Why do customers decline recommended work even when they know they need it? In this webinar with Dan Molloy, President of Molloy Sales Development Group, we break down the real reasons behind declined work and what your team can do to improve approval rates.
We cover:
- How to build trust from the very first conversation
- Why customers say no even when they need the repair
- Simple ways to reduce sticker shock and deferred work
- Why relationship building matters more than leading with price
- How to present recommendations with more confidence and clarity
- and more!
Episode Transcript
*This transcript was generated with Artificial Intelligence. Error may occur. If you identify an error please contact [email protected].
Lauren Thunen (00:00):
Good morning and good afternoon, everyone that I see jumping in. Thank you so much for joining us today for our most recent webinar with Molloy Business Development Sales Group. Why customers decline work even when they need it? Why do they say no? Even if they know they need recommended repairs, certainly everyone on this call knows that they need recommended repairs. So why do folks say no? That is what we are going to be tackling today. I’m really excited to talk about this because it’s something that affects every shop every single day. And we throw a lot of solutions out there, but sometimes we never really talk about the root of the problem. And to understand how to fix a problem, you have to understand the root of it. So today we’re going to spend a lot of time talking about not only the reasons why customers decline work, but just as importantly, what can you do about it?
(01:01):
So thank you all for joining us. My name’s Lauren. I’m the director of partners and product marketing here at AutoVitals. And Dan, would you introduce yourself to everyone that’s
Dan Molloy (01:09):
Jumping in? Yes, thank you. First of all, thank you, Lauren. It’s great doing these with you. My name’s Dan Malloy. I’m the founder of Malloy Business Development Group. I’ve been in the industry for 28 years. At one point, I owned 104 water repair and tire stores, and I’ve been working with clients all over the country for the past 25 years, helping them. And I wrote a book. Where’s my book? Here’s my book. I wrote a book titled The Language of Commitment, which I invite people to go to Amazon and pick up if you’re so motivated to do that. But my philosophy is that every result inside all your businesses, inside my business, in Lawrenceville, AutoVitals, all of it has its roots in how we communicate. And so that’s where I’m coming from. In all our work, our training programs, our AI programs, our AI agents and bots, and everything that we create for our clients is all rooted in what I call the language of commitment.
(02:04):
So with that being said, I’ll tell you, you know what? I love this topic because in my working with many, many hundreds of dealers, and I’ve analyzed it in detail, if you have a shop, just throw this out there. If you have a shop that does $200,000 a month in revenue, there’s odds are that you have about $200,000 a month in deferred work and do the math. If you have a company that does $10 million in revenue annually, you get eight, nine, 10 million in deferred work. It pretty much correlates like that. What do you think about that, Lauren?
Lauren Thunen (02:41):
Yeah, I mean, absolutely. For many shops, if you’re running a 50% decline rate, you might actually be thinking, “Hey, I’m doing pretty good,” because you’re also running a 50% approval rate depending on how many recommendations you’re making on a vehicle. If you’re making 10, 12 recommendations, you’re getting six out the door. Typically, shops are pretty happy with that. So when we’re thinking about what does that mean for the business downstream, obviously hopefully you’re running a customer retention, management, service reminders, things like that to get people back in. But what we’re going to talk about today is how you can get more and more of that work approved when the customer’s already sitting in your shop because that is your best opportunity. Because no matter how loyal customer you have or how good a job you do, you never know if they’re going to come back through your doors.
(03:24):
You don’t know if they’re going to move. You don’t know what’s going through their head. So how can we make sure when they’re sitting in your shop, when their car is in your bay, technician’s already done all of the work on this beautiful inspection, pulled the wheels off, the car’s up on the lift. How do you capitalize on that opportunity? Because you’ve already spent so much money to
Dan Molloy (03:42):
Get them in the door. The cost. And to get the car up,
(03:46):
Right? The cost is huge. We were just talking about that a minute ago. The cost of advertising to get people on the phone or in the store. The cost of paying the sales team and the service advisor team to actually have a conversation with them as they come in or on the phone. The cost of the technician, how much does it cost to actually have a technician shake down a car, inspect the vehicle, do a DVI and get it up, and then the cost again of the service advisor to present it and then not have it be sold? Yeah. I was doing a training class for a new client here in New Jersey just last week and I did a session for an hour with the technicians. I asked them, “How frustrating is that for you? If the work that you did all this time and effort to get it done, to get the inspection, get the DVI set up and it doesn’t get sold.” And it’s frustrating.
