of mindsets and, and techniques are working in, in different industries that are missing kind of across the board, if that makes sense.

Well, you know, I, obviously when you've got different OEMs, you've got some of the higher OEMs, you've got some of, you know, like Mercedes, BMW, you know, even Toyota. You've got these, these customers who have, who have money, they've got, or they've got really good credit. They come in, they get accessories, you know, all kinds of stuff. You go down to maybe, I mean, not Kia anymore. I mean this is a pretty, we're getting to be a pretty upscale brand there with the Kia. But there are some other OEMs that, where customers are a little bit more credit challenged. And so they come in and they're going to need to get, you know, like their needed necessary maintenance on these cars because these are their only cars. And when we head over to like RV motorcycle, you've got some customers who have really good credit and they're going to get qualified for higher loans, you know, higher, higher credit limits. And so they're using these on accessories, they're using these on the fun things. And so we're there for both. We've got options for the ones who maybe be on the lower side of the credit scale. We've also got options for those who are going to be able to that $5,000 credit limit to go you, you know, motorcycle parts, helmets, fix their, you know, RVs and boats. And so I think that, I think that that's like any other industry. Right?

Yeah. And I think oftentimes that what we do is we think like that things are, are taken at face value. So it's like, oh, well, in my market it's, the credit's a little rougher or people aren't as affluent and instead of looking for options or other ways for them to purchase, we kind of just like, we make that a statement of fact and that's the rules we live by when there, there are tons of options. And I always go back to the, the analogy with that is my late uncle, he's passed away, but he, he wasn't a very successful guy in any sense of the word. In fact, he was, you know, he was pretty poor.

Didn'T have a lot of money, wasn't really motivated, and, you know, frankly, didn't contribute a lot to society. But he had a $7,000 pool queue.

It used to blow me away when he would ask to borrow money or he couldn't pay his $300 rent because he literally lived on somebody's property in, like, a guest cabin. Like, it wasn't even, like a real. A real house. And he would not sell that. That, you know, pool cue for anything. Right. And I, I remember I would make fun of him. I'd be like, hey, if you're a really good pool player, it's not just the queue.

Like, it's an income.

Yeah.

Like, you could. You could play, you know, with something for, I don't know, $1,000. I'm imagining you can get a pretty good pool cue. And so I think it's the same when you talk about parts departments or, like, you know, in a Jeep dealership or in an independent shop where when you look around, most people are adding wheels to their vehicle. Most people are accessorizing, right. If they've got dirt bikes, then they need the trailer, then they need the helmets. They need all those things.

There's a way to increase your sales by increasing their options of how to buy it. So just them traditionally buying it is not the only way to increase your sales.

Yep, exactly. I mean, and with that, you're also creating the customer loyalty because, I mean, think about it. When you, if you have a Lowe's card, you know, when you're going to go, you need lumber, light switches, or plants, where are you going to head to first? You're going to go to Lowe's because you've got the card. Right. And I mean, it doesn't matter if you have cash or not, but you're loyal to that. And so that's how we came up with this expressway program is it's not something that the customer can take and go, you know, go down to Home Depot and buy appliances. We're not going to poach your best customer and go, you know, make them go to Best Buy every Labor Day and get appliances. We are trying to partner with.

Wherever the dealerships, RV centers, we're trying to bring those customers back into your dealership so that. So you don't. They don't go to the, you know, the customer or not the customer. They don't go to the dealership down the road. I mean, because there are many point of sale lenders that can just Take cash, you know, take payment for something. But, but we're different. We want, we want them to have this now. We want them to have no down payment. We want them to, you know, give them six months interest deferred for this so that they keep coming back. This is what's important to dealership, is important to the customer and it is important to us.

So how does it work, how does the industry work that you're, you're able to loan money against accessories, against repairs, things like that. How, how do you, how do you hedge those bets? Is it in a higher interest rate or like just tell me basically how the industry works.

So it's okay. So it's a service, dignified service platform. It's a platform for matching consumers with lenders for whatever they need. So we can do $2,000 cash advance for trade assist. So if you need a down payment, we can do an instant cash advance to the customer. You turn around, write a check, swipe a debit card, that's their down payment. They also can go over to the service department and put on tires for that car that they just bought. They can go back to F and I, they can buy extended warranties which now you know the way that used cars are right now, how expensive they are. You're going to need that extended warranty for a little while. Right? So, so basically we get the customer pre qualified through the dealership. The advisor or the salesperson sends a link to their phone, they click on that link and they pre qualify for whatever they're going to get. There's two different, two different things we can give them. If they're approved for 3,000 or more, they get a line of credit that they can only use there at that dealership and then they can use it for anything that they want. It's not swipeable anywhere else. They're just going to be able to keep coming back there. There's another tier that for customers who have a little bit lower credit limit or credit rating, that is a short term loan that they're going to be able to use just one time and that will get them accessories. They can pay for extended warrant, stuff like that.

