We all like to think that we make up our own mind, but do we?
In reality we do copy other people, and there are lots of experiments that prove this.
So when you are talking to your customers, there are 5 simple phrases that can help based on this.
Here are the highlights:
{01:17} We are like sheep
{04:50} Busy restaurant
{05:52} Stand up, sit down
{08:25} Turn up late
{13:33} NADA
{17:50} 5 Simple Phrases
About Symco Training:
Symco Training was founded in 2000 by Simon Bowkett and it was his belief that the business had to offer its clients something different. That difference was clear to Simon from his days in the dealership when he experienced many sales trainers who had all the answers, but were unable, unwilling or both to actually show the delegate how they could be implemented. It remains the ethos of the business today. You see, Symco only employ trainers that are committed to delivering not only in spiring and insightful training, but are equally as happy to demonstrate these skills and techniques with real customers in your own showroom. We believe in order for sales training to be effective and in Simon’s words ‘real world’, it needs to be tried and tested in the only place it matters the showroom floor. There is no room for theory when your goals are for your team to sell more cars, hours or parts and retain more profit. In dealerships around the world the focus applied by many of the sales executives is to try and sell a deal. Symco specialise in getting your teams to focus on selling themselves, the product and then supporting this with the deal.
To find out more visit
www.symcotraining.co.uk
Welcome to the Selling and the Motor Trade Podcast, an association with Symco Training. This is the weekly podcast where we share best practice tips and ideas on how to sell more cars, improve your service department and generally put more profit into your dealership or dealer group. I'm your host, Simon Bowkett. As some of you probably already know me as Skippy, I will start by saying thank you for taking the time to listen to this podcast. Do you have an appetite for an open sales training program? You see, we normally run our sales training programs for dealer groups or manufacturers so we can get enough people in a room to make the training cost effective. But every year I get lots of people saying, oh, I've got one dealership or I've got just two dealerships, I've got three salespeople that could really go through your training program. And we're often saying, I don't know how well it's going to stack up for you. Now you have options. You could also go to Amazon and get the book Words That Sell Cars. It's a great book and we have lots of clients give that to every salesperson when they start in the industry. Of course, you could always go to our signature sales fitness training program. If you listen to our podcast, we plug that all the time. It's cost effective because it's only £299 for three months of digital online training that gives your salesperson a great start in their career. You could do that. But what is an appetite for an open physical training course? Now guys, we have to run that course interactively. It's not one of these courses where your salespeople sit there, cross an arms, just listen to it board throughout the day. It won't be death by PowerPoint. So that sounds like something you'd be interested in. Go to our website. It's simcotraining.co.uk. Look for the tab about open courses and you get all the details you need right there. Hi, welcome to another episode of Selling in the Motor Trade. Five phrases I want to talk about today. Five simple phrases, which I think will really help your sales process if you're in the after sales, on the service part side of the business, in the sales side of the business. If you're selling finance, these five phrases, I think will work all the time. But I'm going to get to these five phrases at the end. I want to explain where they come from. You see, we as humans, we like to think that we make up our own mind. OK, it's my decision. We don't copy other people. But reality sometimes we're a little bit like sheep. We know we don't think so where I'm in decisions. But sometimes we are. In fact, I'm going to urge you to go and have a look at a few videos online. I'll tell you where to go and find them. OK. But here's the first one. Did you hear the famous toothbrush manufacturers say four out of five dentists recommend R'll be four out of five dentists recommend R'll be now? They can't lie because trading standards would jump all over them. In fact, their competitors would cry fail. They can't directly do that. See, years ago, people would do a very, very low sample size. Four of the five people we bothered to ask recommend R'll be. In fact, have a look at some of the sample sizes you see on TV, the commercial side. I see Laurie L does it all the time. OK, dove soap. OK. Seven out of 10, ladies said that skin feels better after using dove soap. But by law in some countries, they got print on the bottom based on the sample size of and some of the sample sizes are so small, 70 people, 100 people sometimes. OK, so that loophole has kind of been stopped because definitely in a lot of countries, you go print the sample size out and by the way, all of this I learned from a book Influence OK, by Professor Robert Kaldini. OK, it's a great book. OK, and he'll talk about some of the things in there. OK, so this is this is how they did it apparently every new market. If I remember this correctly, it is in the book, but every new market they wanted to get into what they did is they sent a whole lot of free samples to every single dentists in that market. Simple as that. They phoned up six weeks later and asked three simple