(04:45):
It’s frustrating for the salespeople too. When I had that big company in Ohio, I used to talk with the guys. It was very frustrating. They want to sell it.
(04:54):
They want to take care of the customer. And so then it leads us right up to the next question. How come? How come work gets declined so much? What are your thoughts?
Lauren Thunen (05:03):
Well, we’re talking a lot about costs right now, the cost of doing business, the cost of attracting customers, the cost of getting folks into your shop. So let’s start first with price. Now, there’s a lot of different components that go into sticker shock, to the cost of services, but can you break down a couple reasons why price is one of the first thing that comes to people’s minds when they think about why customers are declining work?
Dan Molloy (05:33):
You’re talking about pricing. I’m thinking to myself, but I know the issue is never price. It can’t be price.
Lauren Thunen (05:41):
Say more about that.
Dan Molloy (05:43):
Well, I make this claim all the time and I get into raging debates with people about it, but I’m certain it can’t be priced. If somebody’s car is broken or there’s a check engine light on, or if the front end is out of whack or if they need an alignment or their tires aren’t working and the brakes are grinding or whatever the issue is, the real issue, my opinion, and I’m open to hearing other opinions obviously, but my opinion is that the real issue is whosever car that is, is stuck. They can’t live their life. They can’t go to pick the kids up at school. They can’t go to work. They can’t go on vacation. They can’t go fishing. They can’t go hunting. They can’t do their job. They can’t live their life. They’re on the sidelines of life. Unless you live around here where I live right next to New York City, you could hop on a bus or a subway or mass transit.
(06:37):
That’s not the case in most places.
Dan Molloy (06:39):
Don’t have a vehicle, I have lots of friends who don’t even have vehicles, but if you live in a place like Tulsa, Oklahoma or down in Texas or out in Western New Jersey, if your vehicle is out, you’re out of the game. So the real issue is you’re out of the game.
Lauren Thunen (06:55):
Yeah. And I think you’re making an important point here because what will come out of a lot of customers’ mouth of why they decline is it’s too expensive, et cetera. It’s cost. I want to go find somewhere cheaper. But I think what you’re saying here is really important because there’s two sides to the coin. When if someone’s towed into your shop, yeah, it can’t be about price for all of the things that you just said because they are on the sidelines of life. If they weren’t towed into your shop, but you can see on their vehicle like, “Hey, if you don’t get this serpentine belt fixed or if you don’t fix your shop and struts, you’re going to be on the sideline of life soon.” It’s communicating to them the urgency and the importance and what’s going to happen if they don’t fix it. Because all they’re seeing is, let’s just call it a thousand dollar bill.
(07:40):
They’re not seeing because they don’t know that if they don’t spend $1,000 now, they’re going to be sidelined for life and they’re going to be spending from life and they’re going to be spending $5,000 in six months. Great example is getting your brakes fixed. That’s usually an easy one, but explain to them like, “Hey, if you keep letting your brake pads wear it out, not only are you going to have to get the brake pads replaced, you’re also going to have to replace your rotors. That’s going to cost exponentially more.” So you’re really investing right now in your future so you can spend less money. And I think that’s when we talk about price, it’s like, yeah, it’s the cost today, but what happens if you don’t do it? And explaining it. I think
Dan Molloy (08:21):
The problem is why people don’t buy is because we’re not having the right conversations with them. And I remember when I got into the business in 1998 and when I became a partner in that big company and I would travel around to the stores, I had to learn the business. I had to learn what was going on. And my background is in communication. I’ve been studying language and communication, the language of commitment for 45 years. So I’ve studied this more than any. I’ve analyzed way more than a million business conversations, most of it in the auto repair and tire and his car dealerships and all that. So when I talk about this stuff, I have some background in it.
(09:00):
So when I get in, I didn’t realize what business we were really in. And so it’s safe for me to say right now that most dealers out there don’t understand the business they’re in. A lot of them will say that we’re in the auto repair and tire business, but that’s not it. My studied opinion is you’re in the communication business. You just mentioned it, Lauren. You’re in the communication business, and more importantly, you’re in the
trust building business and the relationship building business. That’s number one, Numero Uno. And I might add that by saying that in my business, we train and teach and coach. It’s one of the things we do. And I developed this whole idea or this, maybe it’s better to say it was an observation that we were really in a three-act play. This is what I came up with over the years, that we’re in a three-act play.
(09:57):
It’s show businesses, communication and show business. So in act one, the phone rings, you spend all your money to make the phone ring or somebody walks in. So act one is about building trust and credibility right off the bat. Because let’s face it, when somebody calls you on the phone, a brand new customer, do they trust you?
