You want how much for your trade?

This year is different.   Yes it is.  This year, you will keep a watchful eye on your dealership’s sales initiatives.  No more of this “every so often” review of team performance or blindly hoping the new guy is doing a decent job on the phone.  Yup, you will tackle it all…but wait, what’s that?

This morning should be dedicated to an in-depth review and a conference call just came up.  In the afternoon you’re scheduled for two sales meetings.  Tomorrow you’re travelling for a conference and of course, deserve a restful weekend off upon return.  Yikes.  It’s already early March and you’ve added this resolution to the “try again next year” bucket.

If your dealership is like many others, phone call tracking is an integral piece of the sales process pie.  It certainly should help in this area but unfortunately, may fall victim to the situation above. Have no fear.  There is hope because good call tracking is designed to make your life easier, not harder.  Below are three easy, simple, tasks you could execute right now to get ahead of the game.

1.)    Set up automated reports

Easy enough right?  Yes, it is actually.  Creating an automated report takes seconds and provides the data you want most in your email inbox.  How about a detailed daily report of all inbound calls?  Maybe a weekly high level summary or a monthly overview of call trends?  These can be sent to multiple recipients and generally, a specific subject line and comments are editable for each.  Automated reports take the work out of retrieving data.

2.)    Listen to call recordings

Your tracking lines should be recording phone calls.  The opportunity to improve phone efforts by reviewing these calls is enormous: simply measuring and monitoring phone efforts improves performance.  To make your life even easier, have those automated call reports discussed in step one include call recordings.  You never need to leave your inbox!  Provide feedback on phone skills to the individuals handling calls, both the positive and areas needing improvement.

Some call tracking companies also offer a call categorization feature which weeds out calls that aren’t necessarily new business inquiries.  Take advantage of this if available to increase your efficiency when listening to a large amount of calls.

3.)    Talk with your vendor, ask questions!

A good vendor is there to support, answer questions, and discuss best practices.  Take advantage of their knowledge and work with them to get the most out of call tracking data and features.  Have a quick inquiry about a reporting capability? Shoot an email!  Looking to talk big picture strategy? Set up a call!  Whatever you do, don’t forgo a great resource.  Communicate with your vendor often and they should be a guide to finding the incredible value and power of call tracking.

There you have it.  Three easy ways to get more from your call tracking….right now.  It’s a New Year and an exciting time to step your game.  Let call tracking be your best (and easiest) tool for improving your sales efforts.

By: Mike Haeg

Mike Haeg is the Director of Sales and Marketing for Century Interactive, a phone call analytics company based in Dallas, TX.  Century Interactive works with thousands of dealers across the US and Canada by measuring their marketing efforts and improving their communication with prospects.  If you’re interested in learning more or would simply like to chat, give Mike a call at 888-593-0830, email at mike@centuryinteractive.com, check out centuryinteractive.com, or follow CI on Twitter @centinteractive.

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