10 Social Media & Follow Tips You Must Know To Sell More Cars / ShiftSocial™ Strategy Guide For 2024

A couple last things that I want to talk about on the tail end of this. Just setting proper expectations. Look, guys, if you went through my presentation, you probably already saw these videos. But I want to make one thing clear. This is what allowed Garden city to sell 17 cars in September and another 20 in October. And we've helped them add over a hundred car sales in the amount of time of working together with them. And it's a simple strategy, but it. There is some nuances to it. And I want you guys to consider a couple things. Look, we're running these kind of ads here, videos. He worked with us, collaborated with our video scripts and sent us this video. We worked with them over months to get this. Okay? If you have people that are camera shy, that's okay. We have other means, but you need to communicate that with us so that we can get these videos. If not, if you're willing to get out of your cage and get your people out of your cage, just go up to your salesman with, with your phone out and just say, hey, give the people a message about buying a car with us. Boom, let them go. Send us the video. We'll edit it, we'll use it in our ads. This is the number one way that I found to increase lead quality, decrease lead costs, decrease no shows, and increase your overall success. Because people get to see you. They come in, this guy, David, he says people are showing up to the dealership every day. They're saying, that's the guy. That's the guy from the video. That's the guy. And they walk up to him feeling like they know him. You can't ask for much more than that. People walking in your door, knowing who you are, already having that know like and trust factor, okay? Another part of what we do, these happy customer images. This is really important, guys, okay? It's just raw, okay? But the thing is, is this is generating top of funnel leads, okay? A lot of you guys are used to all fighting for bottom of funnel leads. That means customers ready to buy today. They're shopping you, they're shopping your competitor and they're trying to make a decision. This system isn't really about that, guys. Yes, we're trying to influence people that are at the bottom that are ready to make a purchasing decision. But on social media, you're attracting a top of funnel lead and you're working them down through your process. This is very important to understand, okay? Some people might not be ready to buy right when they click the lead. That doesn't mean throw them out. That Means connect with them, figure out their needs, check back in with them, put them in a bucket, organize them, check back in with them. When the time comes, other people are going to come through. They're going to be looking for a car right away. Okay? It's up to you. Treat every lead equal and be ready to throw out the bad, organize the good, and call everybody within five minutes. Okay? We're going to create your guys landing page for you, everything like that. There's one last thing that I want to cover in today's training and onboarding with you guys real quick. And thank you so much for rocking with me. This is going to be the most impactful system that your dealership has ever seen when we execute it in the correct way. Okay, this is some of Garden City's results. Hold on, let me just pull this up, guys. Let me just pull this up here. Just give me one second here. This is going to be worth all the time. All right, you guys can see my screen? Yeah, you can. All right, cool. So, guys, this is the last thing that I want to share with you. Um, just go ahead and pause this video right now and go get your BDC team, get your salespeople on this. Okay? This is a combination of nine different independent studies that we took around lead management, and we compiled them together for your benefit so that you can see the best ways to follow up with leads and a lot of things to consider. Okay? So I'm going to talk a lot about speed to lead and no lead slipping through the cracks, no lead left behind, right? Here's a couple stats that you need to know regarding this. Okay? 78%, guys, 78% of customers will buy from the company that responds to their inquiry first. Okay? If you can be first, you're going to get the deal 78% of the time. You got to remember, people see your ad and then they see your competitors ad and they're filling out everything, okay? You need to get in with them first. You need to get them trusting you. And you need to do this 100% of the time in order to be successful. Okay? You are seven times more likely to qualify leads when reaching out within an hour as opposed to just one hour later. Like I said, guys, you will be throwing away 70 to 80% of your leads if you are not reaching out within the first five minutes. And if you're not reaching out within an hour, you might as well just kiss those leads goodbye. Okay? It's really hard. You want to get somebody when the phone's in their Hands. And they're literally thinking about this because it's an open loop. They're looking at your ad. They're thinking, oh, maybe I could get approved for a car. I've got this much down. Here's my, here's where I work, here's what I want to have for a car. All these things they put in this information, they're like, oh, I get to schedule my test drive. Boom. I did that. They close that out and nothing happens. It's a dead end for them. And then they start losing confidence in the process. Once they book that test drive and you get that notification, you make sure no matter what time of day it is, somebody's reaching out to them with a personalized communication. And I get it. There's after hours, you know, but 70% of your leads are going to come in after hours. So you should have a salesman that's dedicated to following up later at night. Okay, we'll help you with this. Okay, you're 21 times more effective when calling within the first five minutes of prospects first contact as opposed to just calling after 30 minutes. 