We are looking at the Higher Gear CRM tool. The demo was impressive and it seemed to be highly adpatable to fit any process, including intergration with Dealertrack and R and R. Any thoughts on this one?

They all want it, but...

Have yet to witness a dealership implement any consistent follow-up with their database of customers; sold, unsold, or service- electronically or otherwise.

A good CRM offers a powerful process that provides transparancy and accountability. There is no question that a CRM is not only an asset but is essential to a online marketing strategy.

A CRM that has been developed by and for online car sales, intefaces with the dealership web site, considers the online sales cycle and have the flexibiltiy to adjust to the existing dealership culture is a tall order.

CRMs provide a permanent database and the process to manage it and can spit out accurate reports on you sales staffs perfomance or how succesful you marketing campaigns are.

Lets not kid our selves several companies offer CRMs that provide all of the above and are relitively easy to use.

The biggest challenge to implementing a CRM is the how well it is accepted on the lot. Every Dealership has a distinct culture that must buy in to any new process. The flexibility of the CRM to mimic the best practices of existing processes and its ease of use may contribute to it acceptance.

It is only a matter of time before all dealerships are using CRM technology many are just waiting for the right time and the right CRM.

We have found most Lead management tools to be very complicated and difficult to use by the sales team and management. To many reports to run and screens to go through to get what you need to know.

Process control is critical in any product you select and far out weights any other need with a lead management tool. You either believe that sales people do their job naturaly or that you must manage and direct them. As a current fact sales people do not naturaly do whats correct next and your lead management tool either helps them decide this or hinders them from knowing it.

Dealer Peak and AVV currently do the best job over all of making it simple for sales people to know what to do next and management knowing if they do it. Dealer Peak is currently the best one that allows good and simple work flow process change based on status change. It will also notify a manager when the status dictates it is needed. My company sees them all, uses them all and this is the opinion of a consultant of more than 30 stores who was in this prior to any tools existing and I have watched most ofthem over develope to the point of being useless with great reports.

this is quickly turning into an ad forum where vendors are writing way too much. Jeff be careful here, shouldn't this just be for the car guys? Cloaked ads serve no purpose

I have worked with almost every major lead tool and I have to say ADP, Reynolds Contact Manager and Dealer Socket have to be some of the worst. Unless your sales staff all has computer science degrees, don’t waste your time or money.
If you want user friendly for your sales people then I would recommend DealerPeak or AVV. Out of AVV or DealerPeak I would have to say DealerPeak is the most user friendly when it comes to teaching your sales staff how to use. AVV on the other hand has a few more reports that make a mangers job a breeze.
One of the most positive things I have seen with DealerPeak is DealerPeak is open to new Ideas and they understand that a cookie cutter CRM is not the way to go. Ever try to get AVV to make a change? It has taken AVV three months to make AVV work with windows Vista.
In conclusion, when choosing a CRM don’t be blinded by all the bells and whistles. Make sure you sales team can use it and understand it. With the increases in internet business your team can’t spend half the day trying to find where a customer is in the system. If it came down to it and I had to choose I would go with DealerPeak. Good customer service, ease of use and flexible to some extent when it comes to making changes to fit your needs.

And, no, I do not work for or get paid by dealerpeak.

Jeremiah
Compliance manager
Automotive Internet Management

Many CRM vendors, like many website and vehicle management tool vendors, have a tendancy to overpromise and under-deliver.

Before leaving my last dealership, I intentionally brought in 3 CRM vendors for demos since I was only masterful with one, just to see what else was out there.

Since, I was able to assist some friends that had two of those three vendors. Upon seeing first hand, nothing like the presentation or demo.

Even if one is able to understand how to set it up, will it work how it's supposed to? More importantly, will the end users easily understand how to use it according to their responsibility, sold deals may get locked if you're lucky enough to have quality consistent pulling from the DMS, how easy is it to pull reports? I do agree there many things not easy to do in some CRMs.

I do believe a full time person for maintenance is essential though, especially if it's mulit-rooftop. Even if the tool can be set up properly while it's implemented, processes usually need to be adjusted afterwards. Also, the CRM tools are designed to do so much, and must integrate with so much (DMS, inventory, websites) that it's always an ongoing project.

