It’s our pleasure to introduce Richard Keeney, Co- Founder of the Markee Group, who were pioneers of bite sized video training modules in the United States.
Richard has been in the industry for 46 years and he talks us through his journey, from car sales to starting the Markee Group with David Martin. There is a lot he’s learnt on the way, and we delve into what makes a great dealer, a great sales person or service advisor.
Here are the highlights:
{04:19} Don’t prejudge
{15:34} Prove the naysayers wrong
{16:53} Recurring income
{19:26} Drip feed ideas
{22:40} Strong standards and structures
{37:05} Take your time to hire
{50:45} Communication Skills
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 Skipping, I will start by saying thank you for taking the time to listen to this podcast. Hi and welcome to another episode of Selling and the Motor Trade. Today I'm joined by Richard Keeney. I first met Richard at the National Automotive Dealers Association too many years ago. Richard is one half of the marquee group and these are guys that really pioneered video training. When I met these guys at this booth, they were sending out a video a day and when I say a video, I'm talking about an actual video a day, two dealerships to sales managers and we struck up a great friendship with a marquee group and I guess a part of Symco Training, all of our online sales training program comes from the marquee group. So it is just my pleasure today to finally have Richard Keeney on the podcast. Richard, welcome on the podcast. Thank you, man. I appreciate it and it's so good to see you. It's only on a screen but it's been a treat knowing you for 25, 30 years. It has to be that long goodness, man. It has been that long. So listen, the people who don't know you, Richard, how long have you been in the motor trade? Must be 40 odd years. Did you start? Can you tell me a little bit about how you got started in the motor trade? Actually, I got in the business about 46 years ago and I remember, I made a phone call to my stepbrother who was running a store and I was about 21 years old and said that I do believe it's time for me to make some real money as compared to what I was making at the time. And just to kind of ask him, you know, point me in the right direction and he did and I was very fortunate to be pointed in the direction of a gentleman named Joe Hardman that got me kicked off. But yeah, I was in sales for about three years and anyway, that's, you know, it was just kind of on a whim. I called thinking, you know what, I'd like to see if I can make sales, you know, a direction. So what did you do before the motor trade? What was cars a passion or hobby or no, you just need to get out of what you're doing and make some proper money, as he said. Always loved automobiles, but it was intrigued with, I can remember as a kid before I was even able to drive a car. I used to, for some reason, I found myself studying cars just in traffic or in parking lots and I became a game in a sport to me to point out to people again, before I was of driving age and to start telling them what car was coming and went by and just sat in the other. I don't know. That's just, I guess I was a little bit intrigued right off the bat and it became a game in a sport to me to kind of learn all the vehicles. Good. Now, I find this question really separates the true motor car dealers and the people have it in their blood. Do you remember the first car you sold? That would have been in a late 78. But yeah, and you know, it's interesting because I don't remember the first car that I delivered because that was probably a hand-holding process and somebody helped me to that degree. But the first one that I sold was, and it sticks in my mind because about prejudging curb qualifying, plate glassing, all those little cliches was probably less than 30 days in the business and there was some lady. I even remember her last name that pulled up in the rain. Now was the new kid on the block in the rain. She was in an old beater station wagon. Well, I've been to any of us and I didn't know any better. We don't sell snow cones or carnival rides. I figured she was there to buy a car because, you know, my desire to sell a car and make money was stronger than my desire to stay dry. So people chuckled as I grabbed an umbrella and went out to wait on her and she ended up being the soon to be ex-wife of an executive with Scott Pinker Company down in Mobile, Alabama. And so it was one of those, thank goodness I hadn't learned how to prejudge it. And that's the first one I literally sold from beginning to end because nobody else evidently felt there was any promise to it. So I've carried that story with me for 46 years. Well, I tell you, I grew up in North Queensland, Townsville, North Queensland. What we would always say is if it's a rainy day, okay, people are there to buy a car because there's so many other days of sunshine, if someone's coming out the rain, they're not wasting their time. They're there to buy the car. So it's amazing that that pre-judging still happens, doesn't it? It does indeed. So back when you were still selling on the floor and before the marquee group, do you remember one of the greatest days that stood out for you? Maybe you're a manager or still selling that stood out? I guess one of the things that stands out in my mind was a prideful moment, was working with a team of people. It was a GSM of a Honda store, I mean a Mazda store at the time. And we had the tent sales, whether it's at the Civic Center Auditorium or Fairgrounds or whatever. And we had a good plan. We had high energy. We had maybe been the rules just a little bit, but hey, we're in the motor trade business, right? But we actually were the smallest dealership at this offsite, 16 dealerships. We went with a plan. We had a high energy, great team members like Jim McNavid. You might remember that name? Yes. He was my F and I manager at the time. That would have been about 28 years ago. Wow. 33 years ago. And we went and we came back with the trophy and the sales and the gross and high five and made a few, we rubbed a few