21 times more success. I don't know about you, but I want to be 21 times more successful in any avenue of my life. This, this will help you with that. Okay, but check this out, guys. One minute is the new five minute rule. 391% increase in lead conversions when responding within one minute. Okay, this is what I'm saying, guys. We're going to send out the personalized double text within one minute for you guaranteed. We're going to send out the email right away. Within seconds, milliseconds. We're going to have that email in their inbox. We're going to have the personalized double text. Boom, boom. And they're going to be hopefully responding. You need to tag that process on with us by giving them a phone call. Right at that moment. Right at that moment, they're thinking about this. I don't know if I can get a car. Maybe this isn't going to work. They haven't talked to their friends yet to give them, you know, that, that little bit of doubt. They need your best salesman or even just one of your good rookies or even you to call them at that moment. Hey, man, just saw that you filled out our application, requested a test drive with us. Super excited, man. I see you got a Chevy Malibu you're looking to trade in, is that right? Yeah. Okay. Perfect man. How long have you been looking for a car, perfect man? Oh, what kind of Complications. Okay, cool. You know, just get them talking, get them trusting you, and then set the appointment. Okay? And a lot of times these appointments are going to come in, preset for you guys, and all you're going to have to do is confirm the date they. They're going to go in and click the time they want to book. And all you have to do is confirm the date. Okay? And. And make sure they show up. Tell them, hey, what cars are we going to be test driving? What are they going to need for the process? Make it real for them. If anybody goes through and books a test drive and no contact happens, they don't talk to a real person. It takes a certain special type person to just show up to a business owner with very little interaction, you know? So make sure you guys are involved, okay? I would call every appointment the second it's booked, and also the day, the morning that they're booked, I would call them that morning and just confirm. Make sure that they're coming in. And if they're not able to make it, get them rescheduled. Right there. Guys, it's normal for people to reschedule. We've seen people reschedule up to five times before and then come in and buy a car, okay? It doesn't mean that they're a deadbeat lead, but if you give up on them, they'll give up on you, too. Keep following up, okay? But check this out, guys. 7. Only 7% of companies respond to leads within five minutes, while 55% of companies respond in five or more days. Don't be the 93% of companies, okay, that respond to leads after five minutes. Be the 7%. Be the 1% that follows up within one minute, and you will be the most successful. We spend all this time getting new leads in. New leads, new leads, all this stuff. For new leads, you. You don't need new leads. You need to just prioritize the opportunities in front of you. And I get it, guys. I let deals slip, too. I forget to call someone back. I forget to do these things. But our system's going to help you a lot with a lot of the heavy lifting, okay? Get somebody involved, you're going to close more deals. It only takes a few deals for all this to make sense, guys. That's a huge thing. And these are. These are leads that your competitors aren't necessarily going to be able to get because we're marketing in this unique way. Okay, Here's a couple negative stats to think about. 80% decrease in your odds of qualifying the lead after five minutes has elapsed. That's what I was talking about earlier. Throw away 80% of your leads if you wait over five minutes. So if you're waiting 20 minutes to call your leads and you get 10 leads, you might as well just throw away eight of them because you're only going to talk to two of those people. If you're paying $10 a lead, that means that you just paid $100, okay? And you're only talking to two of those leads, $20 worth. You're literally throwing $80 in the trash. Okay, don't, don't do that. Okay? Just don't do that for real. If you need help following up leads, we can get virtual assistants for you. We can help you with staffing, we can help you hire. You know, we've got the AI follow up that's going to be going on, but you're still going to need to get involved. You're going to need to have a human involved. And I'll be the first to tell you, you know, the money that you guys pay for this, that's the easy part, okay? But the real investment comes with the time and energy that we're going to have to put into each other to really make this thing a success. And a lot of leads processes are outdated, widely outdated. Okay? We're going to get them honed in just for you. Seen this a lot of times. This is the best way. That's why we put this study together or compile these statistics for you. Okay? You're 10, 10 times less likely to have leads respond if your outreach takes more than five minutes. That's just kind of like the same as the other one. 73 of leads never get followed up with at all. This is true. I've put in multiple lead forms, guys. I've audited over a thousand dealerships, follow ups over the years. I put in a fake lead. I secret shop you. And I see how your team follows up. There's very few that actually do this process. Right? And I will tell you that a lot of the dealerships don't follow up at all. We're in an industry where we at least have some automated follow up in general. But a lot of times, guys, more often than not, even with my clients, I'll put in a lead. I'll never get a call, just my automated text. That's a disappointment. Call and connect. Okay. It says a lot. I know. It's a time. It's a time burner. Okay? Oh, it's too much time. I'm following up with all these leads. Oh, it's hard. Yeah. Sales is hard. Business is hard. Growing anything is hard. But when you tell me that you want to get from here to here, this is the un. Unflattering and unsexy thing that we have to do. Call our leads faster. It's simple. It really is simple. This formula will help you out a ton, okay? And that's why I'm, you know, I'll die on this hill. It's. It's the lead management that's such a big part for you, okay? That's why we're here at the shift social to help you optimize this, okay? 30 of prospects go to a competitor if not contacted. Yes. That's going to happen a lot, you guys. Your ads are going to inspire them to go and look at your competitor if you're not fast enough at capturing them, okay? I can't tell you how many times we follow up with leads and then they tell us, oh, I went