Just as someone is needed to post specials on the dealer website weekly, monitor inventory feeds to and from vehicle management tool to website to vendors, someone is needed to know the CRM tool for adjustments, glitches, and full utilization. However...

This is where the dealership needs to decide who's responsibility it is for such work but most still don't see beyond the current sale being worked in the showroom. If a CRM tool is properly utilized to even 75% of it's capacity, that salary should be easily covered many times over.

I have to agree. We use UCS, so nothing can be updated through the DMS (ergh...UCS), so that's not a huge issue for me personally.

What really kills me is the sales process, like you said. The only CRM I've ever used that has worked well is Compass. (AutoNation's in-house CRM). I would gladly pay twice the money to use Compass. Everything works so fluidly.

You can tell the difference between the company that believes CRM is the way to go, and has spent tons of dough to get it right (AN) vs. the company that put something together to make an additional couple hundred bucks a month from us.

I just came onto this site...its great. My question is: Has anyone been involved with training from Proactive Dealer Solutions?
My GM made me to go their BDC boot camp last month and the internet material was great, but I'm wondering how the actual in-dealership training is.
Any comments?

Hi Jeff,

Nice Site!!!

We have just launced ismConnection.com. It is great to see another site dedicated to Internet Sales only!!!

Thank you!

I have received more knowledge from this website than any other resource available for Internet Managers.

The guidelines listed above are common sense and practical.

Thank you Jeff for taking your personal time to help make us all more successful in the dealership.

Hi Jeff, thanks for a great site, I value your opinion as well as the many others who contribute here. Building on that - I don't want you to be "neutral", I want to hear your honest input regarding the issues that each of us faces with internet sales at our respective dealerships, just as I want to hear the honest input from the other folks who post as well. I know that you are not paid or endorsed by any vendors for this site, and that the cost of running this site comes out of your pocket, and I sincerely appreciate that. Keep up the good work! Kevin Frye/eCommerce Director/Jeff Wyler Automotive Family

This is nice post here. Google added a few new appearance to its Local Business Center. This is the abode area any business with a concrete area can go to about bulb themselves on Google Maps.

Jeff,

As a DMOZ editor, I can definitely say things have changed. The site inclusion requests are down since the outage and it is perfect time to get your site added for review. It normally takes a while as we have to go through so much spam and users submitting to wrong categories. If you submit to the right category and follow the guidelines your site will get listed.

Ya... post on the review topic will be perfect. Thanks for the Yahoo Answers heads up... I was actually thinking about building a tool that a you could add yourself too and it would alert you whenever a review comes up. I wonder if Angie's list will give me access to their backend to plug in.

The website vendors can't really do this for the dealership as it requires authentication... but if they did not inform you then you should defiantly be asking why not.

Also when filling out the profile make sure to choose the right category mix.... for your dealership... you can use the overture keyword tool link at the bottom right of this form... to help you..

Also while you are doing Google spend extra 30 minutes and set your self up on ... MSN, Yahoo, SmartPages, SuppperPages and DMOZ... DMOZ powers Google directory... and is worth it.

To cover your self for any future yellow pages like site launches... update your data on InfoUSA and Acxiom... InfoUSA update URL is http://list.infousa.com/dbupdate.htm

While we are on topic... add Google alerts for your dealership and keep a tap on your dealership reviews... CitySearch.com, Yahoo Local Reviews, LemonFree.com and etc... take control and shape your own local search reputation.

--Farooq.

We have been working with Autojini for 4 months now. After searching for a while and talking to many service provider and comparing services they all offer finanly decided to work with Autojini and I must say that their service is great and I have recieved all that i have been promised.