Lauren Thunen (10:18):
No.
Dan Molloy (10:19):
No, they don’t. They’re like this. And they start out, they’re like this. “I don’t know you necessarily. I just want a price on X, Y, Z or on my brakes or tires or whatever. I want a price, but I don’t necessarily trust you. “So the first game in act one of this three act play is to build trust, but more importantly is to invent
the future. And this is what people don’t realize. You’re talking in the moment with a brand new customer that doesn’t trust you. So what you have to do, and your only tools are language and your ability to move your body, but you have to invent a story, a narrative that you inject into that customer’s head that has them think differently about their future, that has them see new possibilities about the future. They have a problem. And if you just give them a price, if you talk about price, a price doesn’t necessarily open the possibilities or create a vision in that customer’s head about what’s possible for them down the road in the future.
(11:27):
So the first game … So I’ll give you an example. So just to role play a little bit with you, (11:34):
If you called me and said,” Why don’t you just do it? Ring a ringlet. I’ll do the thing. Let’s do it.
Lauren Thunen (11:43):
“Ring, ring, ring. Hey, Dan, I’m calling your shop because, man, I don’t know. I know I need an oil change, but I think probably the brakes, I think they’re squeaking a little bit. I’m not in a good place. How much do you think it’s going to cost?
Dan Molloy (11:57):
Well, I’ll tell you what, Lauren. Thank you so much for calling Malloy Automotive and Repair. I can definitely help you with that. As a matter of fact, I’m going to help you with your issues right now. And I want you to know a couple of things about how we operate here. First of all, we’re a full service shop. We can fix anything from brakes and tires, alignments, check engine lights, whatever issues you have, we can take care of it, number one. Number two, I have money for you. If you ever have a problem, if you ever feel you need … We have payment plans so we can fix anything and I have money for you. So my point is, by speaking in a particular way about what you’re doing, I invent a possibility for you that down the road, you may be able to use payment plans that we have.
(12:50):
And I declare to you that not only can I help you with your immediate concerns, but I made a service declaration on top of it in which I also offered the payment plan. So this is an example of creating the future for that customer.
Lauren Thunen (13:08):
Yeah. Yeah. I think what you’re saying, I want to pick apart a couple of things. I think obviously one of the things, and we’ve talked about this before, so I’m not going to spend too much time, is just the yes, I can help you with that, is making a safe place for the customer, that being the first thing that comes out of your mouth. Because again, a lot of the shops on this call and not work with us are very, very busy. You get caught up in the busyness of the shop. Even if you can’t help them today, maybe you need to schedule an appointment for tomorrow, is the first things coming out of your mouth is like, yes, we’re going to help you with that. We’re going to get that taken care of. Because I know a lot of times the first instinct when you’re on the phone is like, “Hey, I hear you, Lauren, but we’re super slam today, so we’re not going to be able to get you until next week.” Second customer or a potential customer hears that, they’re going to call the next show.
(13:59):
They’re
Dan Molloy (14:00):
Done. Yeah. One other thing I want to talk about inventing the future with this, business happens between people. It’s about relationship. And so when you call me, I also will weave in there a declaration of my commitment to take care of you and to become your car guy for life. Especially if I find out that during the conversation I ask, “Have you done business with us before?” And you say, “No, I’m just shopping around.” And I say, “Well, look, let me tell you this. My only job, Lauren, and I’ve been doing this kind of work for 28 years, my only job is to become your car guy. I want you to know that you can count on me as long as you’re in this area to give you a great price, to give you the best service and to take care of you, literally to be your car guy.” So
Lauren Thunen (14:53):
It’s
Dan Molloy (14:55):
Another declaration that invents another piece of the future. I mean, think about it. Think about this. The customer that’s calling you for a price on something and they have a problem, do they have a car guy?
Lauren Thunen (15:13):
No, or else they wouldn’t be calling you.
Dan Molloy (15:16):
Exactly. Now, so the inbound call is about inventing the future for when? When they walk into the store Go ahead.
Lauren Thunen (15:26):
Before we move on to them walking in the store, I think you did two other important things on that phone call is you introduced that your shop does more than what I asked for, oil change and brake service. You said, “Full service, we can do anything.” That, without you even saying anything more, plants in the customer’s minds, there might be more that needs to be done on my vehicle, which a lot of folks … Actually, I just taught a three-hour class at Vision the other week and I asked everyone in the room, there was 200 shop owners in the room to raise their hand if they thought their customer knows every single thing that’s wrong with their vehicle, that they know exactly what their vehicle needs. I think I had two people raise their hand. They’re like, “Yeah, my customers, they know what’s going on.
