Chris Collins explains why service advisors freeze when selling maintenance and how to fix it. He uses a bear metaphor and a story about an advisor named Woody to show that suggesting maintenance is the job. Leaders need to role-play, coach, and hold advisors accountable to improve closing rates.
This is actually our first video. We're filming here in our new office. We moved down the hall from where we were before, and we have some windows behind us. It's a little lighter and not as dark of a cave. So I want to talk today about selling more maintenance this summer. And I had a dream the other night, and I know a lot of you in the Midwest are like, oh, Chris, you're from California. But I actually grew up in Seattle, so I'm not as foofy vegetarian Brussels sprouts, no, alfalfa sprouts and wheat bread as you think. But I think dreams sometimes mean something. I have no idea what, but I had a dream and I think it was inspired by a conversation I had with a chemical rep in San Diego not that long ago. I don't really dream that often. And people say that's bad because you're supposed to dream. And when you dream, you're in RAM or whatever, the deeper sleep. Rem. Rem. Thank you, rem. And so dreams mean different things. And I have the same people that analyze whether I should be dreaming or not analyze dreams. And they love to analyze. And I think dreams are pretty funny. So I looked up some of them and then I'm going to tell you my dream. So I looked up the meaning of dreams and these are the ones that we can share because evidently a lot of people are dreaming about sex and they're. Most of the dream analysis has to do with sex. So these are the more G rated ones. But did you know that if you dreamt about a mansion, that may. That symbolizes that you're dreaming about your physical body. If you're dreaming about death, that may symbolize a phase in your life is coming to an end and something new is beginning. Kind of cool if you dream about kissing somebody, like a significant other, hopefully that may represent the merging of two different aspects of yourself. It's pretty deep. What does it mean if you dream about work? It means that you need to work harder. Basically, it means that you're anxious about work and that you might have some sort of big project or goal that you need to complete. And then the best one here, the last one is pizza. I guess a lot of people dream about pizza. I've never had a dream about pizza, but it may represent that you're not getting your fair piece of the piece. So if you're dreaming about pizza, then you need to get your fair piece of the pie. But my dream was that I was being chased by a bear. And not so much chased. I Was more cornered, but the bear is up on its hind legs and it's swinging at me. But the good news was I had a shotgun. And so I had plenty of time and plenty of room while this bear is coming at me to aim my shotgun. And I was going to end it for the bear in self defense, not because I have anything against bears. And I froze, and I couldn't shoot him. And it was like, literally like I was in a solid block of ice and I couldn't move at all frozen. And I think that happens sometimes to advisors because the chemical rep I was talking to, he said, you know, I started off in this industry in the 80s. And he's telling me this story. And I used to service and sell coolant machines, like to expedite the coolant exchange, or coolant flush, I guess you could call it, even though we shouldn't say flush.
And I would go around the stores and I would stock the parts department every month with coolant, and I would service my machine and I also would spit the advisors, he said, and I'd spit them two bucks for every coolant exchange that they sold. And he said, there was this one advisor, Woody, of the three advisors in this Cadillac dealership he would call at, and Woody would sell over 100 koolaid exchanges every month. The other two advisors, between the two of them couldn't sell five. And so he would come, he would give Woody his 200 bucks or whatever it added up to. He'd give the other guys, you know, their couple bucks, four bucks, and then he would leave. And he said, I, over time, I was just like, I can't believe the disparity between Woody and the other two advisors. So one day he had them all there and he said, hey, can I ask you guys a question? Why is it that same service drive, same customer, same opportunity, Woody sells a hundred of these dudes a month and you guys can't, between the two of you, manage to sell five? And they thought about it for a second and they said, well, that's because Woody cheats. And he's like, woody cheats? How does Woody cheat? And they go, well, if a customer is due for a cooling exchange, he suggests it and tries to sell it to him. He's like, that's cheating. Because last time I checked, your title is service advisor. And you're not a toll booth operator, you're a service advisor. That's what you're supposed to do is advise, check history and advice. And the truth is, like, a lot of service advisors, just like My dream, I think they freeze and they don't check history and they don't do it because either they haven't done it before, they haven't been successful, whatever it is. But I think this summer, us as leaders, we need to get out of our office, we need to go out in the service drive and we need to get them past that. We need to melt the ice. We need to role play with our service advisors on how to sell maintenance. We need to make them do it, stand behind them, hold them accountable and make them do it. Even if they bumble through it a couple times and you need to be checking ros and making sure that they're either offering or that it's on a decline line so you can market to it and get it back. But I think in my dream, if I was to analyze it right now, I think that the bear is how hard it is to sell customer labor nowadays because repairs are dropping. There's recalls with certain brands that make it really difficult and really maintenance is all we have to sell. And we should be selling, you know, a quarter of our CPRO count plus should be alignments. Alignments are the easiest maintenance to sell. So let's have the best summer ever. Let's get out in the drive and, and let's role play with our advisors. Let's get them through that freeze and get them to offer maintenance and then hold them accountable for it. And you're going to get luckier more than not, because if we're not asking, we have zero chance of ever selling any work. But if we are asking, our closing ratios are going to be a lot higher than you think. So that's my tip. I hope you like the new office and we'll talk soon.