people the wrong way, but it resulted in a phone call from my eventual boss saying we need that kind of energy. So it all panned out. Oh, that is. So you're actually putting leaflets on people's cars then? Well, heaven forbid, you're not supposed to do anything aggressive, right? Yes. You know, a sack like bankers or something. But let's just let people ease into the auditorium and give them a nice, well, we had a couple of ladies and people planted out on the parking lot that would come out and greet and hand it eight and a half by 11 color promotional piece telling them, walking them through it. Hey, this is pretty special. Be sure to ask about this extra cash too. And I got called up front a couple of times, but it was okay. It was worth it. It was worth it. Brilliant. Okay. Now listen, this is a shameless plug for our first 90 day sales fitness program. And I know in the marquee group, you've actually got your first 90 day boot camp. So maybe it's a shameless plug for both of our products there. But we often say in the first 90 days, we learned the skills, good and bad, that last with us for the rest of our selling career. Well, definitely in the motor train. Richard, can I say, is there anything that you learned the first three months that says relevant today as it is when you started the motor train 40 odd years ago? Absolutely. I mentioned a while ago about I was blessed to be hired by a gentleman who taught us how to sell a car. So often, you know, people get hired in the first couple of days. You know, if they don't, if they don't get some traction pretty quick, that starts creeping in. And if there's not any training and developing going on, then the doubt increases. The first 90 days for me was he taught us how to sell a car. You know, and I think it was 10 steps or whatever the case may be. But you know, the walk around in the demo drive is a difference in somebody having an interest in some information and having to have the vehicle. I started with a gentleman taught us how to sell a car, pop the hood, the fuel door, the trunk, do a feature, benefit, advantage presentation, sticks with me today. So actually flipping the needle from the logic to the emotional side of the brain. And I'm sure we'll talk later about the internet investment at the time of the internet. But back then, it was capturing hold their attention, start navigating around the car, feature benefit, you know, run 70, 80% demo because you are determining the sequence of events, you know, and make it interesting, capture, hold their attention. So I learned the first 90 days, sticks with me today, and I'm able to make suggestions in the training. I pull so much from what I learned in my first 90 days and starting with the right guy. Yeah. So he definitely says like a mentor at the time. His name was Joe Hardman. Joe Hardman. Listen, other than Joe, did you have any other mentors along the way that really stood out that you learned so much from? I've learned from a lot of my managers, you know, when such as Jim McNavy that runs a McNavy group and products and services and F&I. And just he and a select group of others that were on the same page that were able to, when the bell rings in the morning school starts, it's brief, it's day energized. You know, I guess there's just a couple of people, one of them, one of them I still do this day. I've retired for a while, but for about 35, 40 years, he sends me a positive mental attitude. We call them a PMA. We actually provide these as tools for dealerships for their salespeople, you know, to touch base with customers throughout the year in a very, very well received manner. And I just got one from him again the other day. And he's been retired for 15, 20 years. He influenced me because, you know, talking about Jim Rohn, the art of exceptional living and Zig Ziglar and all these people, he got me involved in self development. He got, I spent 80% of my drive time for about 12 years in the car listening to educational motivational, inspirational things of that nature. So that gentleman Phil Ward, he really touched me. And I still listen to things today that take me here and said, I don't watch the news. Yeah. Yeah. There's nothing but doom and gloom there so many times. So listen, I'm always intrigued. How does someone like you and I, okay? You were in the motor trade, you started selling cars. How does someone, I take it you, actually I haven't even asked yet. Where did you progress to in the motor trade from selling cars? Where did you go from after that, Richard? Well I sold cars for about three, three and a half years. And again, fortunately somebody taught me how to sell a car and to determine the sequence of events and increase the probability of a sale. After three and a half years I was asked to take a new car manager job at a small Toyota store. And I did that for a few years and eventually evolved into F&I and then a used car manager, general sales manager. And then before David and I launched the marquee group, he was a corporate recruiter and trainer for the Bullard organization, a big dealer group. And I was the general manager of a Honda store. So actually it was so much of what I learned, I'll even go back to the first 90 days, so much of what I learned by being involved and connected and listening to the, I didn't specifically go out seeking to be a serious student of the industry but fortunately I had something that made it, that helped me become a serious student and I learned from everybody. And so actually it's amazing, you're bringing so much to light right now about how much of my makeup, so much of my content, so much of what I want to convey to people to build a career, you have really allowed me this morning to say so much of it was impactful from the very beginning. Always amazing, people like us, who are the trainers and this is why I started to start with it. What's the motivation? I always wonder, do you see someone else and think, wow, I could do that. But listen right from that start, you were listening to tapes all the time. I imagine it was cassette tapes back then on Zig Ziegler and Jim