(16:09):
” I was like, “That’s crazy. You are the anomaly. You two out of 200 folks here.” Most people don’t know the true state of their vehicle. Well,
Dan Molloy (16:16):
There’s one other piece of that. If a customer’s been coming to you for five years for oil changes, they might not even know that you do tires or brakes or want. That happens all the time.
Lauren Thunen (16:27):
Right. So introducing to them, setting the scene that they might be recommended other things besides what they’re coming in for, because that also goes into price shock and why customers decline work is like, I had no idea you were going to inspect my vehicle and you were going to recommend all these other things. Now my trust has actually been eroded by the DVI, even though the point of it was to increase trust. So you set the table there and then you introduce, again, before they even have the estimate in their hands, we have money for you. We’re going to help prioritize the repairs either through a payment plan. Or again, if you don’t offer a payment plan, you can say, “Here’s what’s most important to do today. Here’s what I think we should do next month, help them prioritize them financially plan.” Or if you’re using a tool like a consumer financing program, things of that nature is again, plant that seed as early as possible, not once you’ve already sent them the estimate and you’re working uphill.
Dan Molloy (17:23):
No,
Lauren Thunen (17:24):
No,
Dan Molloy (17:24):
It’s too late. A lot of times it’s too late then.
Lauren Thunen (17:27):
It’s
Dan Molloy (17:27):
Too late, but it’s too late. Once you bring up the prices $2,800, it’s too late, they’re gone. Mentally
Lauren Thunen (17:33):
Because that’s all they’re thinking about. And then that’s why they say it’s the cost because you haven’t done these really and you almost miss them in a conversation, these really important things to set the table for yourself.
Dan Molloy (17:44):
Plus, I can’t stress enough that the whole notion of business, the only time commerce happens is when we exchange commitments. My job as a service advisor, as a sales guy, is to express my commitment to take care of the customer. That includes with regard to letting you know that I’m going to do an inspection on
the vehicle. I have money for you. My technician that’s going to work on the vehicle is an ASC certified master technician, fully qualified. So on the inbound call and at the count, when people walk into the store, it’s act two in the play. The first act is building trust and credibility and creating action and creating the appointment. Act two in the play when they walk in, what I always teach my team, my clients to do is say something like, “Lauren, I’m so thrilled you’re here, buddy. I’m so thrilled.
(18:36):
I’m glad. Let me show you around the shop. Come on. ” And I do a walk and talk. If I have time, I do a walk and talk. It takes five minutes. It’s my investment into the customer. I’m going to invest time and I’m going to walk them around the bays. If it’s winter out, I go up and down inside. If it’s nice out, nice spring day, I go up and down the outside and I point out the alignment rack. I point out the tire changing bag, the oil change bay, the diagnostics bay, the brake area in the business. I bring over a technician, introduce them, make them a part of the team. The customer is a part of the team and they know. And I point out the investment. The customers don’t know the investment that the average dealer has a million dollars invested in equipment.
(19:24):
The line rack is 75 grand. The tire machines, the diagnostics tools, everything that we put into it, they have no idea that we can research any problem on any vehicle ever made, that we have all that information and technology right here, and we make this investment to take care of you. That has to be communicated in a particular way. Again,
(19:47):
It’s like building up to act three into play.
Lauren Thunen (19:51):
Yeah. Before we move on to act three, I want to say a couple really important things here is, again, what you’re reinforcing is that this is not in your typical auto repair shop or what the customer thinks because this industry, we’re overcoming a lack of trust. It’s no one that anyone on this call has done, but the historical impression is that it’s sketchy. I bring my car in. For most people, the vehicle is the most important thing and the most valuable thing they own if they don’t own a home. This is the most expensive thing in their possession if they don’t own a home. And so you bring it, but also people don’t know anything about it for the most part. Most of your customers don’t know anything about their car other than maybe I think it kind of needs an oil change every 10,000 miles.
(20:35):
I don’t remember what the dealer told me. So it’s the most expensive thing they own. They don’t own a home and they know nothing about it. So they’re scared. And now, instead of me just bringing it in, I’m bringing it into a person. And there’s some other things you can do the walkarounds like the walk and talk, like Dan’s saying. There’s also things you can do with technology as well to make it feel more natural, more human. One of the things we include on our inspection sheets is a picture of the technician, a picture of the service advisor that’s actually working on the vehicle right front and center on the inspection sheet. You might think that’s a little silly. I don’t want to go in and take pictures of my technician, so I’m just going to skip that step when I’m setting up the DVI.
