The holidays are here, and there’s plenty of evidence that this shopping season will be the most digitally connected yet.
According to one projection, online sales will increase at least 13.5 percent compared with 2013. Shopper confidence due to lower gas prices and a recovering economy helps support the overall feelings of good retail tidings. When you consider Google data that shows automotive query volume at its highest during the holiday period, it becomes obvious that dealers need to optimize their digital advertising strategy during the holiday season to capitalize on shopper enthusiasm.
Here are four tips to get your digital advertising strategy in the holiday spirit:
1. Fill the top of the funnel – With so many people already online this holiday season, get shoppers in the awareness and consideration phases through Network and Premium Display. By driving this traffic to your website, you are gathering these shoppers into a remarketing list, which will help keep your brand top of mind as they consider a possible holiday car purchase.
2. Keep your dealership visible – With car sales up year-over-year, so too is digital activity, and the opportunities for your competition to steal your business. Make sure your campaigns are fully funded to defend the brand name you have worked so hard to build.
3. Align your advertising campaigns with manufacturers’ ad investments –It’s always a good idea to align your dealership campaigns with OEMs’ national advertising efforts; but it’s critical during the holidays. Manufacturers invest millions this time of year in an effort to help clear out old inventory to make room for incoming models. By aligning your own dealership’s display advertising creative with the manufacturer’s national campaigns, you are turbocharging your ad investment through association.
4. Communicate your holiday goals with your digital team – Is your dealership pushing pre-owned vehicles? Is there a specific new model you’d like to move? Keeping clear and consistent communication with your digital advertising partners will ensure professional recommendations to make this holiday season a very happy one.
Jeff Bellinger is General Manager for Brandfon Honda, a sales and service volume leader in its district. Located in Branford, CT near New Haven, the dealership sells 1,560 new and used vehicles a year. Brandfon Honda operates 16 service bays and has eight service writers. To improve its fixed operations performance, the dealership installed Xtime hosted service CRM (customer relationship management) systems two years ago and recently provided service advisors Xtime ServiceTab™ mobile tablets.
“Our use of Xtime, and especially ServiceTab, has helped increase our labor hours per RO at least 35%,” Bellinger said. “Advisors like it because it helps them write up customers faster when they greet customers at their vehicles, and its checklist-driven walkaround guide helps them increase their upsell commission dollars.”
The mobile ServiceTab lets advisors greet customers right at their vehicles in the service drive, where conditions are more conducive to face-to-face interaction that builds stronger relationships and trust. By using this intuitive tablet interface, a service advisor can check customers in as they drive up, digitally record walk-around inspection results in real-time and discuss service recommendations without ever leaving the customer or vehicle.
"Our use of Xtime, and especially ServiceTab, has helped increase our labor hours per RO at least 35%."
Jeff Bellinger
General Manager, Brandfon Honda
“This technology adds credibility to what an advisor is recommending,” Bellinger noted, “and everything is captured electronically – including the customer’s signature to get the repair order started so customers are on their way a good five minutes faster.
XTIME HELPS BRANDFON HONDA:
Simplify and organize appointment scheduling: Whether customers book their appointments by viewing Xtime’s online automotive scheduling software on the dealership’s website or service staff does it from their desks, scheduling is easier, faster – and more visible to help management better load the shop.
Maximize appointments: Customers using the dealership’s Xtime service e-menu select recommended and desired services and book their own appointments. Because the online appointment schedule is the same as that seen by dealership staff, customers book only available days and times. They may also call the dealership and schedule with the dealership’s Xtime call center.
Build customer trust and comfort: E-mail and other electronic service notifications keep customers aware of their vehicles’ service needs based on scheduled maintenances, recall notifications or other service reminder or promotional emails.
Increase service revenue: By helping to maximizing shop utilization, Xtime helps keep technicians productive.
