Are you meeting your customers’ expectations?

What makes a good customer experience? Speed, convenience, consistency, friendliness. How about human interaction and communication? According to a research study by PricewaterhouseCoopers, even if people love your company or product, in the U.S. 59% will walk away after several bad experiences, 17% will walk away after just one bad experience, and 32% of all customers would completely stop doing business with a brand they loved after one bad experience.

I can relate.

I recently took my car in for service at a local auto dealership. The service writer told me it would take one hour to complete the repair. Two hours later, I tracked down the service writer to find out what was happening with my car. He assured me that things were proceeding, and that my vehicle would be ready soon. Over the next hour and a half, I had to track him down three more times. Needless to say I was frustrated. What upset me most was the lack of communication along the way. If they had been proactive and kept me updated as things were progressing (or not progressing), my perspective would have been different. A few simple text messages would have kept me calm.

The reality is that most auto dealerships have at least 150 service orders open at any given time. Service writers are juggling numerous repair orders, customers and other activities while trying to keep their heads above water. They can’t do it all, but a good Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solution could have solved this problem.

Using CRM to improve sales and customer service index scores

CRMs are designed to help businesses manage and nurture their customer relationships and facilitate timely communications 24/7. They also help manage sales opportunities with potential customers. But to get the most out of a CRM solution, it must be seamlessly integrated with the rest of the technology you use to run your business. For auto dealers, this means integrating the CRM with the dealership management system, the telephone communications system, social media platforms, and other applications where customer information flows.

Application Program Interfaces (APIs) allow all of these applications talk to one another, making sure everything is harmonized and workflows are streamlined. The result is improved operational efficiencies, and happier customer interactions that lead to increased sales, service revenue and customer loyalty.

Getting your return on investment

We’ve created a white paper to help dealers learn how to get the highest return on investment out of your CRM and how to best integrate your CRM using APIs available on the Fortellis Automotive Commerce Exchange.

Source: PwC “Experience is everything: Here’s how to get it right”
https://www.pwc.com/us/en/advisory-services/publications/consumer-intelligence-series/pwc-consumer-intelligence-series-customer-experience.pdf