(21:16):
But the reason that we do that is then in the customer mind, they see, oh, Steve’s the one recommending these repairs. He’s a real human being. He’s a
Dan Molloy (21:25):
Human being. Yeah.
Lauren Thunen (21:26):
Exactly. I saw Steve when I walked in the shop. Oh yeah, that’s my service advisor, Dan. There’s their face. If you ever have a hard conversation over the phone and then you have that same conversation in person, maybe with your spouse, friend, over the phone, it’s so easy to get angry at someone and just dismissive because you’re doing other things, you can’t see their face. And then you see that person’s face in front of you and you’re like, oh my God, I can’t believe I was being such a jerk to you. I can’t believe that conversation was so hard. Those are the little things of, again, humanizing the business. So you’re in the business of communicating
Dan Molloy (21:59):
Well, you bring up a great point, Lauren. I believe, I’m certain about this. I’ll be 75 years old in the next month. I can’t believe it. But most of the time we forget, we forget in business that the reason we exist is to help other people.
(22:24):
I believe at this point, looking back over the years, that the only reason I exist, and I’m more clear about it now than ever, the reason I exist is to help other people. In this case, I want to help the dealers. I want to help the business people because I know how hard it is. I know how hard it is. And I know that everybody I meet in the business, all the service advisors, technicians and owner operators, they want to help their customers. They want to help each other. That’s why I came up with this whole concept of I can help you with that. And the problem, the challenge is teaching people how to articulate their commitment.
(23:02):
If you can express your commitment clearly to the customers and to your fellow coworkers, to your kids, to your wife, everywhere in life, people will look at you differently. They will know exactly what you stand for and you’ll be able to tell them exactly why you’re on the planet to help them, to take care of them. I was just thinking, reflecting on this as you’re getting ready for this little webinar. And I went to the dentist a couple of weeks ago. I had a toothache, nothing worse than that. And you wonder, is it going to go away? And it’s a problem.
Lauren Thunen (23:42):
Everybody’s
Dan Molloy (23:42):
Had one. So I’ve been going to see Bruce, my dentist, for 31 years. We have a tight relationship. So when I sit down in the chair and he does his X-ray and he looks and he shows me, educates me, shows me the tooth and he says, “This is what the problem is. ” And then he did his drilling, he filled it up and then sends me on my way. But the point is that whatever he told me he had to do, I don’t question because I know him, I know his wife runs the front counter, I know his assistant, I know everything. I know where his house is. I know everything about the guy because we’re friends, but that took a long time to get to that. So whatever he tells me, “Dan, here’s what I want to do. Here’s why I want to do it.
(24:30):
I’m in. ”
Lauren Thunen (24:31):
What
Dan Molloy (24:31):
Do I pay because he’s going to take care of me. So the point, the reason I bring this up is that’s the type of relationship we have to create. I had 31 years to build out with him. When you’re in this business, there has to be a plan. There has to be an approach to when the phone rings, what do we do? Like I said, it’s show business. It’s show business. And when that curtain goes up and act one, boom, you have to hit it and you have to know what to do because you have to create a wow effect for that customer.
Lauren Thunen (25:07):
They
Dan Molloy (25:07):
Have to go, “Wow, okay, maybe I can trust this guy, Lauren. Maybe. I’m not certain yet, but he sounds pretty good. And he told me all the right things. So okay, okay, I’ll buy. I’ll make an appointment.”
(25:19):
Then when you come in, okay, a woman going in now into this testosterone filled place where she has no idea what’s going on and they walk in and say, “Hey, let me show you around. Would you like a cup of coffee?” And then you do a walk and talk. And as you’re walking and talking, you’re getting to know who these people are. You’re getting to know how many cars, how many kids they have, what’s going on with their vehicle. You interact with them in a personal way. And again, using language, you invent what the future, I’m going to take care of you no matter what. And we have money. Say you have money again, we have money for you if you ever need it. So what we’re going to do is we’re going to do the oil change and the tire rotation and we’re going to inspect your vehicle.
(26:05):
That’s what we do for all our customers. Then I’ll send you the DVI and then we’ll talk about it. But as you do that walk and talk, you let them know again about the money. The second time you let them know about how you have payment plans for them.
Lauren Thunen (26:22):
Right. Again, overcoming that objection before you even get it, right?
