Daily Habits of Successful Salespeople
"Success is nothing ore that a few simple disciplines, practiced every day."
-- Jim Rohn
"Winning is a habit. Unfortunately, so is losing."
-- Vince Lombardi
In Retail you may call yourself a salesperson but you should call yourself a "Product Specialist"; in Buy Here Pay Here (BHPH) or Sub-Prime, you should be calling yourself a "Finance Specialist", but we'll talk more about that later why every person in America hates & distrusts anyone with "Sales" in their title. In either case whatever your title is, there are certain things that you need to do on a daily basis to be successful. Here's just a few of them:
First, when you first get to the dealership, obviously grab your coffee, whatever you do. Then look for any messages from customers and respond to them immediately. For example; leads from last night that were assigned to you, voice messages and emails. Next, you want to make sure that you follow up any undelivered customers or appointments that didn't show up on the day before. After that, you want to make sure you confirm all appointments for today. This will get your day started off right and it's always a good motivator. Ensure that you are updating your CRM. Whether it's updating your appointments for the day, logging your daily activities, sending emails, sending texts, or sending videos to customers, all that should be inside your CRM. Hopefully you're using Neo CRM like a lot of my dealers, where it's all that is built in, but just make sure all of that is being tracked.
Tracking everything in your CRM will allow you to effectively update and review your goals daily to see how you are progressing and making sure that you're doing all the important things that lead you to the results that you're looking for. Peter Drucker reminds us that, "you can't manage what you don't measure". Tracking is really important EVERY SINGLE DAY. It only takes about three to four minutes. I know sometimes it's boring, but if you don't track, you don't affect the goal set and ultimately you don't hit your goals which means you don't get the results and, you know, make the money you want to make. So just make sure you have the discipline to get your tracking done so you know where you are with your Goals and what skills you need to work on.
Next, Stephen Covey talks about sharpening your saw in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. You want to work on your skills, so be selfish and work on the things that you want to get better at. Whether you come a workshop, sign up for an online course or you're reading a book, make sure you take the time to gain the knowledge that will make you better. At live workshops, we go over how to set aside customer concerns, how to close better, how to overcome objections, and many more topics. Where are you learning these skills? Learning the technique is only the first step. Then you have to practice until perfect, at least 28 to 90 times in order to master it so it's second nature. Make sure you schedule a little bit of time, minimum 15 to 30 minutes per day, to work on your skills because that will help you do a better job with your guests and close more customers.
Next, you want to make sure that you prospect. Prospecting isn't cold calling somebody from the white pages like I did in the 80s. All prospecting is is just networking. It's letting people know who you are, what you do and where you work. Mostly nowadays it's done through social media. Whether you have your own Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn or Offer Up account, make sure that you are getting your message out there about who you. It should be specifically for BHPH dealers and your message should not look like a retail message. You want to brand yourself as a finance specialist to make sure that they ask for you and you're there to represent them, get the most favorable approval and show them how many of your 50-60 vehicles that you have in inventory that you can get approved for them. For those of you not comfortable posting to social media, just pick one platform and start small. Post a weekly message about some of the customers that you were able to help the previous week and grow it from there. In the mean time while you are building your presence, just call your current customers that you've delivered. Every one of those customers for the most part has 200 to 300 people in their phone so they can offer great customer referrals. You can even get referrals from people you didn't deliver. And if you really want to grow your sales, we can show you how to actually get "Business Referrals" from other Retail Dealers that can send you 5, 10, 15 deals per month, every month, but it takes a lot of strategic techniques and a plan to do that.
It's really important that you know your inventory. This is an example of how Sub-Prime and BHPH finance specialists are different than product specialists or salespeople. This is a completely different mindset and strategy. This is not about knowing the features, advantages, and benefits of the cars. It's about making sure that each car starts every day, making sure that the check engine lights aren't on, or if there is an issue with the vehicle that you notify your manager and either get it fixed or practice on how to overcome that. One of the main objections we deal with every single day in my life is TPS M sensors. About half the cars may have check engine light on, but those codes don't affect the operation or safety of the vehicle. There are many other objections you may need to overcome like the Inventory having over 150,000 miles. Hey, it's better than the bus. So you need to make sure that you know, what cars you have available, know the down payment required for each vehicle and making sure they start. You need to focus on putting your customers in a car they can actually afford versus their dream car. You should be practicing this, gaining the knowledge and just getting better every single day.
These are just some of the main actions it takes to be a successful salesperson in the Sub-Prime or Buy Here Pay Here world. You should try to improve your skills daily so you can reach your future goals. Always let today be your before picture! Now get out there and build more relationships that will Deliver more vehicles.
