Why is Automotive CRM Software Necessary for Modern Dealership?
Nowadays, more than the shiniest showrooms or the latest model cars are needed to outshine competitors in the ever-changing automotive industry. It has become the need of the hour for car dealerships to manage leads and develop stronger relationships with existing customers. Gone are the days when newspaper ads and cold calling were used to generate dealership traffic. Today, buyers search for cars from different digital sources, compare brands’ prices, and make informed decisions before entering your showroom. You can earn the trust of these digital buyers from miles away by leveraging Automotive CRM Software.
What is Automotive CRM Software?
It is specifically designed for dealers to easily manage customer service interactions, sales and marketing communications, and relationships with prospects and customers. CRM technology allows tracking customer interactions from various touch points like calls, texts, emails, social media, and contact forms. The software automates repetitive tasks that you may forget like sending a thank you email to a client who just took the test drive. Moreover, salespersons and dealers may not remember each customer they interact with and the buying process. Automotive solutions allow you to track the updated interaction history to offer personalised interactions and a satisfactory experience.
How Automotive Solutions Are Different From Standard CRM?
CRM solutions are great tools for your sales and marketing teams as they automate various tasks and improve your business relationships. However, automotive solutions are different from standard solutions. For instance, CRM dedicated to automotive contains features required for this industry. These include service appointment scheduling, vehicle inventory management, and integrations with other sales platforms. This facility enables dealers to manage the customer lifecycle from beginning to post-sale services. Using specific CRM designed for the automotive industry offers various benefits that generic CRMs may lack. Dealers can schedule test drives and easily follow up on leads.
Navigating To The Uses of Automotive CRMs For Dealers
Dealers may not follow up on almost a quarter (23.5%) of buyers in routine while 13.3% of leads never entered your customer database. It means that car dealers lose the opportunity to get 37% of online leads due to follow-up and record-storing issues. Following are some core operations where these specialised CRMs can improve relationships and bring efficiency.
1. CRM for Sales Teams
Automotive customer relationship management solution centralises all customer interactions and data. Hence, your sales teams can easily track lead information, understand potential customers’ preferences, and close deals quickly. They can also use automated features like personalised communication templates and follow-up reminders to streamline customer relationship operations. This way you can keep your customers engaged and reduce the likelihood of losing sales opportunities.
2. CRM For Customer Service
The customer service teams in the automotive industry can utilise CRM potential to maintain service schedules, track vehicle maintenance records, and send alerts to customers about impending service needs. CRM technology streamlines almost all of your customers’ related operations. In addition, this proactive customer management strategy keeps your customers satisfied, boosts loyalty, and increases retention rates.
3. CRM for Marketing Teams
Your marketing department can leverage CRM to segment customer databases. It makes it easier for them to run target marketing campaigns following specific criteria. You can automate various aspects of marketing campaigns to increase the conversions and ROI of your marketing efforts.
How Dealers Can Achieve Their Outreach Goals?
- Social Media Engagement: They can run personalised and automated campaigns to increase their outreach efforts. Moreover, your marketing teams should connect to your Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and other social media pages to monitor conversations about your business. They can involve or engage with leads and prospects whenever your presence is required to create a positive brand image.
- Mass Emails: Automotive businesses can send event invites using the mass email feature. You can create e-invites for incoming events and schedule them to send to your contacts at the scheduled time. For example, if you plan an event in Japan, set the city criteria as ‘Japan’. Likewise, to send an e-invite to young entrepreneurs, you can find all your contacts in this age group using advanced filters.
- Google Ad Campaigns: Many CRM also allow integrating CRM data with Google Ads to learn about the keywords that generate the most qualified leads. You can combine online and offline conversion data to get clear insights about sales data and spend your advertising budget wisely.
- Web Forms: You can also capture leads using web forms to avoid missing out on high-intent leads on your website. CRM systems already have built-in and customisable web forms to transform your marketing campaigns into lead generation.
Top Advantages of CRM Solutions For Automotive Businesses
1. Mark Your Digital Presence
Technological advancements have transformed how dealers built and sold automobiles. Now, most automotive dealerships have moved their customer buying journey online to make reach easier for customers. Earlier, original equipment manufacturers shared information through articles or blogs but now they provide test drives and virtual tours.
2. Improve Pre & Post Sales
Purchasing a car does not mean a customer’s journey has ended because most customers like to stay engaged with the deals even after purchase. Dealers can engage them through automated maintenance reminders, and promotional offers like extended warranties or vehicle-related tips. They can also interact with customers to upsell car accessories. Moreover, a study has shown that 90% of customers search online before purchasing while 68% only visit one showroom. You can answer your customer concerns to resolve their issues so they can choose you to buy their car.
3. Improves Productivity & Secure Your Data
Automation of sales and marketing repetitive tasks improves your automotive business performance. CRM software can collect customer information from various resources and store it in a centralised database. Your sales and marketing teams can easily qualify, score, and nurture leads. You can also get detailed reports to access valuable insights into customer behavior and preferences. In addition, your sales agent can access customer information while in the office or on the go with a secure automotive CRM system that ensures the security of useful business data.
Final Note
Remembering each customer interaction and buying information is difficult whether you are a car dealer or salesperson. Moreover, a customer’s buying journey begins online today so the automotive industry needs lucrative ways to provide superior service on all touchpoints to convert leads and boost sales. Automotive CRM Software is a scalable and secure solution to streamline the buying process for your customers. Don’t limit your choice to a general CRM, contact CherryBerry UCM for a specialised CRM tool to drive sales and customer satisfaction in the digital age.
