The Brutal Facts about Call Centers!

We have a Dealer who asked us to find out why his Customer Pay R.O. count is dropping every month. We know the Dealer is using a Major Call center to receive in coming calls and make appointments for the service department. They also call customers who are due for their next scheduled service as well as customers who have declined previous repairs & recommended services to set future appointments.

We had this Call Center send us the last 20 calls they recorded so we could listen to how they were being done. WOW! What we found was out of the 20 calls we reviewed, only 4 appointments were made! That means 16 out of 20 Customers who either wanted to make an appointment or were called said No! This is a Red Flag for any Dealership!

The major problem we found was the Call Center was trying to “Sell” the customer repairs and maintenance over the phone instead of just making the appointment and let our Service Advisor's build the Relationship &Trust “in person” which is needed to allow the customer to buy. The phone script being used is targeted on making a sale over the phone which we have found over the years is the fastest way to loose a customer to your competition. If you have not built a Relationship with your customer, the fact is they won't buy!

The real scary part of this is most customers will never tell you why they never came back. So I urge you as I have in the past to listen to 20 or more calls being made to your customers and ask yourself would I make an appointment after listening to the Call Center “pitch”?  If you’re unable to get the recorded version then just call into your Dealership and make an appointment.

Remember that 80% or more of your Service Department Revenue is coming from the phones and should be the most important part of your Service Operation business model. Also as an industry we have year after year lost 50% or more of our customers to the competition due to things just like this.

If you would like us to assist you in building a Phone Process for your Dealership give us a call and we will be happy to help!

Guy Salkeld is the President and Head Performance Coach of Automotive Consultants Group Inc. The only Low Risk High Return Training, Coaching, and Consulting company in the world! To learn more go to www.smartservicetraining.com  Have a question? E-Mail Guy directly at guyacg@aol.com or Call me direct at: 305-331-3373    Follow @smartserviceguy