and bought somewhere else, but yet the client says that the lead was low quality. It's not a low quality lead if they're going and buying a car somewhere else. It just means that you didn't contact them. People are busy. It's not personal. Okay, guys, like, if somebody doesn't respond to your text message right away or answer your call or they're busy, it's not personal. We all hate getting calls, okay? We all hate getting calls at first, but when that guy connects with us, shows us how much they care about our unique situation. Not just, hey, you want to buy a car? More like, hey, so tell me a little bit about what you're looking for. Let me make sure I can help you. Oh, I'm looking for this kind of car. Oh, perfect. We get tons of those. Where are you working? Oh, you're working. Perfect, perfect, perfect. So, yeah, I mean, just based on, like, what do you think your credit, you know, estimate 1 to 10. Have you financed before? Yeah, I financed before. I got a plus credit. Perfect, man, you might not even need a down payment. How soon are you looking to get this car? But how soon are you looking to get behind the wheel of this car, Brother, we can get you down here today. Just. Just. Why don't you just stop what you're doing? You were just looking at my app. Just come drive down here. I'll meet you at the door. Do you like coffee? I got a hot coffee for you. I'll pull up the Malibu. Actually, I've got another guy looking at it, and this Isn't bs But I need, you know, if you want this exact one, we can replace it, we can find another one. But I got another guy looking at that this week. So if you're really wanting to get in this really soon, like you said, come down, drive it right now. Okay, I'll meet you down here. I know it's, we're closing up here in a couple of minutes, but I can have them stay, keep the door open for you. Can you meet me down here in 20 minutes? Like connect with them. It's person to person conversations. Okay. Salesmen. Guys, I just got to say this. A lot of salesmen became real spoiled in 2020. A lot of salesmen became real spoiled by the BDC. But sometimes your BDC is screwing this whole process up because they don't know how to have that personal one to one communication. You have to have sales people that will really connect with the lead first and foremost. Okay? So that's, that's most of the stuff that I've got for you guys, the stats that I wanted to share and hopefully that conveys the right message and we're all on the same point or on the same page with the importance of this whole process. We will audit your BDC and we'll check for the, and, and hold you accountable to this. Okay. Because if, you know, I mean we could send in every lead in the world, the highest quality of qualification that we can and still if somebody's not there on the other end, that's not a marketing issue, that's a sales issue. Okay. So common challenges we see is lead sit stalled and unattended to before being rounded to a rep for follow up. We automatically round robin leads to your sales team. We just need to know who needs the leads and you know, what the priorities look like there. We're round robin instantly, real time. You'll get the leads right as they click. A lot of time leads are misrouted within the organization requiring a rerouting and incurring subsequent time delays. We need to make sure your lead routing is on point. Okay. The salesman gets assigned a lead. They're on stat on the clock at that time. Okay. And we can help you with all this. Leads lack sufficient contextual information resulting in a need to research and or triage the leads for data. Guys, we're, we're sending everybody through an application so you're at least going to know their contact information plus the timeline they're looking to do business in and also some of their financial information, how much down they have and we can customize that application based on your needs. If we make it real tight and granular, you're going to get a real specific type of lead. If we open it up more, you're going to get more general opportunities and there's less friction there. So you're going to have more of the bad, but also potentially more of the good. So we'll create a custom strategy for you that lines up with all that. So yeah, guys, a couple things that we're going to do is we're going to utilize automation. Okay. We're going to automate the, the lead routing and the round robin. Okay. We're going to automate the process of answering frequently asked questions with our AI bot and we're also going to automate certain conversations and prompting follow up and doing reactivation campaigns to do a lot of the heavy lifting for you. We're going to deploy a response solution that automatically responds to leads when they are ready to talk. So when somebody raises their hand, when they respond, you're going to get a notification, your team is going to get it pinged on their phone. They're going to be able to respond in real time right there. We're going to build reporting mechanisms and dashboards within your leads portal to track lead response metrics in real time. We're going to track all this down. Okay? So we're going to be able to see everybody's leads in one place. All the follow up happening in one place called tracking, call, reporting, call recording, it's all going to be there, guys. Okay? We're going to see exactly how much activity everybody's putting in on these leads and then coaching the representatives on timely and effective follow up thinking, conversational follow up. Okay? Selling the appointment. All right, guys, so boom, boom, boom, guys, this was a deep dive onboarding call. Okay? If you made it all the way to this part, that just shows me how serious you are about growing your dealership. And I'm serious about growing your dealership too. From the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for joining this program. It's going to be nothing but a success. Commit to this, commit to the work we're going to have to put in. There's going to be friction, there's going to be hurdles, there's going be problems, but we're going to work through those together. Okay? I trust you. I wouldn't have let you in this program if I didn't. And hopefully by now you trust me. I'm going to show you what I can do. All right? I'LL see you guys on the launch call and really look forward to doing business with you. We'll see you.