Rohn and these great educators. What was your motivation for you and David to start the marquee group then? And giving up on guessing really good jobs? Yeah, we weren't doing too bad. But you know, David and I talked for a year and a half or two about different optional ways business models and different things to do and that we're all automotive related. My dealer who still has about seven franchises here where I'm local from where I'm speaking to you from, he sold the dealership. And when he sold the dealership and David and I had already been talking remember and so both of us had some decisions to make and they had nothing but they didn't even have a lateral move for me as a GM at this organization. So it was just the perfect trigger. Things happened for a reason I feel the timing was, well it was the timing, well look back looks a little reckless because I had two month old babies. Babies and twins. Yeah, twins. Yeah, you met them. You came down for NADA a long time ago. As a matter of fact, I was talking to one of them the other day. I don't want to get off on a tangent. But I said, do you remember the gentleman from the UK Simon Bowkett that was in the living room? You know, we're about eight, nine, ten years old. He was, I think the only time you heard an accent similar to that was the gentleman that had the Discovery Channel, Erwin. Steve Erwin. And she goes, you're kidding. I said, yeah, I'll be talking to him tomorrow as a matter of fact. Anyway, David and I did talk about it for a while. And then all of a sudden we let that serve as kind of a sign that was time to do it. And so in 96 we just went ahead and of course everybody said, you're nuts, you're crazy. And some people even insinuated it's not going to work. Don't tell me I can't do anything. Don't tell me I can't sell them a service contract. Don't tell me I can't anyway. You know how it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the motivation you need to do it. That's some fuel and motivation right there. Always has been. That's it. So listen, we did first bomb into the NADA conference. And I just want to explain to maybe some of the younger people listen to this. The reason why we got along with you guys is you guys were the pioneers on bite-sized training. Okay. You had this program where you would send a videotape to a sales manager every week and it would turn up in the post. And it was a short little training segment that was laser right to the point on a different idea and success. What idea to turn success one idea at a time. That was it there. And you guys really were the pioneers of that video training. Now I'm going to say that especially in the motor trade, in fact, all training. It's all video training one idea of time training. Can you tell me about your motivation to come up with that success one idea of time program? Well, I credit David with that because David understood, for example, recurring income from like an insurance business or something where you sell the ice instead of the refrigerator. You know, if you sell the ice and the recurring income and things of that nature. But at the top, so it was a monthly subscription that we were focused on selling the ice versus the fridge. Sell the fridge too. Yeah. Right. Yeah. But when you sell just the fridge, you got to find a prospect, close the prospect, prepare for the gig, travel, do the gig, clean up after. Now I got to find it, sell another refrigerator, you know, find another prospect. But anyway, it was, I credit David with that. And because at the time there were no shortage of trainers, you had Jackie Cooper and you had Joe Verde and all of these, and they had these seminars, very good. I mean, some of the icons of the industry with training and all that, but they had these long continuous play videos of them putting on all day seminars for two or three days in hotels. It was great information, you know, and it was the go to for a lot of people. But David, and we came up with that name by discussing it and building the model and everything. And it was success. One idea at a time, how to eat the elephant, abide at a time instead of these people going and drinking training out of a fire hydrant. You know what I mean? Let's feed them and develop them slowly. If you got an idea and it was the nucleus for a brief meeting, I used to joke about it Simon and talking to dealers and managers and say, the salespeople are agreeable to participate pay attention because it's one less 90 minute depression session hollering about who didn't lock the cars up. That was a joke. Yeah, but so short of. They all, hey, and they all chuckled and a chuckle to me as a confession. You know, sometimes, but, but yeah, it was a brief 15, some of them were 16, 17 minutes brief, but it was 15 minute videos training in a box, train the trainer by him implementing this brief program salespeople receptive because they get to come in 15 minute video, talk about it 30 minutes, they're out of there. Yep. Right. And to and free to go use the ideas. Can you imagine getting somebody on a 15 minute video now? Oh, wow. No, I don't think so. So that's why we even developed two minute drills. Yeah. We got over 100, 122 minute drills because that's six minutes isn't that long, but two minutes is even shorter. Yeah. But the way we, the way we explain that is let's say that you're a salesperson or your service advisor, you have a whole lot of ideas. We need to get into their brain and their brain is a sponge. The idea is, is this glass of water. If you throw that glass of water at the sponge, sure, some of the water will get in the sponge, but the vast majority is going to end up on the table, the floor and everywhere. Because there's too much, but if you get the same sponge, the brain and you drip feed it bit by bit, that sponge will job all of the water there. And that's what that micro learning does, doesn't it? It just drips all the time in it. It's your fire hydrant analogy there. Look at this guys, we've got to apologize. Two trainers, okay? Two training companies there. Of course we're going to talk about what actually sticks