Letting Go (Text Version)

In any conversation about following up unsold customers I think it’s critical to discuss how you let people out the door when they don’t buy. I know you’re disappointed, I know you’re shocked that they don’t see the benefit of doing business with you today, but your last minutes with this customer before they leave is key.

Over the years I’ve learned a lot about selling by actually being a customer. More specifically, I’m a lay down. A few years ago, I went to a timeshare presentation in Sedona. When I walked in there, I thought there was no way I was going to fall victim to a timeshare pitch. By the time the guy was done, it made more sense to me than anything I had ever seen. Hence the part about me being a lay down.

I had two objections to doing business on the spot by the end of the presentation. Number one, I wanted to talk to my accountant and find out what the tax benefits of buying a timeshare would be. Number two, I simply wanted to check out the company online and see what I could find out. That’s what I told the sales rep. If it would have been me in his position, I would have offered me his office to call my accountant, since it was a Monday morning, and a computer with internet access. Instead he started hammering me on why I needed to buy today without even considering my objections. His attitude was terrible. Then his quote un-quote closer came in and she was even worse than he was, once again not making any attempt to address my objections, while the original sales person sat next to her with a hurt look on his face. When I got up to leave no body made any attempt to thank me for coming in or for my time.

Their attitude was ‘don’t let the door hit you on the way out’. I was really irritated when I left. Guess what happened the next day? The sales person called me up with a renewed enthusiasm and tried to get me to come back in. At that point I wouldn’t have taken their timeshare membership even if they would have given it to me for free. The moral of the story is this, as your customer is ready to leave, no matter what the discussion was, sincerely thank them for coming in and thank them for their time. Have a big smile on your face so that they remember how much they like you as they’re walking out the door. You know you’re going to be calling them back the next day trying to get them back in, don’t destroy your chance as they’re on their way out the door. Want more? It’s all on my ADAPT Virtual Trainer.

Military Appreciation (Text Version)


I just felt like filming this because while it’s not along the lines of what I normally train on, I think you’ll find it to be useful. How do you find good sales people? People that are already motivated and trainable. Some of the best sales people and managers that I’ve ever worked with, either at my dealership, in San Diego, or in my travels as a trainer, are former military. A lot of the time people getting out of the military have formed an attachment with a community in which they were stationed and would like to stay there. Without a job lined up they just end up going back to where they came from.

When I was getting out of the Marine Corps, I was fortunate enough to already have a job lined up. I wasn’t going back to Buffalo, nothing at all against Buffalo, I like the people there, and I like the Bills and the wings but I preferred the winters in San Diego. Not everyone I knew was in that position. Again, many of these people, all of them if they are marines, are highly motivated and trainable. You’re probably not as scared of presenting a figure on somebody’s trade in after you’ve faced down enemy fire in Bagdad.

I remembered that before I got out of the Marine Corps there were separations briefs. These briefings were designed to help you assimilate back into civilian life, explain your benefits and find a job, or to scare you enough about your bleak prospects to get you to reenlist. So after I got out of the Marine Corps and I became a manager at the dealership I was at, I contacted base separations at Camp Pendleton, told them about my background and that we were looking for former military to train as sales people and asked if I could speak at future separations briefs. At each one I did I got at least a couple of great applicants. Applicants that didn’t consider 9am too early to be awake, that knew how to show up on time and did what they were asked to do without a debate.

Here’s my suggestion, if your dealership is in close proximity to a military base, instead of hiring the last dealerships problem child, contact the base separations office and ask them if you can come speak at their separations meetings. Most of the time, I suspect they’ll be happy to let you do that. This is a great way again to staff your sales department with some real quality people and more than that people that deserve every opportunity that we can provide them, especially if they’re Marines, just kidding. I love all branches of the military and appreciate everything they all do. You won’t find this on my ADAPT Virtual Trainer, but you will find hours and hours and hours of what to say and what to do to put customers in the seats on your showroom floor. Thanks for watching.