questions. Hello, Mr. Mrs. Densis, we'd like any more free samples to recommend to your patients for a to five density go on then or take your voice recommended the first lot of free samples we sent you. I suppose so if you're going to give me more free stuff, I think it's fair to say you've recommended I will be then having you. And by the way, can you see how it wasn't just four out of five people? It's four out of five experts. Listen, if I sound the best sales trainer in the motor trade, quite rightly because they back off. Who do you think you are? OK, but if I turn around and tell you that your boss, the person who pays you says on the best sales training in the motor trade, that's probably going to have more credibility. Sam is four and five dentists. They're the experts recommended or I'll be. Let me ask you a cheeky question. What sounds better for out of five dentists recommend or I'll be or four out of five customers gave a free shit to their patients, which is what probably happens. But you know what? That it works so well from the advertising now is the global number one manufacturer of toothbrushes. OK, and apparently if you read the book, apparently the number four supply of two brushes in Europe before they started doing that. OK, because here's the point. People copy other people. We like to think not, but we do. You think you're on a beach on holidays in Mexico, in Spain, out in Barley. You're trying to find a good restaurant. You're walking down the the strand, the promenade, wherever it is. Do you go into the restaurant that's empty and you go and get served straight away? Or do you go into the restaurant with other people in their eating? Hopefully locals. Of course we do. We go into the other one, don't we? OK, and in fact, rubberneckers on motorways. We all hate these rubberneckers. I'm on the M50 motorway. It's all slowing down because there's an accident on the other side of the motorway. We all hate these rubberneckers, but what do we all do when we drive past that accident? We have a look to see what's happening there. We copy other people. We like to think not what we actually copy other people. OK, and it happens in all walks of life. All right, in fact, what we do is on our training course, this is one of the master classes we do. I'll show a video of a lady in a I think as an optometrist. OK, and we'll go get all the guys to say, hey, listen, do you think you would fall for this? So ladies waiting and there's a whole lot of actors sitting there. Now, this video is done by National Geographic. So this is they're probably not going to play around with this. National Geographic is someone that I think they would have done their right. The research on it. So what happens with all the actors, a bell goes off. That's a bit of a beeping sound. When the beat goes off, all the actors just stand up and then sit back down. This lady comes in who doesn't know what's happening. The beat goes off and everyone stands up and sits down. You see a look around thinking, what the hell is happening here? OK, it only happens to maybe three times. And when the beat goes off, of course, what does she do? She stands as well. Now, one at a time, the people waiting, the actors, they take away. They've gone in to see the the optometrist that doesn't exist. OK, she gets the situation. She's by herself and the beat goes off. Does she stand up or not? She still stands. She's been conditioned. She's been coached what to do when the beat goes off. OK, now then after that, a fresh person comes in. He's not an actor. He doesn't know what's happening. The beat goes off and she just stands like she's being taught to do. The new guy, do you think he asked what the hell's happening or not? Of course he asks. He asks what's happening because it's a one-on-one basis. See, that's the difference. When there were big, crowded people doing it, she didn't almost have the gumption to ask. But when I was on a one-to-one basis, guess what? He's more comfortable to ask. All right, and then he and her starts standing. More and more people come in who don't know what's happening and they all start copping the other people. Now, I show that video and invariably people say, I wouldn't do that never in the world years. OK, Australian guys say, I make that's why they're in America. Sorry, my American colleagues, but that's what he actually said. OK, now I don't think there's any of that at all. And I know it's not because I've tried it in so many countries around the world. Invariably, people say, no, I've never do it. Let me tell you, I'd never ever do it. OK, that's right. Billie's turning up late. So what I do is I get my phone. We work out how late Billie is to the training course. I say, every time my phone rings, I want you to stand as you see in the video and sit down. Now, guys, I've seen this video. It must be nine, ten years ago, something like that. I run three training courses every week normally. That's the schedule. OK, so I must have done this. And, you know, people invariably turn up late. Please don't if you're on one of our courses. OK, but if they turn up late invariably, OK, I play that video first really quickly because we know someone's late. OK. And people say, no, I'd never do it. I never do it. Let's try it with Billie's turning up late. How many times you reckon I've done it and Billy hasn't stood up. Does it tell you there only been twice? Twice and it shocked me because I'd like to think I'm one of these people who would ask what's happening, but maybe I'm not. We copy other people. That's where we if everyone else are doing it, maybe I should do it. OK, and I promise it, absolutely shocked me. And they stand up and then I can't keep it straight place. We start laughing. In fact, there's