the best. And we just know, well, I know in our business, it actually works by drip feeding the training all the time there. Can I mention something? Of course you can. And you're right, brief, laser-like succinct messages, but you must have management involved there. For managers, and the reason I say that is you can watch a video, you can watch a video and print the course material to review later, you can print the, you can watch a video, print course material, build your training manual, take a test to make sure there's comprehension. Too often, and we have to keep revisiting with clients. Managers need to watch this too. And then because they need to be on the same page, but not only that, it needs to be discussed with the salespeople. The succinct message shared by all, everybody's on the same page where you can put some teeth into it, get ideas from your students, the other students of the training, so they can be part of the solution created where there's buy-in for forward movement. But it's, I didn't mean to get off of that tangent so much, but the brief succinct laser-like messages discussed with continuity about moving forward on all the topics and subject matter what's most important to that particular dealer at that time, the opportunities or challenges they're faced with. Everybody should always get on the same page with these brief succinct messages. Put teeth in it, talk about how it relates to your particular culture of your environment and keep moving instead of a three-day seminar. Well, I'll go and say it's, we go in and do deal visits and our dealerships we work with and programs all the time. So many times it's our sales manager, our service manager. We need to turn into the trainers because they're the people, training people day in, day out, deal by deal by deal. What we need to is give them the information to be able to load their lips, load the sales risks and lips to them what to go out and say. So I hear you on that one. It's definitely as the managers need to buy into any training program. So dealer principals listen to this, people owning dealer groups, general managers, it's your management team that really need to be the trainers. Yep. Very true. Listen, over the time in the motor trade, okay, Markie Group from 96 in the motor trade 46 years, you must have seen the great dealerships out there, the good dealerships and maybe the ugly. So can I ask you, what do you think separates the good dealerships from the great, or sorry, I should say the other way around, what separates the great from just the good? I think it's having standards for employment. I think it's having strong standards, undiviated from structure in the environment, standards for employment that are etched in stone, structured for continuous learning and performance, key performance indicators being met by everybody. I think accountability, I think that's the difference because if it's a wild west in any fashion at all in a dealership, there's just going to be this. If you have structure and accountability without structure, people are out of control, right? If everybody's held to the same high standards, you have standards of performance. If they're revisited on a regular basis, I think what you're doing is you're creating professionals who feel real good about the organization that they're working for. So I guess the difference is because I have some dealer groups and those that don't play, they're fair but firm, they're clear in their message and their mission, they give everybody on the team the best chance to succeed, their managers are held accountable for all of the performance indicators for all the people. Training is huge at these organizations. So I really think structure, standards, accountability and training develops the whole team. That's it. I would say is the culture that these dealerships, these dealer groups have as well that really punch above their weight, you walk in there, it's kind of like walking into a restaurant. Richard, have you ever seen the, you walk into a restaurant and before you've seen a menu, you know if you're going to have a good meal or not sometimes and it's the atmosphere, it's the people. Isn't it the same with a great dealership? You walk into a dealership and it's that the culture that you can feel it before you get there and you think, you know what, this manager, whoever owns this group, they're just on it. And it is that structure, stuff you're talking about, I couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more. But listen, as a couple of trainers here, I want to ask you a question. We both train lots of brand new people to the industry and every now and then I get people saying, oh, I seen Jordan Belford, the Wolfville Wall Street, I want to be like him. I've just seen Andy Elliott and all great training. I've never been on any of the training from either of those gentlemen. OK, I see some of the social media clips there and I always say, I want to get your views. I say to the young salesperson, really? You want to be like the Wolf Wall Street. Nothing gives the man, I don't know the guy, but he made his money by ripping off pensioners. He made his money by selling shares. You've seen the movie. He's selling shares in stocks that weren't the best. He did it back in the 1980s. OK, this is 2024. Anyone can sell one car. We don't want to do that. We want to sell people a second car, the third car, their family and friends cars. I just want to get your view on this. Wambam, thank you, ma'am. Sell them a car, get rid of them onto the next. If they're in place that in the modern motor trade. It's going to go ahead. And it sounds like, I'll go say, Mr. Jordan Belford, if you listen to this, Mr. Grant Cardone, listen, I met Grant many a times there. I don't want to directly knock those guys, but it's just some of these guys I think maybe are picking up the wrong image from social media. Can I get your views on that? Yeah, and some of the people that you're referring to or that pop into our minds that we're careful not to because a lot of them are great promoters. And they're the hype. I