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Automotive industry insights, tips, and guides

How Top-Performing Dealers Manage the Long-Term Sales Follow-Up Book

Back in 1988, when the internet didn't exist and a salesperson's follow-up book was literally a leather binder with index cards and coffee stains, top dealers h...

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Trade-In Overallowance Discipline: How Top Dealers Benchmark and Control It

The Trade-In Overallowance Problem Nobody Talks About in the Showroom Most dealerships bleed money on trade-in overallowances without even realizing it's happe...

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How Top-Performing Dealers Handle Payment Objections

The Payment Objection Problem How many deals walk out of your showroom every month because a customer says the payment is too high? Not the car. Not the featu...

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How Top-Performing Dealers Structure New Salesperson Ramp Plans: The Benchmark Approach That Actually Works

Most dealers treat new salesperson onboarding like a rainy day in Portland: you know it's coming, you're vaguely prepared for it, and then you're annoyed when i...

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How Top-Performing Dealers Track Showroom Traffic Attribution by Source

Most dealers have no idea where their showroom traffic actually comes from. Sure, they'll tell you they track leads in their CRM. But ask them to break down ye...

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Deal Desk Approval Speed: Benchmarking the Fastest Dealerships

How Fast Should Your Deal Desk Actually Work? Your sales manager just hit send on a deal proposal at 4:47 p.m. on a Friday afternoon. The customer is sitting i...

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The Problem Most Dealerships Won't Admit

Why do some dealerships have salespeople fighting over the next up while others are stuck with the same three guys doing 80% of the sales? The difference almos...

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How Top-Performing Dealers Handle the Internet Sales Manager Role: A Benchmarking Guide

You're sitting in your manager's office at 8:45 a.m., coffee cooling on your desk, when you notice something that shouldn't be happening: three internet leads f...

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How Top-Performing Dealers Handle Phone-Up Conversion to Appointment: The Benchmarking Guide

Here's a question that keeps sales managers up at night: Why do some dealers turn 60% of phone-ups into actual showroom visits while others struggle to hit 35%?...

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Why Multi-Store Digital Marketing Governance Is Quietly Costing You Deals

Most dealer groups aren't losing deals because their marketing is bad. They're losing deals because nobody actually knows what's working. A dealer principal ru...

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1. The Hidden Opportunity Cost of Locked-in Vendor Agreements

In 1995, Walmart had just over 2,000 stores in the United States. By consolidating their vendor relationships and enforcing strict purchasing agreements across ...

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Why HR Standardization Across Multiple Stores Is Quietly Costing You Deals

Back in the 1970s, when franchised dealership groups started expanding beyond a single rooftop, the playbook was simple: standardize everything. One payroll sys...

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