So you're the middle in that. You're then putting it out to other lenders. So you've collected all the lenders and you're serving them up and then offering them the best option from.

What'S available. Did I explain that right?

Our lender is web bank online and so we, if you're approved for this cardholder, you get six Months, no interest. So you can come back every time the customer spends $350 or more, they. They get six months, no interest.

I bought a drum set on six months, no interest when I was a kid, and guess what?

You play drums?

Yeah, I paid it off before the interest.

That's the smart way to do it. You don't want to do it in seven months?

No, it gets ugly. It gets really expensive quick. But I did.

I did do that. Okay. Any other thoughts or advice?

Well, you know, you can buy shoes that way as well. A peloton, anything.

People buy pelotons that way.

Wait, how did you go to peloton? Like, seriously, shoes on six months, no interest? What kind of shoes could those be?

Yeah, like, what kind of shoes are people buying on financing?

I don't think it's Skechers.

She laughed. I have a friend who just bought $500 pair of shoes.

What is. What is her name?

Oh, her name is Dawn.

See, I knew it was a her because no dude is spending $500 on shoes.

Actually, I spent 5, 750, like a month ago.

So, Christian, the other night I had a dream that I worked in a collision shop.

And it was an auto body experience.

I did not expect that.

That was great.

Oh, so good.

See what you've started.

It's wonderful.

So now return the favor.

And that's great that you had dreams. I actually, I'm a shopper, so it was out yesterday, and.

I bought a wig for a dollar. It was a small price to pay. Oh, you were supposed to laugh.

Sorry.

Leanne and I had the same reaction.

It was. It was identical.

Yeah.

Oh.

That was really good.

Thank you.

See, I'm. I'm an expert, a body language reader. And when she did this with her hair, that meant not good, right?

She wished me off the face.

So she was thinking not good, and she said good. But her. All of the physical indicators were. It was.

You know, it's funny, I wasn't even looking at her, and I could just hear by the tone that she was making.

What? Leanne, what else should we teach our audience about?

About how to increase their sales by offering alternative ways to purchase to their clients.

Alternative ways to purchase to their clients. Well, I think that we need to help them make it quick and easy. I mean, service and service advisors these days, they're just swamped. We've got parts shortages. We've got people coming in. Everybody's kind of at their last, you know, running on their last leg here. And I think that this is something that I've heard from both the customers and the service advisors is that, you know, it's quick and easy. The way we do it, we have the advisor send a link to the, to the customer's phone, they click that, they pre qualify, it's completely contactless, which has been really, really important in the last year or so. And then I also think that, you know, with all these integrations that service advisors have, they're sending videos out to their customers now showing the recommended services. We've got advisors who will give estimates over the phone. It's just we're trying to do everything we can to make it quick and easy for the advisor so that they can get back to doing what they need to do. Because, you know, selling financing is not what, that's not their main job. You know, they're trying to help the customer and get these recommended services that they need. And so I think that, you know, even now, now that everybody's kind of hopping back on and doing, doing what they're doing, they're going out, they're road tripping.

And I also think that because parts are coming in so slow, we need to be up front with their customers. I think that we need to show them and tell them that parts, you know, there are some parts that are just not going to be in for a while. I have a daughter who works at a Toyota dealership. She works at the BDC department and she's headed over to Service Express Service next month. And she says, you know, windshields right now, windshields, batteries, it's, they're hard to come by. And so I think that if we, we help them be upfront and just communicate, even if the, the customers are not happy about it, we're building trust so that they don't go down to the dealership down the road and it's fine. I was at a Toyota dealership down south about a month ago and there was this irate customer on there. She was so upset because her Corolla battery wasn't working. And so they, what the service manager did, he just said, we don't have, they did not have one Corolla battery anywhere. And so he, he went out to one of the two Corollas that they had on the lot and grabbed one out of the new car and went in and put it in her car and she was on her way. And I mean, she was sort of happy about it. She was still pretty upset. But I mean, I think that just letting them know that there's, there's some issues here in the industry right now that we're seeing and we're all trying to help and just to try to be patient and just be upfront with them.

Yeah, it's always better to just tell them the truth up front. So then their expectations are realistic. It's when they drop it off, they leave it all day, and then we tell them at the end of the day, like it's better to just tell them the truth up front.

