Proactive outreach nurtures winning client relationships
By Mark Macdonald
Making your customers feel special and appreciated is one of the surest ways to win their loyalty and keep them coming back to your dealership for service – and their next vehicle purchase.
Strategic CRMs seize the opportunity to reach out to customers by phone, email or text for a variety of reasons, including maintenance reminders for service that’s due soon, follow-ups on outstanding recalls, satisfaction inquiries, declined work that was recommended, and to confirm upcoming and reschedule missed appointments. Customers will appreciate the personal touch and being kept up-to-date on all pertinent information about their vehicle.
Reaching out, rather than waiting for customers to call or visit you, has a number of benefits, including:
Staying top-of-mind. The last thing you want is for your customers to start looking elsewhere for service or purchases.
Ensuring customers remain happy with their vehicles. And they’ll appreciate the chance to voice any concerns to a real person.
Making customers feel valued. A call on their anniversary of purchase or when their term is close to expiring shows your salespeople are paying attention – and that they care.
Preventing customers from falling through the cracks. A vehicle is a huge investment. If customers never hear from your dealership once the purchase is done or their vehicle’s left your service department, they may feel you don’t deserve their business in the future.
Of course, staying in touch means you have to keep their contact information up-to-date. Have your coordinator verify contact information each time they speak with a customer and always get their email, as it’s the one contact that doesn’t tend to change. Along with current contacts, your CRM is a great source of potential proactive contacts, including who’s scheduled for service, high-mileage lease drivers and owners of good quality used vehicles that are regularly serviced at your dealership or those whose vehicle term is set to expire. A good CRM tool has these features built into the software, and can automatically pull daily call lists.
Harness this data to stay on your customers radar – and in their good books.
Mark Macdonald
Account Manager
DealerMine CRM
