I often hear dealers complain about the quality of the people coming into the business. They complain that it’s hard to find people willing to work and who want to make some real money.

Could it be that dealers are trying to hire the same type of person they were trying to hire 20 years ago?

I’m betting that many of you have experienced sales people selling less than 8 units a month. How can someone come to work every day, and only sell 8 cars a month? You have to ask yourself, how is that possible? Are you making excuses for their lack of performance? Have you accepted mediocrity?

There’s a difference between showing up for work and actually coming to work.

The best way for you to start to raise the bar is to raise your standards for the type of people you hire and the type of processes you demand that your organization embraces.

Raising the bar is exhausting. Raising the bar means being committed to the hiring and training of a different type of sales person.

Raising the bar goes against the grain. Raising the bar requires one to be a student of the game and have the willingness to change the game knowing there will be serious opposition from the masses. Raising the bar means developing new and innovative pay plans. Raising the bar means changing the selling system to fit today’s buyer. Raising the bar means having the courage to throw “Legacy Thinking” out the window.

Changing the game means changing the rules. Changing the rules means holding more people accountable for raising the bar. The bar does not get raised and left in that position. The bar has to be raised every day if you are going to continue to play the game and be successful.

Realize that raising the bar even just a little bit gives you an edge. It’s easy to do because so many of your competitors are locked into lowering the bar and accepting the business as it is, not as it could be.

To raise the bar:

Do It With Enthusiasm
Have No Fear
Change The Expectations
Don’t Make Exceptions
Create Accountability
Defeat Legacy Thinking

So, the choices are easy, you can continue to lower the bar, you can raise the bar or you can head to the bar. That’s all I’m gonna say, Tommy Gibbs

I’ve come to realize that one of the greatest frustrations of dealers, general managers and sales management in general is average gross profit. The focus on average gross profit has its moments when it drives the management team nuts. I would suggest in some cases it caused the team to lose focus on what’s most important.

I’m not denying that we need to have a focus on average gross and I’m not denying that for a lot of dealers there’s room for improvement.

Having said that, I do believe many of you would be better served focusing on total gross and removing (Try it for the next 90 days) average gross from your vocabulary.

More often than not there’s an expectation of total gross for the used car department. The real goal should be how fast we can hit that number and beyond. The goal should be to pile up as much gross as you possibly can, as fast as you can.

Never forget you cannot spend average gross profit. You can spend total gross profit. That’s all I’m gonna say, Tommy Gibbs

Yep there is. And, you know who he/she happens to be. But, you keep them around because they are productive. Nobody wants to work with them. If anything people avoid working with them. Sales people don’t want to work with them. The office staff avoids them and the service department cringes when they show up.

But, you let them hang around. They have some skills you’ve found useful over the years. Skills that are no longer serving the team and the organization well today in today’s market.

You won’t get rid of them because you feel a sense of loyalty for all they’ve done for you over the years. You’re loyal to them. They aren’t loyal to you or they would have sense enough to know that their bullying creates a divide for the team.

The longer you let the bully stay in the room, the uglier the room will become. The uglier the room becomes, the more people will leave the room. The more people leave the room, the harder it is for you to build a winning team. The harder it is to build a winning team, the more your culture will erode.

Enjoy your bully in the room. That’s all I’m gonna say,Tommy Gibbs

1. Do a better job of training the sales people (and sales managers) to sell the value of your company and the value of the vehicle, and your grosses would be a lot better. The Team needs to learn to say “no” and to convince the customer that you have the best deal going.

2. Provide more information. The more information your sales people have about your inventory and how it’s priced to market, the more likely they are to do a better job of convincing the customers you’ve got the best car at the best price. You have to sell the sales staff before you sell the customer.

3. Do more and better research. The more research you do on what’s hot and what’s not in your market, the better off you will be. Grosses go up when you are selling a product that’s high in demand and low in supply. Key components for you to utilize are vAuto Stocking Tool and Auto Trader Data.

4. Rethink “Buckets.” Buckets are a solid discipline process, but you can’t take a position that all cars in the first 20 days are priced a certain way and at day 21 another way and so on. There are some that need to be over market and some under market, regardless of age. All cars have to be evaluated on their own merits and this must be done daily, not in 15 or 20 day windows. One of the biggest problems I observe is that cars don’t get re-priced soon enough. You might want to start to pay close attention to how often cars are re-priced. Some of your older inventory may have been ignored along the way.

5. Track GAP and ROI. Dealers who are tracking GAP and ROI are seeing a big difference in their average grosses. If you’ve not bought into this process then maybe it’s something you should take a hard look at. If you need the GAP/ROI spreadsheet, send me an email and I’ll get it right to you. (It’s Free!)

6. Fix your reconditioning timeline. If your most profitable car is a 20-day car (and it really is) how can you allow the service department to bog you down with it spending 7 to 10 days in the shop? This is one of those things that’s fixable, but it has to be done by the dealer. If the dealer wants to fix it then it gets fixed. Speed wins; the lack of speed kills. It’s as simple as that.

7. Re-do your website. How does your website look? Your website is the “New Showroom.” Do your pictures tell a good story? Do you have 12 to 20 photos? If that’s all you have then you are not in the game. You need at least 40 and they need to be done in a photo booth. If you don’t have a photo booth you need to make a commitment to get one. Saying you don’t have the space is a poor excuse. You can make it happen if you want to. Kind of like the issue in service. You can fix it. You just need to do it.

8. Install EWR into your “Trade Walk.” If you’re not familiar with Early Warning Radar, read this article. EWR will help you eliminate your problem cars. Even if you’ve read it before, read it again.

The used car department takes a lot of energy and effort to achieve the volume and gross you need to make big money. You can say that “gross is a state of mind” all you want, but what really creates gross is your mind getting in gear and fixing the things that impact gross, not sitting around thinking about it.

There’s no one big thing that’s going to improve your gross. It’s a lot of little things. That’s all I’m gonna say,Tommy Gibbs

I’m mainly talking to GMs, Dealers and Owner-Operators. I’m not saying you’re out of touch. I’m just asking if by chance you’re out of touch?

The view from a computer screen is very different than the view from the sales tower, the service write-up lane, the parts department back window, the technician’s work area and even the general office workspace.

Are you spending any real quality time in these areas? Do you really know what the team is up against?

I fully realize that when you visit these areas things are not always as they appear. Everyone is on good behavior when you are there. But, if you really pay attention you will soon see what they are up against minute by minute.

One of the things that will probably jump out at you is how much time your team members spend being unproductive. If nothing else, you will observe that you’ve turned your sales managers into clerks.

If they spent half as much time each day developing sales people and selling cars as they do chasing paper issues you’d sell a lot more cars and have a much better bottom line.

For gosh sakes, hire them a clerk. That’s all I’m gonna say, Tommy Gibbs