How did Bryan Honda spend $150 on a campaign and sell seven vehicles — with more leads still being worked — in just seven days? Let’s start by saying that this was in Fayetteville, North Carolina during the recent hurricane. They had flooded cities all around them and I-95 was closed. They had every reason to fail, but somehow this campaign was producing leads for around $2.50 each and they were selling cars.
Rico Glover is the chief digital officer at Bryan Honda. He specializes in inbound marketing and handles all things online for the dealership. For the last seven months Rico had been experimenting with different types of Facebook campaigns and had seen some successes, including a $200 campaign that produced 49 leads. He knew there was a better way and decided to seek out a partner or authority to help him get to the next level.
Rico decided to try something new with his Facebook advertising with a new partner company that would do a lot of the heavy lifting for him. He had heard of dealerships around the country that were enjoying incredible results and super-low costs per lead. He and his new partner decided to run a test over five days. They generated more than 150 leads and spent less than $2.50 per lead. Rico was excited to say the least when he saw a customer from the campaign in the showroom taking delivery on the very first day. Even more impressive was the low cost per lead. He was spending just over 10 percent for the Facebook leads compared to what he was spending on Google. That’s nearly a 10- to-1 lead ratio for the same money. Rico knew that he was on to something special and kicked into high gear.
Well, next a hurricane hit and, thanks to Rico’s new marketing system, the dealership weathered the storm and continued to learn more and fine-tune this new process. Over the last two weeks, Rico has seen more than 350 leads produced of legitimate car buyers with names, emails and phone numbers. These are people who want to come into the store to test drive and buy new vehicles. Rico is now able to spend less money and fill the store with car buyers. Rico’s goal isn’t to just spend less; he plans to grow the dealership.
Currently, Bryan Honda has 33 salespeople and sells 250 to 350 cars per month. Rico is planning to add another 10 to 15 salespeople and quickly move the dealership’s sales to more than 500 cars per month and, with his new consistent and low-cost firehose of leads, he will do it.
Where will Rico find these new salespeople? He has started looking in some nonconventional places. Uber drivers are like small business owners. They must set up their own work schedule to reach their financial goals. They are responsible for their own motivation and must maintain an almost perfect customer satisfaction score, all while keeping a perfect driving record, providing a service and looking and acting professional. Sound familiar? Rico took an Uber ride and was impressed with the driver who had no sales experience and had been a bodyguard in New York City before driving for Uber. After two weeks in training, the first of these new hires has hit the floor running. At the time of writing this article, he had six deliveries in his first week on the floor and was motivated to hit 25 in his first month.
Opportunities to get more leads for less money will always continue to present themselves in this industry, and the people to work them well will always be out there. What we must do to capitalize on this constant chance to grow our businesses and dominate is to be willing to look in the places no one else has considered. Don’t be afraid to try something new and be a trailblazer. Every dog wants to run in the front. Even dogs know that the one in the front of the pack gets the first chance at new prey.
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