Dealer Service

I'm Adam Bartos and today I'll be talking about how to create a better dealer network. Last week Joanna Rodder talked about SAS or Software as a Service. That was our first edition of Field Force Fridays and t Be sure to tune in every Friday for these industry leading technology w As I said today, we'll be talking about managing dealer networks. T Part of why we're doing this today is two weeks ago were at AED S There's a lot of great thought leaders We took away some of from where our stance is how you can do that better both as a dealer and a manufacturer. Okay, so what's the big deal? It's no secret that manufacturers of heavier complex equipment have super robust processes, technical products, very unique aspects of their business that they need to manage and those dealers need to manage those for the manufacturer as well. They'representing the manufacturer at the cons When you have the manufacturer creating the equipment, manufacturing the equipment and then those dealers are selling that to your end users, there's a gap here in the service process. So you're a manufacturer who'selling the product to the dealers but then the dealers are selling it to those end users and they're managing the service contracts, warranties, parts, installations, preventive maintenance. So between the end users here at the bottom and the manufacturers here at the top, there's a gap and that gap is the dealer network. So in our opinion, the manufacturer and the dealer need to be perfectly in sync. They need to be on the same page and they need to be working together on how to establish those processes because service is a major part of business for manufacturers and for dealers. It's a major revenue generator, not just sales but preventive maintenance and future service contracts. So when it'such a big component of the bottom line and bottom line earnings, these two need to be in sync. So we'll talk about why. Now t If you have a Major League Baseball team, and for t Obviously much different than a manufacturer dealer relations They have their AAA, AA teams below them and essentially those teams are building processes to get to the Major Leagues. So coac If our AA team is teac They want to be aggressive on the base pass but they want to be smart at the plate. All of a sudden you're filling your pipeline and your talent with disjointed processes, with disjointed coac And again, very different business model than heavy equipment obviously but the point is the same, you have your customers who all have a similar need. They have service, they have repair, they have installations and you're selling the same equipment so why should those processes be different? If all of your dealers are on the same page here and reporting that up to the manufacturer, you can streamline processes, you can do things a lot better, you can synchronize your processes and that creates a better experience for the cons So I'm talking about baseball, I'm talking about sports, you're probably wondering at t What we want to arrive at is the key to building an efficient dealer network is consistency, the synchronization across the manufacturers and the dealers. You probably ask yourself, okay, well, I'm a dealer, my business is much different than the manufacturer, I'm actually selling to the end user and if you're a manufacturer, you're probably that's a good point, So what I want to review is the top five benefits from our perspective of creating consistency wit So managing those dealer networks and the benefits that could help both manufacturers and dealers. Now at the dealer level, you want to know information about your service processes, about lead time, about your pipeline of service orders, when are we scheduling our preventive maintenance calls. All of those information, all of that data as it relates to your customer and your equipment in the field is very valuable to you. You want to know what you have in the pipeline, what you have to do, when you have to send your people out and all of those true service based processes are somet The manufacturer on the other hand is interested in reporting. So where is our best processes, where is our best opportunity to improve, where are we getting the most revenue. And so reporting from the dealer level is of great interest in the manufacturer because they know where that revenue is coming from. On the dealer level, it's that visibility in the managing the service process so you can streamline that, do that more efficiently and use a system to create those benefits. So one system across both can align those two interests and report to both dealer and manufacturer. Point n Last two weeks ago as I mentioned were at AED S Why? Because they're trying to increase sales. More dealers, more feet on the ground, more sales, more revenue. And t If you're streamlining your systems at the manufacturer level and you're trying to build a dealer network, what sounds better? I meet a distributor and a dealer at t It's much cleaner, much more agile and allows you to grow at a much quicker pace. T You're probably wondering why are McDonald'sprouting up on every street corner every two weeks. That's why, because they can just grow. They have set processes and it works for them. N So you have a dealer network. I'm sure you attend different dealers s As a dealer, that dealer network is one of your biggest assets. You can co-market on t You really can share thought leaders Same principle can be applied to software that you're using. So if everybody is on the same service software and you're mirroring each other'service processes, you can create that consistency and consistency of an experience to the customer, to the end user and make it a much better, much cleaner process for you as a dealer and for your other dealers. If you guys are talking on the same system and so that's of interest to the dealers and not just the manufacturers. Another big one, our n So if you have an accounting system or a CRM system, you have If you're the manufacturer, it's more than You've already spent a lot of capital on those. You have a lot of training. There's a lot of t Consistency of systems at the dealer level and at the manufacturer level makes sure that those integrations can really only need to be done once. If you have a common system wit All of your dealers benefit from that one integration. You don't have to recreate the wheel every time a new system comes on, every time a new dealer comes on. It'simple. The work's already done. All you need to do is customize it to their location and their dealers Fifth, best in breed partner. So if So t You have the manufacturer and the manufacturer is maybe looking for a service software that they can implement across their entire dealer network. So the process that will flow will be dealer n Who are your customers? Give us some maybe custom forms and inspection processes that we can map. And they develop a competency for that first dealer. N They're rolling it out. Maybe two with a couple unique processes just to their location. But a lot of the work was already done with dealer n So they can build on that for dealer n And by the time dealers n And they can just roll it out without asking the same questions, without too many extra pain points. Three and four are benefiting from the initial rollout and from the manufacturer explaining that business model. So having one partner who truly understands your business rather than having four different partners here, all who are trying to learn your business, maybe not as well as they should. That can save you a lot of heartburn down the road by just having everybody on the same page and making sure that you have one strong best and breed service partner who truly understands your complex business. So where are we going with all t I mentioned before, you've probably heard the term recreating the wheel. I know you have. If you're doing that, what you probably are as a manufacturer as a dealer network, stop. Don't do it. It's causing more problems for you than it's worth. Have one of those best and breed partners work with you, streamline your dealer network, make sure everybody's on the same page so your cons That will work its way up to manufacturer, increase sales, increase revenue, increase service revenue, and all these t So consistency is the key word for today. You want to make sure that everybody is on the same page. You have a network of strong dealers that your work was already. Why not enhance that with your service software and your service processes? So that's all I have for today. Next week you'll be meeting with Josh Casambo and he'll be doing our t So once again, We look forward to talking to you again. Have a great weekend.