don't Jordan Belford. Where does that get you? OK, you didn't have any friends that weren't also doing time. OK, but the hype can be short lived. It's kind of like Zig Ziglar used to say about enthusiasm. Everybody needs enthusiasm. But it doesn't last. That's why we recommend, like bathing. That works too, but we recommend you do it every day. So you've got to stay in twos. But if it's a short term hype deal, you know, it's I think what Jim Rohn said, motivation is great. But if you motivate a fool, what do you have? I've motivated fools. I think there is a place for motivation. I really do. And please don't knock that. But it's going to be more than just hype, hasn't it? Yes, it's got to be. It's got to be substance. You know, it can't be short lived because then you got to just keep piling in. But you're talking about Jim Rohn, the art of exceptional living. I must have listened to it 80 times because that's in my car. The art of exceptional living, you get paid based on the value you bring to the marketplace. I don't mean you get off on this tangent, but it's kind of relevant. You get paid based on the value you bring to the marketplace. And if you're a manager, a dealer, a general manager, salesperson, you get paid based on the value you bring. And if a manager is developing his people, if he's getting his job done through the people, if he's taking people places, they couldn't have fathomed, they could go. You see, that's not short term hype, right? That's permanent. And you're actually, when you change people's professional lives, you're going to change their personal lives. That's a legacy. I would wish more people would take on and be challenged by because the hype short lived. You know, every day can't be a circus. It's got to be balanced. Every day can't be a tent sale. You got to have energy. Yeah. But what you need is educated, professional people with some inspiration and some vision. And I don't mean you didn't ask about this, but part of what makes a great dealership and a good dealership is a lot of the people, they assimilate the reality that goals are very important. And it makes me think about JCPenney said, show me a stock clerk with a goal. And I'll show you a man that could change the world. Show me a man without a goal and I'll show you a stock clerk. Yeah. So anyway, it's an ongoing process to develop people, not just get them all excited for a couple of days. It's so true. So true. It sounds like I've been knocking some of those there. And again, I think people knowing as well enough, there is definitely a place for that there. And it's just as long as there's substance there. We've had lots of other speakers here that talking about the substance. You being the what's going to help me sell more cars, make more profit, sell more finance, improve the service department. Yes, motivation, enthusiasm is important, but give us the tools to do it as well. But while we're having a go, the motor trade there, we know that more and more customers are starting their journey, the carbine journey online now, it's all digital. Okay. How much research does the average customer do now before they walk in, phone in or email a dealership? It's over 20 odd hours. So with that in mind, the road to a sale is just irrelevant. Certainly. It really is. And I hate to hear sometimes that inclination people have to abandon the road to the sale thinking that it's just a competition on the internet. And because people buy from people and I think 80, 90% of the people, this is going to be my opinion. It's going to be a long time before a majority of people do their whole transaction online. I think people, myself included, I want to go see. The color on the internet is not necessarily what it's going to look like in person or by going to a dealership, I'm able to research my options. I think a lot of people are finding because of the evolution of a more professional environment in dealerships today. I think once they get to the store, they realize in short order, they're not really, they're not in danger. You know what I mean? I think that personal connection is very important. But once you agree to customer and you already know what the plan is, you know what your road to the sale is, I think that's the difference in a great dealership and a good or a good and a not so, is their team that has not abandoned the road to the sale. I think that's given up some accountability right there. I think I need to agree to customer. I need to sit down and slow down and have a counseling session where I show I have a genuine interest. See, that's the part of the plan. They have a genuine interest in providing a good service, money follows service and pulling a car around and popping the hood, the fuel door and the trunk. A lot of people don't do walkar rounds as much anymore. And if they do, certainly they don't own a used car. I just strongly believe in what I learned a long time ago and if somebody thinks it's had to quated, okay, that's fine. But to me, you agree to customer, you counsel the customer, you drop their arms, so when you, they're not in danger, you show you have spent adequate time performing a professional and thorough and educational walk around feature benefit presentation. You run 75, 80% demo because you have determined with much success the sequence of events that take place. You don't have a road to the sale. What are you going to do? You're going to go walk out there and look at the car. Let's go drive it, go ahead, come back. Let's pull a bureau. See if y'all can agree on numbers. I think you need to spend adequate time with the road to the sale and a feature benefit presentation. Flip the needle from logic to emotional side of the brain. You need to sell service before you even write the deal up. But anyway, I just strongly believe that the road to the sale is not passé. And those that have abandoned it and they take shortcuts. Number one, they're not going to sell as many and they're going to hold as much gross in there. I'm not going to build a relationship that they can nurture long term for repeat and referral, which is great. If