Prospects + a Telephone = Relationship Building

Advertising has changed dramatically in the last ten years.  We’ve had to integrate the Internet into our annual marketing plans to remain competitive in the world of minute-to-minute advances in the ways we communicate with customers.

In 1995, almost 15 percent of Americans had access to the Internet.  Today, over 60 percent of Americans are oline, demonstrating the tremendous growth of online activities we are performing – from making purchases, researching topics, to communicating with employers, employees and loved ones.

But, Americans are NOT ALWAYS online.

We spend
about two hours a day watching television (American
Time Use Survey), and we travel 25 minutes on average to get to work (US
Census Bureau, 2004 American Community Survey) where we listen to the radio, read
newspapers and view traditional media like outdoor billboards, moving
billboards and even ads in the subway cars.

Therefore
advertisers need to employ traditional media such as broadcast and print in
order to reach consumers when they are watching television, riding in the car,
or waiting for the train.  It is
important to make these offline advertising efforts as hard-working as
possible.  In other words, it is
imperative to the success of your dealership to give people the marketing tools
to contact you immediately after hearing a commercial, viewing a billboard, or
watching TV.

What is the
best way to do this?  It is our old
friend the telephone – simple as that.  

When
working with clients I always recommend they include a toll-free phone number
(preferably a vanity number because they are simply easier to remember) in their
ads, whether television, radio, print or the Internet. 

I represent
a dealer group in Rochester,
NY.  They own several dealerships, covering
multiple brands – Dodge, Ford, Mitsubishi and Lincoln Mercury.  I was able to reserve vanity phone numbers
for each brand in their advertising market area.  We use the vanity numbers as direct response mechanisms
in both radio and television advertisements. 
By using these unforgettable numbers we are giving prospects an easy and
immediate way to contact the dealers, make a connection and start the
relationship building process.  Another
benefit is that these phone numbers come with real-time call tracking reports so we
are able monitor where the calls are coming from, which radio or television ad,
and then adjust our advertising schedule based on the return on investment for
the media dollars.

Why get a vanity number when you can just send people to your website? Well, by offering a phone
number you are offering a one-on-one customer experience. You are giving
prospects a direct route to your sales team. 
This is where your highly trained salespeople work their magic – they
form meaningful relationships and nurture those precious leads. It is common
sense – a phone conversation will make more headway than the time it takes to
fill out, process, and return an online contact form request.  And, as I mentioned, a vanity number – proven
to increase ad response rates by 30, and up to 50 percent in some cases – makes
it easy for your target audience to contact you. 

Using a
phone number in your advertising will also reduce the likelihood of losing a
prospect to competition.  Prospective
buyers will call you after hearing or seeing your phone number, versus going
online and running into the half a dozen or more other dealerships that are in
your market area.

Finally,
using a phone number in advertising and making connections with prospects when
they call enables your sales staff to more easily persuade buyers to come down
to the lot for test drives.  Your
reputation for exemplary customer service kicks in here – you take them for
test drives, answer all of their questions, introduce them to various members
of the dealership, bringing you one step closer in solidifying a relationship
and a sale. 

One final
thought – make sure you have a smooth process in place to handle your incoming
calls.  There is nothing more detrimental
to a possible sale then having a prospect call your dealership and either getting
placed on hold for an extended period of time, or bounced to multiple
departments until they finally reach someone who can assist them.

I recommend
you monitor your call handling system from time to time.  Place test calls to your dealership posing as
a prospect.  Monitor how your call is
answered, how much time you spend on hold, and how you are approached by a
sales person once you are connected. 
Then you can identify areas that need improvement.  Call recording is a feature offered with
toll-free service and comes in handy when you want to monitor how reception or
sales handle incoming calls.

My
experience with clients using phone numbers as a primary direct response tool
is the single best measurement I have to determine what causes people to respond
to advertising.