The Welcome Call Is Killing Your Retention (Here's Why)
Back in 1981, Toyota launched their customer follow-up program as a competitive differentiator. Within a decade, the entire automotive industry copied it. Today...
Stop Texting Your Service Customers So Much (It's Killing Your Loyalty)
You're sitting in your service director's chair on a Tuesday morning, and your phone won't stop buzzing. Another text blast just went out to your service custom...
Why Your Employee Referral Bonus Program Is Probably Costing You Money
What if your employee referral bonus program is actually making your dealership harder to run? Most dealers treat referral bonuses like a silver bullet for hir...
The Contrarian Succession Plan: Why Your Family Dealership Shouldn't Revolve Around One Person
Most family dealership owners spend their succession planning meetings talking about which kid goes where, who gets what title, and whether the next generation ...
Do You Really Need a 20-Group? A Contrarian Take on Dealer Peer Groups
Twenty-groups have been a fixture of dealership culture since the 1970s, when a handful of forward-thinking dealers started meeting in small peer circles to sha...
Why Your Next Dealership Location Might Be Your Worst Decision
Why Your Next Dealership Location Might Be Your Worst Decision You've been running the same store for years. Sales are solid, CSI is respectable, and your team...
Why Your Recruiter Is Costing You More Than You Think: A Contrarian Take on Dealer Group Hiring
You've probably spent $40,000 to $80,000 on a recruiter to find your next general manager, only to realize six months in that the person you hired doesn't fit y...
The Uncomfortable Truth About Open-Book Management in Dealerships
Back in 1992, Springfield ReManufacturing Corporation became the poster child for open-book management when Jack Stack published his manifesto about teaching em...
The Contrarian PTO Policy: Why Dealership Principals Have It Backwards
According to industry surveys, roughly 73% of dealership GMs believe unlimited or overly generous PTO policies hurt sales performance. Most dealer principals st...
Why Smart Dealerships Are Dropping Drug Testing (And Why You Should Too)
Back in 1986, Ronald Reagan signed an executive order requiring federal contractors to maintain drug-free workplaces. Within a year, workplace drug testing beca...
The Contrarian Take on Dealership Cybersecurity: It's Not a Technology Problem
You're sitting in your general manager meeting on a Tuesday morning, and your IT person just told you that your dealership needs to spend $15,000 on a new cyber...
The Local SEO Trap: Optimization Without Inventory
You're spending $8,000 a month on local SEO for your five-store dealer group, and your general manager at the flagship location keeps asking why the store down ...