you had people across the board doing that, then the dealership is recession proof in their future. We all seen that after COVID-19, it was the same in the US. There was a limited supply of vehicles. I mean, we couldn't get semiconductors blah, blah, blah. And the process, the road to sell a process, call it what you want. Without the window, I think the process was, hey, do you have the car available? Great. Okay. Do you want it now? If not, I've got four other people who want it. And you know what? It was shelling peas. But Richard, those days are gone now, aren't they? They're absolutely gone. And you know what? The people who forgot good sales process, okay, or never learned sales process because they started to Madrid after COVID-19. Okay. Two of them. They're the ones who are struggling now in 2024. Get back to sell the car before we sell the deal. Get back to sell yourself before you sell the deal. Just selling the deal first, the deal second, the deal third. That may have worked when we had more people than we had guards. But you know what? We got to slow it back down now. And we're training the consumer that the balls in their court because now all of a sudden, we, you know, all kinds of drag push and pull and 8,500 cash back and things of that. Now, all of a sudden, now the dealers are in competition with each other. You know, we went from during COVID, the customer would come in and say, how long would it take for you to get me this? You know what I mean? They're not doing, their demands aren't quite as strong as outlandish for the trade-in, the payments, the interest rates and the sale price and things of that nature. We've got a lot of people way over a denim and things of that nature. But the whole game has changed. The sad thing is when you meet somebody that has never been on the other side of the COVID, you know, where you're taking orders, all of a sudden they get hired to be a sales representative when it was a, everybody was a lay down basically. And pretty much it was taking orders. Now all of a sudden the real world hits and they're going, what have I gotten into it? You know? But all of a sudden that's why what's one of the most common requests you have or statements you get, I know for us at the Marquis Group emailed and phone calls, said, we need to get back to the basics. We thought we were good. We printed money. We thought we were good. But reality has slammed us in the face. We've got to sharpen our saw again. So that's pretty common comment. A great advocate of the podcast is Sean Kelly runs the Vines BMW Group around London. Real good operator runs a brilliant business. And he said on the podcast. Simon, it's quite funny. When the times are really good, you're going to manage to say, hey, look what I've done. Look how good I've done. When times go bad, the same measure says, look how bad the economy is. He says it can't be both. He can't be both. And he's dead right on that one there. And so many times people at COVID times were like, Pat and ourselves on the back there. But now we've got to get, listen, get back to the basics. We hear that all the time. Actually, do what we know we've always had to do. It's not getting back to the basics. It's do what we've always had to do. I think that's the process there. So road to self for me is definitely going to be around. And listen, why we're talking about that? I'd love to get your views as well on in the States. Staff turnover with service advisors is a bit more stable than car salespeople. But still, service advisor car salespeople, we still turn far too many of them in the motor trade compared to other industries. How do we stop this issue where we train people one month? They forget it the second month and we end up sacking in the third. What advice do you have for slowing down that high staff turnover? Well, some of them don't sack in the first 90 days and should because they're looking for coverage. You know, and I hear it all the time about you can't find anybody work ethic, this, that, and the other. And I remember David had we did a video a long time ago and he was talking about recruiting and dating is kind of similar. He said the more dire the need to lower the standards. But the reality is, is, you know, I don't know how far back this goes. And I remember it said you need to hire slow and fire fast. Yeah. Okay. It's just mentioned the same thing all the time. Does he brew it? Educator. And people instead they're they're firing fast and firing slow. Because they don't have any resolve to the issue they had before they even hired this, this person. But one of the biggest things if they would just train the people, you know, if you had that first 90 days and not I trained them for 90 days, I got to go back to what I was doing. No, the training is something you did. It needs to be something you do. But, but the turnover part of what percentage I don't know is because they're not ever put on solid ground, you know, they they they made train them a little bit and then you put them out there and they start selling a couple of cars. Okay, I've got it. The manager goes, okay, he's got it. I'll get back to him. And the problem, the turnover, I think, is hiring standards. The fact that hiring isn't recruiting is an ongoing mission. That everybody understands how we're going to go about having fly eyes, looking for good people constantly everywhere you go. But the turnover is atrocious. It really is. I don't know if you've been in there. I go into rooms sometimes and I'm thinking to myself, what were they thinking with one or more of these new people? However, yes, shame on me for prejudging. I've got two guys right now at one store in Albertville, Alabama, one of them did 50 cars in July. Now he is a solid citizen of the community. You're a young man. People probably 80% repeat referral, right? Yeah. I had another gentleman sell 37 cars in July and he was one of those that was in the room and I thought, what were they thinking? He's late for the training meeting with the general manager in the room. He doesn't have a pen. So I had to give him mine and I'm