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Sell More Cars with Auto Sales Phone Skills

In car sales, the ability to set the appointment on any call you make or take directly relates to how many cars you sell every month. If you want to sell more cars, then polishing your car sales phone skills is key. There are a variety of difference situations that car sales professionals deal with on the phone that could potentially prevent them from setting the appointment. However, in automotive sales, things repeat!

This means that if you hear something once, you’re very likely to hear it again. So, the car sales phone skills you will learn in this blog will help you overcome barriers to setting appointments over and over again. As a result, you will be far more successful at getting customers through your dealership’s doors and selling more cars each month. In this automotive sales phone training blog, learn the car sales phone skills you need to succeed at selling cars!

Car Sales Phone Skill #1 – Expand Your Inventory

When you make or take a call from a prospect in car sales, always be ready to expand your inventory! The vehicle that the customer is interested in very likely is not their dream car. Instead, it is a car that meets the buyer’s needs and budget. In automotive sales, customers are very likely call in on one car, but purchase a different vehicle at the dealership anyways! So, why would you let just one car kill your deal?

Expanding your inventory opens the deal up and creates far more opportunity to set the appointment. This is a car sales phone skill that should be used on almost every call where you check on a vehicle for a customer. Especially in cases where you think you don’t have the car the customer is interested in. If you just say, “Sorry, it doesn’t look like we have that vehicle at the moment,” then it’s extremely easy for the customer to just hang up the phone.

Rather than leave your deal reliant on one vehicle, try this:

“You’re interested in XYZ car? What a great choice! I can check on that vehicle now, and it won’t take me long at all. While I’m checking on that, I can also check on other vehicles just like it. The reason you’re interested in the XYZ car is…?”

Car Sales Phone Skill #2 – Just Make the Call

Did you know that you are 100 times more likely to get in touch with a buyer in the first 5-minutes of a lead coming as opposed to 30-minutes? Such a small amount of time makes a huge difference. In fact, we mystery shop thousands of dealerships across the United States each year and found this to be correct. The top performing dealerships all follow up within the first five minutes or less. In car sales, urgency is everything! Speed is an incredibly important car sales phone skill. Especially since you're likely competing with other dealerships to get there first.

So, how do you make the call so quickly? Most car sales professionals feel that it’s not a rush, or that they need to do a lot of research before picking up the phone. However, we already know that speed makes a difference and that situations on the phone repeat. Therefore, there’s no reason to wait. Just be prepared! Make sure that you practice your car sales phone skills and have call guides in front of you that you can use. If you don’t already have some, then click here to get car sales call guides for free!

Car Sales Phone Skill #3 – Handling Objections

Objections in car sales are another major issue that hold up car deals for many automotive sales professionals. However, things aren’t always as they seem. If you get hit with an objection over the phone, it’s important to stay confident and not get defensive. When handling objections in car sales, it’s crucial to remember that most buyers are just testing you. This isn’t just some random person. This is someone who took the time to research a vehicle and then submitted their personal information online. In other words, they want you to call them!

So, if customers want to be called, then why do they object over the phone? It’s because buyers have been taught that they cannot trust the car buying experience. Customers object to things like pricing, trade value, and more because they want to make sure that they won’t get taken advantage of. Since they likely already knew all of the information before submitting a lead, you can overcome these objections quite easily. Just reassure them that they are in touch with the right dealership to do whatever they want to do. Then, go for the appointment. For example:

Customer: “I’m not coming down unless you can offer a lower price.”

Sales Person: “If you’re looking for the best price, we’re the one’s who are going to give it to you. People shop best price all the time, and when they do, this is where they make their decision. When can you come in to look at this vehicle?”

Customer: “Down-the-Road Dealership said they would give me $$$ for my trade.”

Sales Person: “We need vehicles like yours, and the last thing I would ever ask you to do is to come down here without a good reason. People looking for the best value for their trade always come here. When can you bring your vehicle down for an appraisal?”

Car Sales Phone Skill #4 – More Than One Way

When you cannot get the customer to set an appointment on the vehicle they submitted on or something similar, this in not an excuse to stop trying. In this situation, it’s time to move your focus elsewhere, so you can keep the deal moving and set the appointment.

Expanding your inventory to similar vehicles is great because you know that the buyer is interested in that type of vehicle. However, it’s likely not the only type of vehicle that they are interested in. So, you should try to find out more information so you can attempt to set the appointment on a different type of vehicle. For example:

Customer: “I’m also looking around at Down-the-Road Motors.”

Sales Person: “Fantastic! If I was buying a car, I know I’d be searching around as well. What kind of vehicles did you look at?”

You might be surprised to hear that they were looking at something completely different at another dealership or online. So, while you’re aiming to set the appointment on a new car, they might also be interested in used ones. This will open up the deal a lot and allows you to also sell the appointment with the prospect of saving them money. 

Additionally, you can also set an appointment around their trade. When you cannot set an appointment around purchasing a vehicle, this is a great car sales phone skill to switch it up. Customers might just be apprehensive to being sold to. However, their attitude should change greatly when you switch the conversation from selling to buying. For example:

Sales Person: “What are you driving now?”

Customer: “XYZ car.”

Sales Person: “What a great car! We need cars like that! Why don’t you come in so we can give you a free appraisal? At the very least, it will give you something to reference while you’re out shopping around.”