Dealership Corridor - Dealership Corridor

Give Your Customer Retention a Boost with MVP

Post author By efgmarketing
Post date July 24, 2019

Contributing Author:
Eric Fifield
Chief Sales Officer
EFG Companies

If customer retention was ever a buzzword, it is this year! Everyone in the automotive industry is talking about it. But, what are we doing about it? The challenging thing about customer retention in the retail automotive business is the amount of time between purchases and the lack of frequent interaction with the customer during that time. Of course, the answer lies in the service drive, so how are we as an industry thinking about it differently than in years past?

Leaving Money on the Table

Let’s look at retention in terms of customer engagement between vehicle sales. According to research from the National Association of Automotive Dealers, 83% of customers who perform maintenance with the selling dealer are more likely to return to purchase another vehicle. However, the Cox Automotive 2018 Service Industry Study states that dealerships only represent 33% of the share of consumer service visits. Literally, dealerships are getting only a third of the customer’s business for maintenance. Not only are you losing the opportunity to engage with your customer – you’re losing service drive revenue!

Tags Cox Automotive, customer retention, EFG, EFG MVP, Eric Fifield, NADA, National Auto Dealers Association

Industry Trends

Keep On Keeping On

Post author By efgmarketing
Post date June 26, 2019

Contributing Author:
John Stephens
Executive Vice President
EFG Companies

We are halfway through a very interesting year in retail automotive. If you had planned for flat sales, lower OEM incentives, and interest rates bumping along the lower range, congratulations! You’ve planned for this situation and hopefully are managing well. Going forward, you’ll need to stay the course. The forecast for the second half of this year and all of 2020 appears to be equally bumpy.

The Economy

On June 19^th, the Federal Reserve chose to keep interest rates steady in the near term, but retained an option to cut rates as economic risks mount and inflation remains stuck below their target. But amid continuing trade tensions and slowing global economic growth, the Fed is preparing for the economy to take a hit and is keeping an interest rate ace up their sleeve.

There are other indicators of a stalling economy. A subdued global economy, increased corporate stock buybacks, and some spikes in lay-offs will keep business bumpy throughout 2019 and into 2020. Significant peaks and valleys in the stock market have caused unrest. The good news is that investors are predicting another recession in two to three years, meaning a recession may still be a few years off.

Tags Federal Reserve, GDP, tariffs, Tax Foundation, Trump Administration

EFG Companies

EFG Launches Customizable Maintenance Plan to Boost Customer Retention

Post author By efgmarketing
Post date June 18, 2019

DALLAS, TX (June 18, 2019) EFG Companies, the innovator behind the award-winning Hyundai Assurance program, today announced the launch of the company’s new pre-paid Maintenance Value Program (MVP), designed to boost customer retention with a fully-customizable program to fit individual dealership needs. For more information, visit http://bit.ly/2F6IV2D.

According to the National Association of Automotive Dealers, 83 percent of customers who perform maintenance with the selling dealer will return to purchase another vehicle. However, for decades dealers have struggled on the customer retention front. The Cox Automotive 2018 Service Industry Study states that dealerships only represent 33% of the share of consumer service visits.

“We originally developed MVP to provide a solution for the customer retention puzzle,” said John Pappanastos, President & CEO, EFG Companies. “As customer and vehicular needs have changed, we’ve morphed MVP to be even more compelling with customizable options. Dealers utilizing MVP now have a better opportunity to turn one-time only vehicle purchase events into an ongoing relationship through the service drive.”