thinking what and he did 37 cars. He got inspired. He got pointed in the right direction. He's online training. He a couple of classroom trainings. I don't, I'm not taking credit for it. I'm just saying because of the spiritedness of that environment, because it's structured, there's accountability and they don't play. You play by the rules or you play in the ground, but on the grounds. But longer the short of it is there is a lot of turnover. We do need to hire slow fire fast, but we need to look ourselves in the mirror. Joe Bullard told me one time and I was a GM of the Honda store and he's training me on what to look for in a financial statements and things of that nature. I was a new GM and he said, Richard, I think he got it from a 20 group or something. He said, your turnover is a little bit and this has to do with the recruiting and the retention of salespeople. He said, before you let another employee go, part service sales, all I'm asking you to do is look yourself in the mirror and say, have I done everything humanly possible to help that person succeed? And if you cannot say yes, then you need to, you owe it to them and you owe it to the organization to spend more time with that person to make sure there's not a diamond in the rough there. He said, but if you can say, yes, I have done everything humanly possible, do them a favor, do us a favor and let them go. He said, everything's good. The numbers are good and this, that and the other, but he was training me to what to look for and what to track. And I've carried that with me and all the leadership, the management sessions and things of this nature that we do, look yourself in the mirror and ask yourself, have you done everything humanly possible to help that person succeed? And I share that with dealers about their managers too. These managers haven't necessarily been pointed in the right direction, been given the right adequate training and things of that nature. So, you know, it's all the way across the board as far as turnover goes. So, like I said, the modern world then, do you think there's still a place for car salespeople or are we the dinosaurs, Richard? Is it all going to be click and collect? And that's the future. I know that you've got a banner over there. You've got these. You don't have to speak to a sales person. You just go to your big vending machine and the car turns up. Are we going to be around 10 years time, 20 years time, Richard? My opinion, strong opinion. Yes, we will. I don't think there's going to be a wholesale change. I think that there's always going to be, and it's going to be growing percentage of people that will proudly avoid a dealership and tell their friends about it. I think that they like that and have it delivered. But I think right now, I think 80, 90 percent of the consumers today would rather go to the dealership. They want to eyeball it, see what their other options are, face it. The color is not going to look the same on the car than it did on the internet. But the longer the short of it is, the old statistic is 70 percent of people, 70 percent of the people are going to end up selecting something other than their first request once they get in the mix and once they determine what the packages really are and things of that nature. But I know I want to go to a dealership and I want to see the vehicle drive the vehicle and have an interaction with somebody that's going to be accountable for seeing everything through it. I just don't want it showing up in my driveway. And I think a majority of the people they talk about and maybe genuinely have a little bit of caution about going to the store. But because of the evolution of the more professionalism and dealerships, I think once they get there, they see they're not in danger and they'll follow the lead of a good professional salesperson. So no, I don't think it's going to be all click. I think we've got a good 15, 25 more years before is even close to 50, 50, if it ever reaches. Last week, I see it was still less than five percent. I think it was last NOD number that was coming out of the States. And I think that don't quote me that. This is where people on the podcast, Richard, I'll get the message saying, no, no, it's 7.8 percent or whatever. But it was still low numbers there. Last number I said, I'll say this. I think 86 percent of statistics are made up on the spot. I think you're dead right. So like 86, 86.7, I think maybe. OK, I love it. I love it. So listen, tell us a little bit about your company. What's a day in life at the Marquis Group? Look, I, or maybe a month life. Are you all just digital online stuff? Are you out in stores still? Tell us about your business, Richard. Still going to stores. And David has retired. David was what a contribution. I mean, we got over a thousand of the videos on the platform. And David spearheaded most of those. I handle the management leadership, but, but it's so much online now. A majority of our focus and everything is providing a service for our clients that are online. We've got dealers and individual dealer groups, things of that nature. And we just want to a day in the life or a week in the life of us is our team making sure that everybody's taken care of, that the powers to be are informed about the successes and the maybe an opportunity for them to provide some encouragement for some people as far as monitoring the success of our programs within a dealership or dealership group. I still love to go to stores, not like I used to in quantity. Airports, hotels, I still do, but I'm not. I don't, I don't do it anywhere close to the degree David and I used to. That was, it was a half a full-time job right there. But mostly just monitoring the business success of our clients, accommodating those that are coming out saying, we got to get back to the basics and getting them started again. I say 80% of our clients are people that have done business with us in the past that they're going, we got to get back to what works. But as in your case, going to dealerships and been doing it the whole 28 years and still doing it today helps me keep my