CRM Conference in Marina Del Rey Last Week

[Autopub]

If you were in the room at Ritz in Marina Del Rey last Tuesday, you would have probably concluded that after listening to the CRM mgt of the manufacturers and the CTO of a leading Web buying service -- the automotive industry has yet to figure out how to get Customer Relationship Management down to the dealer level. [No dealers in the room of 125]

Interestingly enough the best presentation of the day was the guy from Catipillar. He was right on about how to use CRM and it analysis and really seemed to explain why the buzz words of CRM are not enough. He seemed to say that the reason why CRM is not working is because the dealers are not adopting it and still don't think they need it.

[Viper 10]

Another reason they aren't adopting it is because most of the low end revenue generators don't have a clue how to use automated tools. They look at everything as a burden. I sold software for over 20 years in the global enterprise space to Fortune 1000 companies.

CRM is also viewed as a disciplinary tool fo rmanagement to migrate into daily forecasting and measuring forcast accuracy. That portion of CRMis a PITA.

Brad

[Lhansen]

I work with a lot of dealers who will not embrace CRM. They think it's too much hassle, and some systems out there are, in fact, very cumbersome to work with. If the dealer/general manager does not embrace CRM, then the rest of the staff will not utilize the tools they have (if any).
There are some very user friendly programs out there, but they are only as good as the people who are supposed to be using them
Thanks!

Linda Hansen
Auto Dealer Focus

[Grasojl7097]

What would the more User Friendly CRM programs be? Which ones should a dealer stay away from?

[listseller]

I work with many Dealerships, most have CRM. The issue is that a. They do not train their sales people on using it and B. The data dropped in to the CRM many times has not been scrubbed and processed to optimal or even minimal accurrcy and in effect useless. The sad part is that effective use of CRM will greatly increase a dealerships retention as well as additional revenue from referrals and additional purchase.
An interesting fact is that a dealer list can be scrubbed for accuracy for less than $500 missing information can be appended and addresses corrected we can even add emails. Trainning for CRM can be completed in a couple of hours. Theses guys are missing the boat and there is no need for it.

[RMAY4]

There does not seem to be much activity here for a while. What CRM's are people using successfully that intergrate with Reynolds as well?

[elawless]

I was using Freecrm.com, not that it integrates with ReyRey. It was good for the price.

[Autopub]

Wonder what a dealer wants in a "CRM System"? What data? And how do they use it?
If they kept track of all buyers and all good prospects that got away who live within 50 miles radius of the dealership, would they need all those "get sales quick" and "we got leads" people who advertise in the dealer magazines?

[GM2help]

I'm a GM of a multi point group and all our stores use CRM.
Here is the problem, in every stores sits a GM with different approaches than the others. Even in our group the older non progressive GM's are terrified of my ideas and how our store embraces technology. On average we destroy these what we call "grey hairs" (even though they are great peers) monthly in CSI, gross per R.O, $ per R.O, Internet Sales etc. It's those GM's that are killing the CRM market, and it wont change until they retire! Sorry ADP, REY REY reps.

Auto CRM is not rocket science, the problem is the vendors are ghosts after the application is installed, and the only time we hear from these tech reps is when they want to sell something new. It's easy, support the heck out of us, and see that no matter how cumbersome the system is it will be used, and will remain in the store.

To answer your question here are some of the programs I have used and recommend.

-Higher Gear
-ADP
-180
-AutoSurvey (fixed ops defection monitoring with some bells and whistles)

[DealerEd]

Yes, "the fish stinks from the head down" and if the Dealer Principal does not support the process the software becomes a boat anchor. For the most part General Managers and managers tend to look at a CRM tool as a bunden then complain when they can't hit their numbers. Twenty years running car dealerships and I have to tell you many managers are simply lazy and the Dealer lets them get away with it. Fortunately, our CRM program is so affordable ($300 per month with no contract for an entire store) that they justify paying our fee even when they use the program half the time (maybe!).

Regards,
Marc Kovitz (DealerEd)
DealerSoft, LLC of Illinois
www.keepyourcustomer.com

[DealerEd]

"Jeeves C.R.M." from DealerSoft, LLC of Illinois.
$300 per month for an entire store, no contract. If the dealer wants extra features (not really necessary) they pay for additional modules. This is a client server based program....no web/internet based programs here that open the dealer up to theft of data which can be copied from any pc that has an internet connection and the required admin password which at most dealers is about as secret as the Chicago Cubs record.