How do you motivate store managers to be enthusiastic about

[Melissa]

I am trying to get our internet departmnet off the ground. Didn't realize this was going to be so painful!! My biggest hurdle is getting the store managers enthusiastic about the leads comming in from the Internet and making the committment to encourage and assist the internet salesperson make the sale and/or giving the internet salesperson a free reign to set up the deals, ie. pricing on the vehicle and info on the trade.
Do I need to change my thinking or the managers!!! Thanks for your input.

[O'Brien Automtoive T]

Melissa,
Here is one angle to use..follow your leads from start to finish, every step of the way for one month. At the end of a 30 day period take your results to your Managers in black and white. I certainly caught their attention when I showed them how profitable the department could be if given the chance. You may not sell a lot of units at first, but once they buy into it, the Managers will come to you asking for more leads. They just need to realize that you may not have as high of a closing ratio as the floor traffic until you put a plan into action to captivate your on line customers.

[rockysanders]

O'Brien A.T.
What suggestion(s) do you have when you do the 30 day thing and your GM still gets on you for not closing enough sales. And suggests that you would be better off Selling Shoes?
Rocky Sanders

[demarnee]

I have read with interest your views on unmotivated staff - what about training courses? Anybody here going to the convention in Las Vegas? As a UK dealer - we are miles behind the States as far as internet car sales are concerned - but I for one am really trying to get to grips with it! I want to come to the convention - but would really like to visit a dealership that is actively involved in Internet sales. Any offers?

[bassador]

Now matter how you look at it, it's going to be a tough sale without the support of upper management.

One successful combo I've found in building dealership web sites is to involve either the dealer principal or the GM (or both!) in the process from start to finish. Bottom line is web site designers know a lot about how to build web sites, and not much about how to sell cars. What better way to make a productive site right out of the gate than to ask the automotive professionals for input? Who is the target market? What appeals to them? What works in other media for you?

Once upper management becomes involved with the site, they tend to see to it that it's taken care of. They will allocate the budget and man hours needed to run it efficiently. Without fail, those sites we've built with this level of involvement are hugely successful.

The other successful combo of note is when upper management signs off on a site and allows one highly motivated individual at the dealership to run it and work the leads. In those cases, that individual gets ALL the leads that come off the net (and all the commissions

The down side is that once that person leaves the dealership, the closing ratios all but dissappear. All the internet closing knowledge walks out the door with that one person. That's great if you're that person! But bad from a dealership perspective :-/

The 30 day tracking system is a good idea. But do remember that not everyone who visits your site will contact you via email. Some dealerships track phone ups by placing special numbers on the site or utilizing an 800 number tracking system. A lot of people will STILL pick up the phone and call.. or even walk in, after visiting your site. Be sure the managers understand this, that the web site is generating more than just email leads.

If you're just one lone salesperson out there trying to convince a reluctant manager to buy in, it's really difficult to be successful online.

In fact, as a web design company, we don't take on any new accounts unless we have the full involvement/support of the Sales Manager or higher. We want to see our sites succeed, and if the dealership is being dragged, kicking and screaming, onto the internet, we pass.

[l-keller]

One thing we have found useful is to get a list of sold units each month and track these names back to your internet leads. We have found that a number of customers use the internet to gather information then come in on their own, they don't ask for our internet sales manager and ultimately purchase from us. Track these and let your managers know that some of their 'regular' customers are actually internet customers.

[SMaibor]

Glad to hear that it is working out.

I was going to suggest what it sounds like you already did, that is make the Internet team completely autonomous and simply show the success of the team to the Sales Managers with the numbers.

When I did this we were able to show that the Internet Dept. matched or bested the avg. gross per unit for the store.

As far as the incoming phone calls go, I think that unless your Internet people have a lot of excess time on their hands that it will be a mistake. You will muddy the distinction between Internet and all incoming calls and this will create tension with the non-Internet Sales People.