finger on the pulse and finding out what the challenges and opportunities are. We run our office here in Daphne, Alabama and I'll travel locally. Yes, drive time, windshield time got no problem with an occasional hotel and airplane. But that's pretty much it. And we're not going to do it. We have because it's so online and skippy, I want to mention something to you. 28 years ago, we had a team of four salespeople sending out 10 VHS tape samples a day. Shrink wrap, shrink wrap with popcorn to separate and differentiate us from all the other people came out of the woodwork to provide training, right? And in that it was, we used to call them the digi-sisters, had three ladies and my brother who's still with me today, 26 years later. They would send out 10 packages and on the third day, they'd start calling and we call them the digi-sisters. Did you give it? Did you watch it? It was great, wasn't it? Did you give it? Did you watch it? Let me tell you what's on it. I want to get out of your way, but don't you dare keep this most common objection response from your salespeople. Anyway, I'll call you back in about a week. I mean, we had a process going with the VHS tapes and then we, we evolved. I know this was getting a little bit off target, but I just remember there was a guy that called me after about seven, eight, nine years. We ended up with 64 monthly tapes, a subscription. And he said, Richard, I'm just wondering, you got any, you got any eight tracks from my car? I don't even know if you know what an eight track is. Anyway, he humbled me and I went, all right, smart Alec. I said, I get it. So we evolved into the DVDs and the audio CDs and things of that nature. But with the online, there's not as much activity that, well, you really took me back in these discussions today about those early days. So let's go back to the people that listened to this podcast. So my advice, and I'm going to word it this way. If you bought your own dealership, Richard, your own dealer group, can I ask you, what would you focus on on the first 90 days? And what I suppose I'm driving out here, if there's a manager listening to this, or is the dealer principal general manager, what would they focus on if they had to go to a new business? So can I ask you, if you did buy your own dealership, what would you focus on in that dealership in that first three months? Two things, people and processes, the people and the processes, you're going to be paid a little bit of attention to everything else, inventories, waste, things of this nature. But first thing I want to do is get a true, give every employee there a fair assessment, a process of getting a fair assessment about this person. Their purpose, are they going to be a long term team member? Are they going to be a, are they going to compliment the environment with their existence and their professionalism and effectiveness? So I'm going to evaluate the people first, all while evaluating the processes. Because once we feel like, you know, you got to get the spokes tight. And if the people ain't right, spokes ain't tight, right? And then your processes have got to be firm and you've got to have the people to partner with you for those processes. Those are the two things, evaluating and assessing the people, the processes. And everybody gets on a mission and moves forward, building the culture that it creates a great workplace that we can strive aggressively to reach our true potential doing business the right way. So that's great advice, great advice. OK, do you have any tips, ideas that someone could go back and put in place today, right now to help them sell more cars, put more profit into the deal or I might improve the service department. It's just a takeaway. Have you got any takeaway someone can take away from this episode of the podcast? Communication skills to work on your communication skills. And I know that you know exactly what I'm talking about or I believe you would. Everything doesn't have to just be a transactional thing where we're processing people in the service lane like cattle, right? To keep our promises, commitments, get the car back out that day. It's if you just slow down and realize that the greatest gift you can give another as a purity of your attention. And really when you have an opportunity to interact with a consumer, be it sales or a service customer is to slow down for just a moment to speed it up overall. Make sure that their takeaway is going to be this is a comfortable place to be. It's not just a rapid fire transaction to get to the next one. I think that we need to make that connection with consumers with good eye contact, good listening skills. We need to ask the right questions, truly listen, show them. We have a genuine interest in providing a good service. So the takeaway is not a silver bullet to slam in one more car dealer. Go up a tenth of an hour per R.O. On your 25 R.O.s, you're overburdened with every day. It's communicate with that consumer. Play well with the team internally. My takeaway is just be just be a better communicator and trust. We'll we'll take over. But I've really enjoyed this. And it's been too long since we got you on the podcast. So I just want to say thank you so much for your time. Now, people listen to this. How do they get hold you? What's the easiest way to get hold of Richard Keeney? Well, you can go to the website marqueegroup.com. No dash in this one. Marky group, M-A-R-K-E-E-G-R-O-U-P. And R Keeney at marqueegroup.com. And my cell number, 251-680-6633. But the easiest thing is just go to the marquee group website and it'll have contact opportunities. It'll have free demos, free brief demos for service, sales management, leadership, sales people. And I invite anybody to go to the site and you have any questions, give us a shout. OK. Pretty much really appreciate it, Todd. Thanks a lot for that. Thanks, man. 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 simcotraining.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 sales fitness online sales training program. Easiest way to get hold of me is Simon Bowkett, food linked in. Thank you.