Right, right. It's true. And I mean, I think that even in terms of customer service and retention, just offering these, you know, this line of credit to your customers, because how many times have you gone to Best Buy and you go up there with your, you know, to buy your computer and you have cash, but they say, hey, would you like to apply for this? You know, 12 months, no interest sort of thing? And you're like, yeah, actually I would like to keep my cash going on vacation. And it's more. Maybe they don't need it, but it is definitely a customer service option, something that they appreciate and will keep. You know, it's all about customer retention, keeping the customers happy right now. Anything that we can do.

Yeah. And so telling the customers at the time of write up, like something to the effect of, you know, a lot of our customers value keeping their cash. And we have options for you where, you know, you can pay it off as you go, but, you know, have your cash and not. Not spend it sort of a thing.

Right, right. If we see something, we've got options for you. Send them that link, you know, to apply to pre qualify. It's no hit to their credit. When you send them the video text that the service tech made for them. Just follow that up with. And then there's this payment plan just in case, you know, just in case you want to do this. If not, that's fine too. Just following it up, just letting them know that it's there sometimes is all the difference in the world. I mean, it's better to just to help them before they, they try to. I mean, a lot of times people are just going to say, oh, yeah, no, that's fine, I don't have time right now, or whatever. But it could be that they don't have money and you don't know that until you offer, and sometimes they won't ask. And so, you know, the statistics are there's like 60% of Americans right now who do not have $1,000 to spend on emergency repairs. And 80% of them live paycheck to paycheck. And it's a lot of times they're not going to tell you. So it's best if you just kind of say, hey, we offer this to everybody. You can pre qualify with no hit. We'll see what is there and then move on from there once you know what's going on.

Yeah. And it's. There's two things that happen when you say a lot of our clients really appreciate this or a lot of our clients are using this. Because one is it makes it seem like it's something that's popular that a lot of people are doing and that has a tremendous effect on people because most people are sheep, they're followers. Right. And then the second thing is, is if they're struggling financially, it takes away the shame for sure. And that's a big part of it is taking away the shame.

Right. And you know, you need to educate them. You don't want them to go, you know, they'll go to the dealership down there who will help them. But yeah, taking away the shame, it builds trust. I mean, even if they never tell you this, they feel something. They're thankful. Yes.

That's great stuff. Okay, so if our listeners want to reach out and they want to, to get, you know, get help with this, where should they go? What's the website?

So it's dignified.com so d I g n I f I dot com. We also have an Instagram. I have an Instagram @rad auto solutions and I also do like some car reviews and stuff like that.

Or just, you know, you can go and find a list of dealerships. There's auto groups all over that. Well, we're in almost 6,000 different service centers, so just you can look them up by dealership as well.

Awesome. Well, thank you. I think it's a huge tool to have in your back pocket. And.

You'Re helping people that maybe can't. Like you're helping the single mom that can't afford it but needs a reliable car to just get to work or, you know, with the kids. And you're also helping people during this be able to enjoy maybe motorsports or whatever it is to get their minds off of all the negativity and things that are going on right now.

So with the product and everything like that, there's an ease of use of. Especially I'm thinking about the motorsports motorcycle rv. Is that like so much of that stuff you have to go. Like if you buy a motorcycle, you have to go somewhere else to get all this other stuff. Like, I like the idea of that retention from a one stop shop and that really allows you to do that. Like you can make, you can do so much customization if you have different alternatives. And I think that that's a great way to do it because, you know, to Leanne's point, like when you get the Lowe's credit card, you're not going to 10 different places. You get everything all at once. And I like that from a retention standpoint is what do we need to do to make it so that our clients don't have to go 10 different places to make their, whatever their item is what they want. So that's a great opportunity for retention.

I mean, and you know, I was, I heard about this mechanic that got addicted to drinking brake fluid.

And.

And he said I can stop anytime I want to.

I love it that she's reading it from a screen over on the left. Yeah, she's looking over, reading it. Oh, Christian, the effect you've had, unbelievable. I love that. Leanne, thank you so much. We, we have a pretty big loyal following, so you're going to be getting some calls. I, I promise you that. And you know, we, we believe in it. Yeah. And thank, thank you so much for coming on.

I appreciate it. Thank you so much, Chris and Christian, I appreciate it.

That was great.

I can stop anytime.

Thanks, Leanne.

Bye.

You're welcome.

Bye.

Thanks so much for watching this episode of Service Job Revolution. We're uploading new stuff every day, so make sure you subscribe and click the bell icon so you don't miss out. If you have a question you'd like us to answer on the show, call 8333 Ask SDR and we'll answer your question on the show. That's 8333 Ask SDR. For special deals on our books and training, head over to offers.chriscollinsinc.com that's offers.chriscollinsInc.com I'm Chris Collins and I'll see you in the next video.