Did you know that in a recent study 75% of people felt they couldn’t trust a car salesman? Trust isn’t easily earnt and when lost it can be very difficult to get back. As March is the first of two peak months for motor sales (the other being September), it’s vital that you build and maintain trust with new and existing customers to help your business grow.
Let’s take a look at what action you can take to improve customer trust in your motor trade business.
Listen to your customers
Take the time to listen carefully to all your customers. Respect their time as every customer is different, this means you need to be flexible and patient in helping them to find the deal that is suitable for their needs. This can make a big difference in meeting your customers’ expectations.
Providing customers with greater control
In a survey of car buyers, 25% of respondents felt that the dealer had more control in arranging their finance than they did. It’s important to help your customers feel as though there isn’t any pressure to agree on a deal. If they feel the finance package you offer isn’t suitable for them. Try to be accommodating and offer to help them find alternative finance. This can be mutually beneficial for your business and the customer, by finding the right finance the customer can feel more in control, you could build a trusting relationship and potentially close that sale.
Promote and request customer feedback
For every customer that makes a purchase from your motor trade business, you could ask them to provide you with a short testimonial or to complete a short survey. Over time you could gain a healthy number of testimonials which you could use to display on your business premises and your website for customers to read. Even if you receive some negative feedback, this can be an opportunity to put things right and reduce the likelihood of an incident reoccurring again in the future. To improve transparency further you could even request and promote customer feedback through an third party like Trust Pilot or Feefo.
Make contact easy
After you’ve sold a vehicle, it’s essential that if any customers return with questions or vehicle issues, that your contact details such as an email address and telephone number are easily accessible. Whether this is online or on a client card in the motor trade premises. The after-care service for many customers is the true test of a motor trade business’s customer service. Providing a helpful and consistent customer experience can breed confidence that you’re good to do business with. Failure to resolve problems can lead to customer frustration and a lack of trust, which can harm your chances of repeat business in the future and can generate poor word of mouth.
Motor trade guides
Are you looking to improve more than just customer trust in your business? Then we as providers of motor trade insurance have a range of handy guides that may be of interest to you.
How do you build and maintain trust in your motor trade business? Let us know on our Facebook and Twitter pages.
