In the auto dealership space, making appointments consumes a major portion of the week’s responsibilities. However, every effort does not yield the desired results or steady business. You need to know the right tips and tricks to become successful when it comes to dealership appointment making.

So, if you want to compete with today’s digital disruptors and the guy across the street, it’s important that you sharpen your dealership appointment making skills to get a steady flow of leads. Here’s how to do just that.

6 Tips to Enhance Your Dealership Appointment Making Skills 

1. Build an Appointment Culture

While it’s true that you want your team to focus on selling cars, work toward building a team that is also motivated by an appointment culture. Pay attention to detail and teach your staff — from the sales floor to the front office to service — to think about how they can take the extra step to book a customer’s next appointment. Market research shows that 84% of car buyers prefer buying a car in person, and 73% visit dealerships because of great salespeople. So, by building a team that’s customer experience-oriented, you can draw more leads to your dealership.

2. Nurture Generated Leads

While price is often the most critical factor in selecting a dealership, 54% of customers will pay a higher price for a great car buying experience. Encourage your team to be proactive and respond to leads efficiently. Help customers with whatever questions and answers they have and truly make them feel like they’re a part of your family. A report by McKinsey & Company shows that personalization can boost sales by 10% or more and ROI by 5-8 times!

3. Improve Your Appointment Process

Research shows that more than 80% of the customer-dealership interaction begins with a telephone conversation. So, it is important to identify that the primary mission of the person receiving the call should be to schedule an appointment. You can’t just quote a price to the customer on the phone. If the customer is contacting you regarding an issue with their vehicle, don’t indulge in an on-call diagnosis. Invite the customer to bring their vehicle to your dealership, make an appointment, and schedule a vehicle check-up with a trained technician.

4. Follow-Up With “No Shows”

It happens more often than we’d like, but there are customers who simply do not show up for appointments. In most of the cases, they merely forget and will usually reschedule. Still, you need to be proactive and call them to reschedule the appointment. Your customers will appreciate the concern. Research shows that the best days to follow-up with car buyers are Monday and Tuesday — 30% of views of online inventory and 37% of lead generation takes place on these two days.

5. Schedule the Next Appointment

Before the customer leaves your dealership, you should automatically be scheduling their next maintenance appointment. Work it out with them, add it to your system, and send them reminders of the time and date of the next appointment.

6. Continue to Improve Your Appointment Making Skills

Sales processes and methodologies at auto dealerships are always evolving. Therefore, keep honing your appointment making skills to book appointments constantly. Get the right tools and knowledge to improve customer experience and encourage more customers to visit your dealership. It’s important that you teach marketing skills to everyone on your staff so that everyone understands the challenges and needs of your customers. Then, regularly communicate with customers via a channel they prefer, offer valuable information and support, and request their feedback periodically.