Please Leave a Message (Text Version)


How many times does this happen? You leave a message for somebody and they don’t call you back. The problem in a lot of cases is you talk too much. Here’s what I mean, If you leave it all on the voicemail, what reason does the customer have to call you back? Especially if they have an objection that you don’t know about. The goal of leaving a message is simply to get a customer to call you back and not to leave behind your life story.

Here’s another one I like. “This is Troy at Performance Chrysler and I just wanted to follow up with you. Please give me a call at 248-555-1317.” What’s the incentive for the customer to call you back there? What’s in it for them? Give the customer a reason to call you back. Curiosity is going to be what gets them to call you. “Hi Brad, it’s Alan Ram calling, my number is 858-555-1714 and I’ve got some good news for you”, and that’s it. Your name, your phone number and I’ve got some good news for you. They will call you back. They get back from lunch and they’ve got a message from their ex wife, another one from their buddy that wants to borrow $500 and you with good news, who do you think they’re going to call back first? I go into this much more in depth as well as hundreds of other things on my ADAPT virtual trainer. Thanks for watching.

Facebooking for Fun and Profit (text version)


Can you remember a time when we didn’t have Facebook? Back in the days of yore, how did we know what people had just eaten, or what the weather outside was, or how many chickens were laying eggs on their imaginary farms? Here’s something else I’ve noticed, I have no idea what 90% of my Facebook “friends” do for a living.

Another observation is hardly a week goes by where one of these people aren’t soliciting opinions on what kind of car to buy or lamenting how they just totaled theirs. You need to make sure that everybody knows what you do for a living in a very tasteful and low key way. Facebook is a great opportunity to do this. If you don’t want to let people know what you do for a living or are in some way embarrassed by it, then I just got a memo from your boss; quit now.

Now, I would probably do this about once a month. Here is a sample status update. You might say something as simple as “For those of you that might not know I sell cars, I’d love the opportunity to help any of you, your family, friends or coworkers down the road when the time does come to add or replace a vehicle. Thanks!”

There are sales people all over the country selling cars today because they did something as easy as that. What’s worse than finding out that one of your “friends” just bought a car from your competitor because they simply didn’t know! The rest of the month you can still post pictures of your new puppy, tell people you just checked in at Starbucks or share your horoscope which has absolutely no relevance to them. Thanks for watching.

Make Sure They Remember (Text Version)


How many times have you talked to a customer on the telephone and think you did a great job, then they come into the dealership and they don’t ask for you. Seven o’clock at night and you see your phone up from that morning up on the board as sold in another sales persons name. “Hey that’s my phone up from this morning”, “Well they didn’t ask for you. They said they talked to somebody but they couldn’t remember who”. Does this sound familiar? Why does that happen? It’s simple, If they didn’t write down your name they’re not going to remember it. How often do you meet somebody, you shake their hand and then 30 seconds later you’re wondering “what’s their name again?”. You forgot it and you were looking right at her. That happens to me all the time. So why do we think our customers are any smarter than we are? Right as we’re telling them “when you come down here ask for Alan Ram”, they’re thinking “man I’m hungry I wonder if there’s any chicken left over from last night, alright I’ll talk to you later”. They get down to your dealership and they have no clue of who they spoke to on the phone, but they remember the chicken was good. And then you think you got skated. Here’s the solution, “do you have a pen and paper handy? Write down my name”. Always ask do you have a pen and paper handy before you tell the customer what you’re going to have them write down. If you say “write down my name” and then ask “do you have a pen and paper handy”, they’re not going to perceive that as being important enough to stand up and get a pen and paper and they’ll just say yeah yeah yeah. We’ve all got dozens of yeah yeah yeah pens at our disposal at all times don’t we? “Do you have a pen and paper handy? Great. Write down my name.” If they write it down they’ll remember it. You’ll find this along with a lot other things on my ADAPT virtual trainer. Thanks for watching.