When thinking about workplace culture, it’s easy to immediately imagine employees at startups or tech companies. There are tons of articles showing Facebook or Google’s offices where people eat in massive food courts, host meetings in stylish courtyards, and play ping pong on their breaks. But workplace culture shouldn’t just matter to startups and tech giants—it should also matter to your auto dealership.
One of the biggest issues facing dealerships today is that 67% of salespeople leave within a year of being hired. Right behind them are service advisors and technicians. Put that together, and it’s clear that auto dealers have a hard time keeping their employees satisfied and loyal. Fortunately, it’s possible to create a workplace culture where your team thrives, particularly your sales team. All you need to do is implement the right sales tools.
The Top 5 Sales Tools for Dealerships
Oftentimes, employee-facing sales technology is deemed as a solution that boosts the customer experience and decreases transaction costs. But this technology can also improve employee retention. Your sales team wants technology to help them do their jobs, and when you equip them with solutions that make their lives easier, they’ll stick around longer to happily use the tools you’ve provided.
When LinkedIn published a report on the state of sales, it indicated that 97% of salespeople believe sales tools are “important” or “very important.” Additionally, LinkedIn found that nearly half of respondents use sales tools at least once a day. So if you’re not giving your sales team what they need, you’re missing an opportunity to create a workplace culture where they feel supported—and a lack of support leads to a lack of reasons to stay.
A recent study found that employees who felt the lowest levels of support from their organization or boss had the least commitment to the company, low job satisfaction, and the highest probability of leaving. On the other hand, those in a supportive work environment were committed, satisfied, and eager to stay put in their position. To ensure your salespeople have similar positive feelings, you must create a culture where they feel empowered to do their best—but of course, that means implementing grade-A sales tools.
For insight on which sales technology you should consider getting your team, here’s a list of the top five options.
1. CRM System
Customer relationship management (CRM) software helps your sales teams track and organize your dealership’s relationships with its customers. With this tool, your salespeople can automate communication with leads, keep tabs on sales and marketing efforts, enhance existing relationships with car buyers, and improve customer retention.
Typically, getting a CRM system is one of the best investments you can make for your team. According to a recent study, 68% of salespeople believe the tool is “very important” to closing deals, likely because a good CRM has everything they need to report and reference interactions with contacts and know how to move relationships forward.
2. Online DMV Platform
Another great investment for your sales team is an online DMV platform that makes it easy for employees to get car buyers’ license plates, tags, titles, and vehicle registration. To access this type of sales tool, you’ll need to work with a private DMV services company like our team at Barry Risk Management.
We have an online platform that auto dealerships can use to get the DMV items their customers need. The best part? Our team does all the legwork—we fill out the necessary DMV forms and mail the license plates, tags, titles, and registration to car buyers. All we need is a little information about your customers to make everything happen. It’s that simple.
When your sales team uses our online DMV platform, they don’t need to stand in long lines at the DMV, gather and fill out forms, or call DMV reps for questions and guidance. Our sales tool and team—who has 30 plus years in the DMV industry—will take care of everything digitally so that your salespeople can focus on attracting and closing more deals.
3. Sales Intelligence Tools
A sales intelligence tool is game-changing because it helps your team know exactly which prospects and customers to talk to, what they should talk about, when they should reach out, and what information they should provide to nail the interaction. This insight is made possible through the contextual information sales intelligence technology delivers.
With a sales intelligence tool, your employees will have contacts’ digital footprints, current contracts, purchase history, and business objectives. That information is crucial to closing deals and building relationships, and 62% of sales professionals agree, with them believing that sales intelligence is “very important” in helping them make sales.
For ideas on which sales intelligence software to get, check out G2Crowd. It’s a peer review site that compares sales intelligence technology and their ratings.
4. Social Selling Software
A social selling tool will help your sales team initiate and build relationships with car shoppers on social media sites like Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. Some salespeople log into social media accounts and use them directly. However, others prefer social selling software because it allows them to monitor and sort through messages to see what is and isn’t relevant, check what leads are saying and sharing, and publish content on multiple networks.
If your sales team uses social media regularly to promote new inventory, getting a social selling tool could be beneficial. This type of software will increase your employees’ productivity and success in attracting new customers.
5. Productivity Tools
Want to make sure your team gets stuff done? Then, help them by providing productivity tools. It’s not easy to stay focused and achieve substantial results every day, but that’s why productivity apps exist. They can help your sales team improve efficiency by offering automation and time-saving features like contract building, pipeline report creation, meeting schedulers, and lead generation tools.
Examples of great productivity apps include project management platforms like Asana and Trello, communication apps like Slack, and sharing and storage tools like Dropbox.
Equip and Support Your Sales Team
Your sales team wants to perform well—they want to close deals and make money, and so do you. After all, your sales team’s success is your success. But to give your employees the best chance of accomplishing their goals, you need to equip them with tools that support their ambition and work. Then, you’ll have a high-performing culture where salespeople feel empowered to stick around instead of looking for a job elsewhere.