Dan Molloy (26:29):
Right. There’s going to be that moment of truth coming up soon. Act three into play is the moment of truth. And you have to have a really strong way to close it out, tell them what you want to do, why you want to do it, and when it’s going to get done. And they already know that you’re their car guy. That’s the point. They already know that you have their back, that what you’re doing, you’re doing for them. And then you present it to them in such a way, “I’ve got great news for you. I’ve got fabulous. We figured out what’s wrong with your car. Let me tell you about it. I’m excited for you that we figured it all out. ” And the best news, it’s only going to be $160 with one of our payment plans or 2,800 if you’d want to pay in full, something like that.
(27:18):
But again, so you let them know all along you have payment plans and now there’s no sticker shock. Illuminate that issue.
Lauren Thunen (27:27):
Right. And I think also when we’re talking about this sticker shock, the way you present price is also very important because they are going to pick up on your tone, how you talk about how much it costs. If you’re in person, your body language, are you scared to present the price to them? Customers pick up on all of those things. And if you, the service advisor or whoever’s presenting the price doesn’t think it’s worth that amount or is scared to tell the customer, it’s going to be 2,800 like, oh, they’re definitely not going to improve that. I don’t want to tell them it’s 2,800 and I kind of beat around the bush. I’m like, “Well, if you just want to do what you came in for, then it’s going to be 349. And if you want to do everything in red, then it’s going to be 572.
(28:11):
And if you want to do everything on the estimate, then it’s 2,800. I don’t know, what do you think? ” Versus presenting it confidently and reminding them that, “Hey, this is good news that you’re investing in your vehicle.” How you talk about in the tone about the value of your service directly impacts whether or not a customer is going to be excited to say
Dan Molloy (28:33):
Yes. 100%, Lauren. 100%. That’s why in my approach in my workbook, the power sales training workbook, which people can download, by the way, if you want, you can go … Well, if we have time, we have time. I’ll show them on the website where they can download the workbook. All this stuff is in there. But it’s like I said, when my dentist came to me and said, “Dan, here’s what I want to do. Here’s why I want to do it. ” So they explain it like that. And it’s the same thing in this industry. If we did a great job in building trust and credibility on the inbound call, and we did an even better job when they came in, we added to it. So it’s act two, now it’s act three, it becomes very easy if you have the relationship and trust built to just say to them, “Look, Lauren, I’ve got great news.
(29:25):
Here’s what I want to do on your vehicle today. Here’s why I want to do it. Provide the evidence, show them the DVI, show them the photographs. If they’re in the store, walk out and show them on the vehicle. And the best news is I’m going to have it done by five o’clock because you got to go on your trip. I’m going to make sure everything’s done by five and it’s only going to be … ” And then presenting the money with the payment plan, so there’s no chance of sticker shock, much less of a chance than if you say, “Here’s going to be 20 800 dollars, take it or leave it. No. No.
Lauren Thunen (30:04):
Yeah. And that’s something we see a lot recently in the industry. It’s been a change is it used to always be price was presented over the phone. The estimate was presented over the phone. Today, there’s a lot of systems that’ll allow you to send the estimate at the same time as the inspection or even beforehand, just text that link to the estimate along with the DBI. Why we personally at AutoVitals, and I personally don’t recommend that, and again, open to other people’s opinions, is if I get my inspection report with all of the evidence, the findings, the why, all of the meat, all the value, and one tab over is the price or right on that line item is the price, the customer, all I’m going to see is the dollar value. And then I’m going to go on to the next one and I’m going to see the dollar value.
(30:50):
I’m not going to go through any of that educational material because of the way it’s presented. That’s just human nature, especially with new clients that have never been in your business. You don’t have that value and trust built up, which is why
Dan Molloy (31:03):
Let me ask you a question. What percentage of the customers reading, and I’ve seen DVIs that are 10 pages long. I mean, you can get out of control.
Lauren Thunen (31:13):
Yes,
Dan Molloy (31:15):
You can. So you overwhelm people sometimes. I’m not saying you or AutoVitals, but I’m just saying they get all this information. What percentage of the customers really understand what they’re reading?
Lauren Thunen (31:27):
I think it depends a lot on the quality of the report as well. And so there’s a couple things you can do. First of all, I completely agree with you when you say if you send them a massive report that can be overwhelming. So something that’s really good, and again, not all DVIs allow you to do this. Some do like AutoVitals, but is making sure that you’re breaking them into easy to understand and organize sections and that those sections can easily be collapsed and expanded. For instance, you want to document everything that’s good on the vehicle because that’s going to reinforce value, but you don’t want to spend your customer to spend 20 minutes going through just what’s good. You want them to just see, 30 items good, great, collapse that section, move on to the next. So making sure you’re able to do that.