PROVEN PRODUCTIVITY
Xtime ServiceTab helps advisors do more thorough vehicle walkarounds and identify upsell opportunities. Improved shop utilization through Xtime’s ServiceCRM™ product suite and its certified integrations with a dealer’s DMS ensures all appointments are 100% confirmed. Bellinger said Xtime’s online scheduling does more than help him streamline workflow. He shared that consumers in control of scheduling their own appointment hours often take those late afternoon or evening appointments that often get overlooked when some employees book them. “With online scheduling, we take appointments right up until closing and then stay late to finish the work if necessary,” he said. This table provides a snapshot of Xtime’s performance at Brandfon Honda:
Appointments Booked via Xtime
Show Rate
Appointment Repair Order Dollars
Per RO Value
95.2.8%
84%
$146,964
$268
Bellinger said Xtime’s involvement with the dealership has meant big performance changes. “In our district, we’re one of the only dealerships to have had significant RO count increases during the last two years – and we are also one of the only ones having month-over-month growth this year compared to last. I attribute a lot of that growth to Xtime,” he said.
Buddy Toups, Service Manager for Infiniti of Lafayette, manages three technicians and two service advisors for this Louisiana dealership servicing about 300 vehicles a month. To streamline appointment setting – and put control in customers’ hands – Infiniti of Lafayette started using Xtime hosted service CRM (customer relationship management) systems two years ago.
Xtime services used there include Dealership Scheduling, Online Scheduling and Electronic Service Menus. With all customer appointments, including those by phone, now booked through Xtime, scheduling is visible to all authorized service personnel. This depth of visibility will be even more important as the dealership moves into their new facility this year that will double its size.
Prior to installing Xtime, appointments were scheduled using paper documents and then keyed into the dealership’s dealer management system. The process was terribly inefficient and not very user friendly, Toups said.
“For Infiniti customers who live their lives by appointment, our ability through Xtime to ensure that the time and day they booked for service will indeed be available when they arrive. That’s a critical requirement that we must simply meet,” he added.
With Xtime, we have access to customers’ entire service histories at our fingertips as we’re speaking to them.
Buddy Toups
Service Manager, Infiniti of Lafayette
“With Xtime, we have access to customers’ entire service histories at our fingertips as we’re speaking to them. Having this depth of customer and vehicle information so readily available helps us get to know customers and their vehicles better – and, as a result, Xtime helps us grow customer service and customer satisfaction as well as maintain our desired level of productivity,” Toups said.
XTIME HELPS INFINITI OF LAFAYETTE:
Simplify and organize appointment scheduling: Whether customers book their service by viewing Xtime’s online automotive scheduling software on the dealership’s website or service staff does it from their desks, scheduling is easier, faster – and more visible to help management better load the shop. “Xtime gives us great visibility into our appointments – who recreated what appointment and when – and clicking a VIN tab gives us the vehicle’s service history,” Toups noted.
Maximize appointments: Customers using the dealership’s Xtime service e-menu select recommended and desired services and book their own appointments. Because the online appointment schedule is the same as that seen by dealership staff, customers book only available days and times. They may also call the dealership and schedule with the dealership’s Xtime call center.
Build customer trust and comfort: Electronic service notifications keep customers advised of their vehicles’ service needs based on scheduled maintenances, recall notifications or other service reminder or promotion emails. When they arrive in the service lane, an electronic board announces their arrival, making them feel special.
Increase service revenue: By helping to maximizing shop utilization, Xtime helps keep technicians productive.
PROVEN PRODUCTIVITY
Performance data extracted from Xtime provide compelling evidence for its impact on service processes at Infiniti of Lafayette. This table provides a recent one-month overview:
Appointments Booked via Xtime
Overall Show Rate
Web Show Rate
Repair Order Dollars
Ave. Per RO Value
97.6%
87.9%
100%
$41,375
$245/$263 web
Online Schedule Activity via Xtime
Selected Services
Time/Day Searches
Booked Appointments
Cancellations
3.3% appointments booked
13
10
7
0
Toups said Xtime streamlines the entire booking and scheduling process.
“Without this visibility into our work, it can be too easy to overbook. With it, we can instantly see what our day looks like and respond proactively. Xtime gives us a complete view of how many loaners are needed, how many waiters are scheduled, and we have the ability to add notes or ‘customer alerts’ for customers who may have special needs, and we can easily see how many hours we have scheduled for our technicians,” Toups said.
“We also have the ability through Xtime to email customers when their vehicles are ready for pick up. With Xtime, sudden change is easily accommodated. I simply tweak the day’s workload to keep work flowing evenly and productively so we load up the shop and increase our hours per RO. Xtime has been an invaluable addition to our service process and we are only using a small portion of its capabilities. It’s a fantastic tool, and we look forward to tapping into all of its resources when move into our new facility,” Toups said.