two times though. I'll get people to know. No, no, no, no. I would never do it. I remember one dealer principle. I want to tell you what group it is involved because we still work with this group. OK, it wouldn't be fair to say and this dealer principle is still where OK, but this guy was like, let me tell you, I wouldn't do it. OK, maybe they do. I just know I would not I would have asked. OK, all right, OK, it's fine. This group, they're all suited and booted or wearing ties. OK, the DP had to leave. We were sitting on the train of course, but I had to leave earlier interview or something like that. OK, so and we're in a hotel. So we're offsite. OK, so the end of day one. OK, we had to try to set this up there because I wanted to prove to him that maybe some of the stuff could work. OK, so it happens nice and early. OK, the first break. It must be 20 people on this course and day one. I went to one person and said, do me a favor, take your tie off. I went to someone else. He said, can you do me a favor? Can you take your tie off as well? I can't remember how many, but it must mean I don't know two or three, not more than that. I asked them to take their tie off. When they started to take their tie off, what did other people start doing? They started taking the tie off as well. I then took my tie off up the front of running the class. OK, the DP at the end of day one, was he wearing a tie? No, he wasn't. He left earlier. So guys, do you see how the boss took the tie off? So tomorrow we want to make sure we're all suited and booted. OK, and with the tie on. But I reckon the boss is going to turn up without the tie. Day two, he turned up not wearing a tie. I turned to say, hey, why are you not wearing a tie today? When we're all wearing a tie, he looked around the room and fair play to him. He said, bastards, you got me. OK, because we copy other people. OK, here's another one. OK, Peter, if you'll listen to this, I won't tell you the group, you know who you are. OK, he's a great guy. Peter turned around and said, no, no, no, I'd never do this. I'd never do this as well. OK, so I'll try something else different on this one. And this shocked me. It worked. Absolutely. Now I've done it two or three times now. OK, and it's worked every time. And I go think Deb Jenkins for this. Deb's, you told me about this. I thought, no chance will this work. But let me tell you, it worked. OK. This guy here said, no, no, I wouldn't do it. OK, no worries. OK, as a lunch break. OK, guys, let's see if we can try this with Peter. Let's see if we can get Peter to admit that he's wet himself in the last 12 months. That'd be pretty hard to do, wouldn't it? I'll look around and say, Peter, I ain't ever gonna say that. That's right. OK, so it's rather cool. So I don't know where it is. I'm going to say something on the earth. Guys, you know how it is where you're laughing so much and you're wet yourself or you know, you've had too much drinking. You just can't get there and you're wet yourself. Listen, as an adult, we've all wet ourselves. And then I'm going to immediately turn to one of you and say, John, you wet yourself last 12 months. I know why. Have you? Right then, John, you go say, yeah, I have. OK, then OK, we're going to say, Dave, you have as well, haven't you? Mary, you definitely wet yourself. Do I stick your hand up if you're wet yourself in the last 12 months as an adult? Your goes to Canada. I don't see if Peter sticks his hand up. I wish it could be recorded. OK, Peter turned around. If looking at everyone, his hands slowly went up there. OK, and of course we all started laughing. Peter's got a listen. He's a great guy. OK, and I'm sure he won't mind me talking about that episode, but it shocked me that we could get people we copy other people. In fact, I got to tell you two of the stories. My sales director and I were at a conference, the National Automotive Dealers Association, and it was one of the keynote speeches. This keynote speech was not good. And I just is one of the ones that didn't just resonate with myself or Darren. OK, this was a national hero in America. We just didn't know who he was. OK, and the speech, I'm going to say it wasn't the best. OK, and I've been to 23 National Automotive Dealers Association's OK. This guy might have had an off day. I don't know. OK, I know I've definitely had off days. OK, we all do, don't we? OK, however, at the keynote speak speech, there must be. I don't know what it is. Six, nine thousand people there. OK, and we were sitting probably six to ten rows from the front. At the end of it, he got a standing ovation. Darren and I, we stood up because there were eight thousand people around us. I actually said to Darren, well, that's half now my life. I'll never get back. Why did I stand up? Why did I not say no, no, you's all wrong. That was crap. That was crap. Don't stand up. Don't give him standard ovation for that. Of course, no one would do that because everyone else. Now, again, I'm sure he was getting a standard ovation for what he's achieved in his career, which was sensational, not this particular switch. OK, but I stood up, I think, because we copy the people we'd like not to think so, but we do. OK, how often have you been waiting for a cash machine? There's three cash machines on the wall, but there's a queue behind two of them. And you assume the third one's not working. OK, you don't go to the third one. No one of us goes to the third one until someone tries it. It worked. Why didn't you try it? It's because how often in our life have we tried something like that? It doesn't work. And then you go do the walk of shame. Ask all the other people and know the thinking, yeah, get back to the end of the queue. That serves your