Big vs. Small Dealers, Part 2: Shifting Your Customer Experience

By:

Dave on 01/19/2012

Topic:

Dealers' Lane.

In Part 1, a sampling of 18 dealers and 1077 Yelp reviews revealed that customers were 26% more likely to have a positive experience at large dealers versus small ones. If you’re like me, you neither expected nor hoped for this result. In Part 2, we’ll look into possible reasons for this, drawing from my experience working for small dealers. As you’ll see, the size of the dealer doesn’t have much to do with the customer experience at that dealer. After all, out of the 453 small dealer reviews, how many reviewers had a single complaint regarding the size of the dealer? I would wager not one review complained only about the size. Something else makes a difference here – the people.

The same people who work at large dealers and pull in positive Yelp reviews could just as easily do the same for small dealers – but they aren’t. Why?

Furthermore, why aren’t the people who cause negative reviews at smaller dealers causing wreckage at big dealers? Are the exceptions really exceptions, or do they just have the right (or wrong) people?

Let’s take a look at these people factors, inside big and small dealers, that may be influencing customer experiences.

Big Dealers: People Factors

•       Big dealers may be less tolerant of employees delivering consistently negative experiences.

•       Big dealers may have less turnover; having more experienced employees would naturally result in fewer mistakes and miscommunications with car shoppers.

•       Big dealers may have training programs for their sales associates.

•       Big dealers may have better processes and aren’t ruled by desperation.

Small Dealers: People Factors

•       Small dealers, in an effort to make sales, may be ruled more by desperation. They may sacrifice the customer experience to achieve a sale at the highest profit possible.

•       Small dealers may not be able to afford training (or may not think they can afford training) for their sales staff.

•       Small dealers may hold onto an employee who causes review wreckage longer than bigger dealers, due to a tighter bond between managers and front-line salesmen.

•       Small dealers may lose effective employees to bigger dealers, due to pay, inventory, or lack of promotion opportunities.

•       Small dealers may lack talented or visionary leaders.

In reviewing these factors, it seems smaller dealers may be caught in a vicious cycle of high turnover and low morale. They may try to compensate for lack of sales volume with profit per sale against an increasingly aware customer. Yet, smaller dealers seem ineffective in dealing with this kind of customer (even though they increase in numbers every day). And with no qualified leaders to snap them out of it, they aren’t likely to improve anytime soon.

The upside to these factors is they aren’t difficult to change. Any dealer of any size can adopt the positive (or suffer from the negative) people factors above. That’s why exceptions exist among dealers of any size. As for my belief that smaller dealers could take bigger competitors head-on, I wouldn’t say the dream isn’t entirely lost. Every time I left a smaller dealer, I was hoping to find that mentality at the next one. I still hope to someday. For now, I have better idea of where to look. And perhaps you do, too.

[image by j_m_c]