Automotive Services Consults Teaches to Get Customers
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009
Times are tough for the American automotive industry. Top automakers have closed hundreds of dealerships as they retool amid the global economic crisis. Dealers that remain are looking to their parts and service departments to make up lost sales revenue for 2009, and possibly even for 2010. To accomplish these goals, automotive service consults firms suggest that dealerships look to three top business priorities: customer service, convenience and follow-up.
Dealers may think they have customer service well in hand, but the truth is that customer service isn’t efficient and effective unless its process is transparent – that is, clearly understood by the employees, but virtually invisible to the customers.
Automotive service consulting companies often say there are two ways to keep customers loyal to a dealership’s service department: offer easy-to-reach satellite locations, or offer extended hours of operation. When it’s easy for a car owner to bring in his or her vehicle for repair or maintenance, the result is consistent bottom line income for the dealership.
These are just two of the questions that dealers can ask about the workings of their service and parts departments. According to automotive consulting services firms, smart dealers maximize their profits by minimizing costly, wasted effort and time.
In addition to topnotch service, convenience is another quality that ensures the loyalty of customers who might be lured away by “lowball” vendors. Automotive service consulting firms note that holding onto existing customers costs much less in operational expenses than it does to find new service clients. Convenient hours or convenient locations give customers two good reasons to stay with a dealership’s service department no matter what the specials at Joe’s Automotive down the street. Customers who feel valued by their automotive service departments are much more likely to value them enough not to leave after the warranty runs out.
The last tool in this tough-times survival kit is follow-up. Ideally, follow-up calls should be made to service customers within a day – two at the most. Service departments that don’t treat their customers with this kind of courtesy and respect are practically sending them down to the street to the first automotive service or quick-lube outlet they can find, say automotive service consulting firms. That’s because in the customers’ minds, the service department equals the automaker.
Good follow-up contacts the customer within 24 to 48 hours of a service appointment. Whether it’s an automated message or actual person-to-person calls, the point is the effort to contact the car owner and make sure that everything went well. Automotive service consulting firms say it’s particularly important to convey the sense that the customer is important, and that the service department – and hence the dealership – genuinely wants the customer’s feedback on how well the service was performed.
The auto industry bounces back with the automotive services consults. The service consulting have the best information that you can use in this state of the economy.