(32:13):
And then in terms of what needs attention, anything in red or yellow, you really want to make sure you have short, easy to understand notes that are associated with it. You want to have an image to, again, prove images or videos to prove, hey, we’re saying that your serpentine belt is cracked. Here’s an image showing the cracks and we have a nice arrow pointing to exactly where you want to look at it. But yeah, a lot of times that’s not enough. You’ll have the educational video that explains why it’s important, what is a serpentine belt, why it functions on your car. Again, not everyone’s going to look at the inspection report for 15, 20 minutes. So that’s why it’s important to follow up on the inspection report once you see they’ve opened it and had a chance to look at it. Well,
Dan Molloy (32:56):
There’s a lot of difference. I totally agree with you. I think I’ve worked with you, we’ve done a bunch of webinars together. I think we’re on the same page as far as this goes. For the most part, the data and information that we send them isn’t going to get the job done nearly as well as if my trusted service advisor calls up and says, “I got good news for you. ”
Lauren Thunen (33:20):
Yeah, it’s both. When we go over it,
Dan Molloy (33:22):
We’ve got you covered. We’re going to get it fixed for you. I’m going to have everything done by 5:00 PM for you today. And would you like to get into the details on it? Which I’d be happy to right now. I sent you the DVI. Did you get a chance to … But it’s one human being. If we go back to the philosophy, the language of commitment philosophy, one human being, helping another human being. The quality, if that’s done well, there’s a quality to that and there’s a relationship to that. And there’s a personal commitment from me to you that I’m going to take care of you and my team’s going to take care of you and we’re going to get you on the road. That isn’t going to happen in a text message.
Lauren Thunen (34:09):
Yeah. It’s not going to
Dan Molloy (34:10):
Happen.
Lauren Thunen (34:11):
And I’m going to use an example here, and then I also want to call out one of the comments that we got chatted in here is you go on Amazon. That’s kind of the standard for buying today. Again, I asked class of 200 shop owners if they’d ever bought something on Amazon, everyone raised their hand. For most part,
everyone in the US has bought something on Amazon. If you haven’t, chat in because I would be interested. And when you go on Amazon, for most people, one of the benefits of Amazon is there is so much information about every product. They got five photos, they got a massive description. But what does almost every single person that goes on Amazon do first? They go to the reviews and they want to see what other people said about this product. It’s the same thing. You have to provide a customer the education, the ability to educate themselves on their own, which is the DVI report.
(35:01):
But then also people always want that human connection. And that’s what reviews give folks on a marketplace like Amazon where they’re looking to buy. Yeah, but
Dan Molloy (35:09):
Let me ask you a question. Let me ask you a question about that analogy, right?
Lauren Thunen (35:13):
Yeah.
Dan Molloy (35:18):
Buying some new hand soap or buying some type of supplement or something on Amazon I think is different than trusting someone on a medical issue or trusting someone to fix your car. Or now I’m doing a lot of home improvements here in my house. It’s interesting because I wrote this guy who came on strong, he’s a home improvement guy, and I have an old house, so I want to put nine windows in and do all this other stuff. And he wasn’t getting back to me. So I wrote him an email. I wanted to get a commitment from him and I did not an email, a text message this morning. I just sent him earlier. I said, “Do you want to work with me? ” Because he told me he was going to come over yesterday. He didn’t show up. “Do you want to work with me?
(36:10):
“It’s different. So I think when you’re dealing with stuff where humans are involved, there has to be that it’s all about the trust and the credibility. And I said to my wife,” I don’t know if I could trust this guy because he’s not getting back to me.
Lauren Thunen (36:25):
“Yeah, absolutely. Obviously it’s a different experience. You’re not buying hand soap on Amazon. But what I was intending to get across there is that there are consumer expectations now for every buying experience and they want they don’t want to be sold to. So you need the evidence. Gone are the days where you see a magazine, you get it sent to you, see one photo of something in the catalog and you pick up the phone and order it. You need the evidence, but still in every purchasing experience, folks want some level of human interaction, whether it’s reading a review, obviously that’s on Amazon or with your shop, is being able to talk to someone on the phone and get their questions answered because in every buying process, there’s questions no matter how- Yes,
Dan Molloy (37:13):
100%.