We include all of those points that you have mentioned because of the SFE standards that is already a part of Cadillac and is rumor to be spread to Chevy pretty quickly. The problem I'm having is getting the response that they think that this is an internet response because it's too long. The message is all informative. We answer their questions but it seems like if they don't have direct questions, they see it as an Auto Response. For April we ran 39% appt to leads. That's not contacted leads. That's the actual lead. We are selling on average 81 cars a month however we are reaching for 130 to 150 cars a month. I'm speaking with my SFE advisor to see if there are better ways to get responses. If there is not a phone number we have a real hard time to get a response especially from our 1st day repsonse. I think the most popular is the one from me, the director saying how an our managers help or the one subject: Please respond. Any advise is greatly appreciated.

Jeff-

You raise some great points. I immediately became concerned about my leads some time ago, particularly so when a dealer can switch CRMs from time to time, so the question is: Am I seeing ALL my leads? One very easy way (a little time-consuming) is to get a cc to your email address. Make an inbox for each lead provider, and when you have confirmed they have been sent to your CRM, move them to the appropriate in-box. At the end of the month, the number of leads in the in-box should match what you are paying for (or what your CRM tallies). If a server crashes, (on the CRM, or elsewhere) you simply respond to the lead in the cc email.

As far as how much information, that isn't always easy. We generally send a greeting which is a why buy from us, followed shortly by a quote on a couple of vehicles including a pre-owned one if appropriate. Then a phone call to thank them for their inquiry, and to see if they received the quote. If the answer is yes, the next question is "Which one did you prefer?"

The answer is almost always what is the difference between the two or they prefer the cheaper one. Great! Set the appointment.

That has worked pretty well for us, and we average 24-26% appt set ratio to leads.

The staff at MJMI did a great job in developing a website for us that is very easy to use and easy to update. The website was designed and built in a short amount of time and has worked well for our company.
Suzanne has always been ready and willing to help make sure that assistance is just a phone call (or email) away.
I would recommend this company to anyone that asks me.
Kimball Bruckner

MJMI made the process of building my internet site a pleasure. I was always kept up to date, and involved in the look and layout. I am extremely please with my decision to go with them to build my site. It is unique and very user friendly, and everytime I run into something I want to change, they are right there to get it done. Suzanne Mullinnix the site production specialist was always readily available to answer my call. Extremely personable and reliable to work with, she made the difference. I highly recomend them to anyone interested in building or re-building their internet site.
Robert L. DeFelice
Vice President
Circle Auto Group

I can say that the best part of this company is the response. You can always count on someone being there to help you out. They don't run from you and hide like some of the over-priced big companies out there.

THE WIGGINS AUTOMOTIVE GROUP COUNTS ON MJMI AND THEY DELIVER. THEIR CUSTOMER SERVICE IS 2ND TO NONE. THE WEBSITE THEY DESIGNED IS ONE OF THE BEST. I CAN'T SAY ENOUGH ABOUT BILL AND THE STAFF.....WHEN I CALL THEY ANSWER AND ALWAYS HAVE A SOLUTION TO MY PROBLEM.

The Harte Auto Group has been with MJMI now for almost 1 year. I cannot say enough about how satisfied we are in every single area of service. The look and feel of our website is perfect; we get compliments all the time about how nice it looks and how easy it is to maneuver through. More importantly, however, I personally have never received such thorough customer support and attention as I receive from my account rep, Anna. Anything I ask for I am accommodated with, and the turnaround time is awesome! I would highly recommend this company to anyone that asks me.

I have actually worked for both of these companies in the past,know both products inside and out, and without hesitation, recommend iMagicLab above any other CRM company. iMagicLab is a company with a great product for both internet and showroom control, and has all necessary certifications for major DMS integration (RCI for Reynolds, ADP certification, and with DealerTrak DMS). iMagicLab is also a web based provider, compared to Higher Gear's archaic client server based architecture (who wants a server on site for a CRM system??).
Lastly, Keith and his team at iMagicLab are tops in the industry in regards to email and digital marketing. Creating media rich ang graphic emails are a breeze with iMagicLab.

Hello,

I'm brand new to this industry. I'm currently trying to obtain a dealers license in CA and I need some help.

To my understanding, in order to sell new/used cars in CA, you have to have a office location zoned to sell cars. I don't have the financing to lease a location just yet. I plan to eventually open a location of my own but would like to get my feet wet and sell a few cars. How can I do this? Any comments/suggestions?