Toyota Car Sales Breakdown
A friend of mine shared a frustration with a recent re-sell cold call tale.
He’d bought a new car three years prior.
Being eco-friendly, he chose a hybrid.
The payments nearing their end, the vendor had been “bombarding” (his word) him with email invites to various events to view their current offerings.
He wasn’t interested, happy to keep using a suitably well performing vehicle.
That the maker happened to be Toyota I doubt is an issue. As I suspect all car manufacturers act the same.
The follow-up calls gathered pace. Eventually he felt compelled to answer one. Not just to stop him being hassled, but to let the salesperson switch their workload to actual prospects.
The call was not a pleasant one.
It opened with details of the latest “open day”.
Despite saying from the outset that attendance was not for him – as he was happy and not for changing for a good, long while – he couldn’t believe that the caller seemed oblivious to this.
A succession of “but” style clauses gushed forth:
The new range is so much better. You’ll get more for less. There’s a special discount on right now. An added extras promo too. Running cost value even healthier, by the way.
It all sounded quite exhausting.
Stuck firmly in the wrong gear of last-century selling.
Straight away we talked over mechanics of tactical improvement.
Current best-practice consigns this match-alight-burn time machine gun fire to the scrapyard.
Best for proper conversation to find the buyers.
Here was the first, instant attempt at servicing;
have you caught yourself thinking how you might be able to upgrade your car?
…and even get a better one for less money?
…saving money on running costs too…
With a touch of refinement – and experience gained from real prospecting – you’d soon get closer to both higher hit rates and any willing potential re-sign customer. After all, even if you major on classic ‘create the need’ angles, you still need a decent starting point here.
Anything that avoids this outdated ratatatat example which finds those with the state of play you can address is the only real way.
You sense this is a failure of management here. Using flawed old school cart before horse metrics of measurement. Imagine they tallied event signups second. How does your intro drive your prospects reaction?