rights. How dare you? OK, we copy other people. So with this in mind, here's the five phrases. And by the way, I want you to type that in when you get back to work or home, type in people standing and sitting in an optometrist or social media experiment. And then you've seen lots of other things similar. One that pops up regularly is a lady sitting there looking at a building edge in New York or something like that. No one pays attention to they get a group of five or six psychology students. They all stop and look at the building edge. Of course, everyone walk and pass. What do they do? They all stop and look. And then the one I'm thinking of a lady says a real thick New York accent. Oh, my God, is it a jumper? When she says that, what happens to crowd now? It gets bigger and bigger. I hope it's not phone 911. I already have. OK, another one pops up all the time on this. OK, and there's lots of these different ones there. But there's the lift experiment. OK, I love the lift experiment. When we walk into a lift, we want we want to walk in and turn around and face the exit. But what happens in this lift, this poor lady gets into the lift. And there's lots of different ones. I like the one that's Perth, Australia. They do that one well, but you'll see them. OK, and they're all facing the wrong way towards the back of the lift. OK, this poor lady gets in and they're all got back to her. You can see she mentally goes into a meltdown. She starts looking at if it's a double opener lift. It's not. She gets out her modern day safety blanket, her mobile phone. She studies it intently and ever so slowly she turns around and faces everyone else. OK, lift keeps going up and down as you expect. People get on and off. OK, but they're all facing the wrong way until it drops down to below critical mass. It gets down to two and right then a real thick Australian accent because it's made. What are we facing this way for? I don't know. And they turn around and face the other way. We copy other people say, how do we use this in the sales world? Here's the five phrases I want to use. The five phrases are most people, everyone knows. Everyone tells me everyone says there's an old saying. You see, if everyone else is doing it, maybe I should do it. OK, most of my customers do this. Everyone knows that's the best way to do it. Everyone's telling me, hey, there's an old saying. In fact, if you tie that into selling your value added products and Mr. Mrs. Customer, what level of asset protection to have on your car? Sorry, that's something most of our customers have because everyone knows that insurance companies love taking money, but they don't like paying it back out. And most of my customers want to protect the whole car, not just a small amount of insurance company wants to offer you. In fact, there's an old saying insurance companies love taking the money, but they don't like paying it back out. Do you see how you're applying? Well, if everyone else is doing that, maybe I should. And Mr. Mrs. Customer, do you still have your paint and fabric protection certificate? Sorry. Ah, that's a shame. My boss normally pays a touch extra when we've got that paint and fabric protection certificate, simply because she knows any scuffs and marks in the upholstery tend to come straight back out. But check your paperwork when you bought the car. You might have it not realize it. It's just that every manufacturer in Europe recommends some sort of paint and fabric protection now because cars are all painted in water-based paints, not mineral-based paints. So now it's not me recommending your paint and fabric protection product. It's not your manufacturer recommending it. It's not your dealer group. Every manufacturer important cars in Australia recommends some sort of paint and fabric protection. If everyone else are doing it, maybe I should. If in your country you're selling a PCP product, a personal contract purchase or personal contract plan, you might just say, hey, when's your guaranteed minimum future value suit? I don't have one of those. That's something most our customers have. We give the customers a minimum price, what the cars worth in, two, three or four years time. Would you like me to give you a minimum price, what your cars worth in three years time? Yes, please. Great. What we'll do is we'll find out the exact model of car you're interested in. Then my boss has got a computer in there to work out the minimum price that car in three years time. We then simply deduct one from the other, work the figures out in a smaller bit in between. Most of my customers only want a fun part of the car they're going to use, not the whole car. Everyone knows that's the best way to do it. Can you see those phrases? Most people, everyone knows, everyone tells me there's an old saying. I want you to start looking at those phrases next to me here, a politician talk. When a politician is trying to get elected, OK, I don't care what side of political party you're on. We had this in the UK with the Brexit, but everyone said, everyone knows, everyone tells me, everyone says this, politicians use it, locks all the time. Those five phrases, look at an advertising because these guys know that if everyone else is doing it, maybe I should try those ones to wrap yourselves process. See how it gets on you again. Thanks for the time to listen to this podcast. That just leads me to say that all details of this episode and other episodes on the selling in the motor trade can be found on our website, symco training.co.uk. Go there to get a copy of our book, Words That Sell Cars. Go there to sign up to a free trial of our Sal's Fitness Online Sal's Training program. Easiest way to get hold of me is Simon Bowkett, food LinkedIn. Thank you.