Lauren Thunen (37:14):
… how simple it is. Even if it’s hand sold, you’re going to be like, ” Does it actually smell good? I’m going to go to the reviews and see what people say about that. “Everyone is going to have questions and they’re more important, the more expensive the purchases and the more important the purchase is like your vehicle. So Glen chatted in and he said,” I brought my vehicle in for an oil change. They told me a free inspection would be included. Then they never mentioned the inspection. And when they picked up their car, when Glen picked up the car, they said, “Just read the report on the receipt.” That’s absolutely the wrong way to do it. Nobody involved. It’s just leaving it all on the customer and just saying, “Well, I sent it to you, so what do you want to do? ” You got to have that human interaction to talk them through and let them know prioritization and what they’re looking at, because they’re still going to have questions.
(38:01):
You know
Dan Molloy (38:01):
What I love about working with you is that webinars go by so fast. How much time do we have?
Lauren Thunen (38:06):
We have seven minutes left, if my math is correct, till 10:45.
Dan Molloy (38:11):
I promised as a part of my role in this, I promised four things to help people because the game is we want to help to bring down the amount of deferred work. So one thing, I promise four things. I’m going to give you more than that, but here’s the big four from my perspective. You got to remember you’re in show business. Show business. Act one has to be effective. It has to be about trust and credibility. Act two has to be about trust and credibility. Act three is where the payoff comes because if you’ve done a good job in act one and act … So there’s a challenge here because a lot of times act one is handled by one person. Act two might be handled by another person. Act three could even be handled by a third person. So you have to have … It’s like in show business or music or whatever, you have to have the whole team involved in an approach.
(39:06):
So that’s number one. Show business, three act play, really big. You got to think about always inventing the future. People make decisions today about the future. We’re talking. You and I are having this webinar. What’s it all about? The future. So in the moment you’re talking with people, you have to remember, you’re painting a picture in their head about how they’re going to be riding down the road, in their car, going onto their vacation, and it’s going to be trouble-free.
(39:37):
It’s going to be fabulous. So it’s important to always remember about the future, even if that future is 10 minutes from now or an hour from now. Number three, you got to get your head out of the data and the transaction. It has to be focused on the relationship. Eventually, like I said, in act three, you have to talk about the data and information and the pricing and all that and the delivery date and time and warranties.
You have to get there, but you can’t dwell on that. Too many times I hear people say, “Well, my tech told me that you need…” And they go right into the data and information and all that. Commerce happens when one human being makes a commitment to take care of another human being. That’s what produces commerce, my studied opinion. The information and price doesn’t do that. Too often when you just give a price to someone or you give technical information, they go, “Okay, I’ll get back to you.
(40:39):
I got to talk to my wife.” There’s a reason why they got to get off the phone because you didn’t make a big enough commitment that had them knock them over. So the third thing is get your head out of the information and data. You got to get there, but that’s not the initial approach. The fourth thing, it’s all about commitment. It’s all about you expressing your commitment to take care of another human being. And if you do that well, if you do that well, people will respond to it because that’s all they’re looking for anyway. They need a commitment from you, somebody who’s competent. So this is why I want to make … Can I make an offer to the group?
Lauren Thunen (41:22):
Yeah, of course.
Dan Molloy (41:26):
My offer to you, my commitment to humanity to people is to teach them about the language of commitment. And so my offer is to all the dealers here. If you want to have a training class, if you want me to lead a training class with your team, let me know. Just type it in the chat box. Say, “I’d like to have Dan lead a free class.” No charge. My mission in doing that is to open some possibilities for you. So you say, wow, this language of commitment is really powerful. It could make a difference for my team. Ultimately, I would like you to pay for services, of course. I’m a businessman, but I’d be more than happy to do an introductory class for people, no charge on me. So yeah, that’s what I wanted to say. And they can get to my website, maloysales.com is my website.
Lauren Thunen (42:25):
Perfect. Yeah, I’ll put it here in the chat too. And of course, if you’re watching this recording or you’re watching it live, we will also send a follow-up email later today or tomorrow morning that has the link to obviously Dan’s website, how to get in touch with him. We’ll also have the recording of this episode. If you want to share it with your service advisors, the rest of your team, technicians, anyone else, friends, family, whoever, we’ll have the YouTube link right in there for you as well. Thank you, Lauren. Yeah, so definitely there’s more than one way to get in touch with us. If you have any questions about AutoVitals, you can always go to AutoVitals.com. And if you go forward/demo, that’ll take you to our contact request form, which big secret of AutoVitals actually just go straight to me. So if you have questions, you can get in touch with me.