Celebrating our 14th wedding anniversary today!
Very exciting to make it past another milestone and wonderful that I still get along so well with my wife and am still totally in love with her!
Whether or not you have been together for 1 year or 30 years, would love to get your tips on how you maintain a great relationship. One of the best things getting married on 7-7-01 was that it has been a very easy date to remember and I haven’t forgotten it! We’re headed out to dinner and a show tonight which should be a lot of fun.
Here’s a few fun things to share on the business side of things…
Done Poorly And By So Few
I helped my mother-in-law get a new car last week.
It was great to see the sales process of so many different car dealers.
She wanted something that was “up higher” than a car, had good gas mileage, was safe, and didn’t cost a ton to repair.
It was narrowed down to a Toyota Rav4 and a Subaru Forester.
Special thanks to my Project Manager Esther who gave us some great advice about her Forester and how much she loved it.
She ended up getting a white Subaru Forester pictured below which she absolutely loves.
New Subaru Forester
After 4 1/2 hours at the dealership, she finally drove it home.
Most of the dealerships do the same exact thing that the others do when it comes to marketing and follow-up… not a whole lot.
The Four Big Things I saw with the dealerships were:
- Most of them did little to no follow-up other than 1 phone call. The best follow-up was from a dealership in south county who had TWO different managers call me the day after we visited.
- Email is antiquated for follow-up, only one dealer was sending me text messages and it was from the salesperson’s personal phone, not from the dealership.
- Dealers always prioritize those who show up in-person and they want to get you on-site. (a big reason why we have our monthly marketing summits LIVE and IN-PERSON… www.RegisterSD.com).
- Everyone was selling the same thing – an identical car with no differentiation.
And, it’s very difficult to differentiate when you’re offering the same EXACT thing that others are offering!
So I learned a lot about what not to do with marketing!
But I do have a few things for you that can help your business avoid the problems these dealers had:
- Make sure you have a thorough follow-up sequence (not just 1 email or 1 call). Ideally use a follow-up strategy that integrates story and testimonials.
- Use multiple forms of media to get the best results. Send email, call AND text message.
- Do something to differentiate yourself! NONE of these dealers did anything to make themselves different from the other dealers other than say “we’ll get you the best deal”.
- Offer education to help your clients. With the car dealers, nobody offered to help me learn more about the car buying experience. Nobody had a phamphlet or even a brochure to offer us education or assistance. Nothing, zero, zip, nada.
Just for you…
During the marketing summit this month I’ll share the best story on how I’ve seen a car dealership completely differentiate themselves.
The funny thing?
It wasn’t even related to the cars they sold.
Super valuable idea for you and we’ll walk you through this at the Summit this month.
Just in case you’re interested in buying a car…
One of the best things you can do to get the lowest price is research first on TrueCar.com to see what others are paying.
Printing off the TrueCar.com research and bringing it to the dealer ended up saving us 1000’s of dollars off the sticker price.
WEEKLY MOTIVATION
Start Some Of These 7 Habits
From one of my favorite business books of all time…
7 Habits Stephen Covey
Yours In Success,
Henry Evans
Timezone Marketing
Author, The Hour A Day Entrepreneur