Key findings
- The first sale can lead to further service work, the purchase of the next car and a trade-in. When the customer doesn't come back, the dealership loses these deals.
- In the model example, better customer care brings 100 more customers to the workshop. After paying for parts, labour on the jobs and the annual cost of contacting customers, the dealership is left with an extra €12,000.
- A blanket discount of €40 on every visit would leave the result €20,000 worse than before. It would also go to people who would have come at the normal price.
- Omnetic CRM stores previous communication, purchases, service visits and agreed tasks. The salesperson can then get in touch with an offer that matches what the customer needs.
- Returning customers are valuable for a used car dealer without a workshop too. Ten more sales earning €1,000 each after direct costs bring in €10,000 before the cost of contacting customers.
The dealership pays for advertising, the salesperson spends several hours with the prospect and the deal finally goes through. But after the car is handed over, the business goes quiet. The customer has the car serviced elsewhere and buys the next one from a competitor. Their departure need not be down to poor work or high prices. Often, nobody simply got in touch at the moment the business had something to offer. We show how much this silence after the first sale costs, why a blanket discount won't solve customer retention and what works instead.
A customer doesn't have to be dissatisfied to go elsewhere
Mrs Novotná bought a family estate from our model dealership. The salesperson helped her choose, the car suits her and she remembers the purchase fondly. She had her first service with the same business. For the next round of maintenance, however, she went to a different workshop, which offered her an appointment that fitted into her working week and told her the price in advance.
The original dealership is unaware of any problem. Mrs Novotná didn't complain, didn't ask for a discount and didn't tell anyone she was leaving. Her name remained in the database, but she now spends her money on servicing elsewhere.
Two years later, the family has grown and Mrs Novotná is looking for a bigger car. The salesperson has a suitable car on the forecourt but knows nothing of her plans – they haven't spoken since the estate was handed over. By the time the salesperson learns about her new purchase, it is too late: she has bought elsewhere and left the estate there as a trade-in.
The dealership has lost the service work, the next sale and the chance to buy back a car it sold itself. Yet the monthly sales report contains no line saying “Novotná won't be coming back”. The business sees the jobs it has won, but not those it has quietly lost with former customers.
Omnetic helps break this silence after the first sale. In Omnetic CRM, each customer's record keeps an overview of purchases, service visits and notes from conversations. This allows the salesperson or service advisor to pick up on previous arrangements and offer another service at the moment the customer needs it.
The first deal gives the dealership an advantage that competitors don't yet have. It knows the customer's car, their requirements and previous repairs, and the customer knows who they are dealing with. Further service work or another sale can build on this experience without the business having to start from scratch with a complete stranger.
A hundred more customers can bring in €12,000 a year
Our dealership has 1,000 existing customers to whom it can offer servicing in the coming year. Without any special effort, 300 of them would come back. But the business starts sending timely reminders, follows up on postponed repairs and offers appointments that suit them. In the end, 400 people come to the workshop. The difference is 100 customers who would otherwise have spent their money elsewhere.
Each of these hundred comes twice a year. After paying for parts, the mechanic's labour and other job costs, each visit leaves an average of €80. This money pays for further customer care and the business's shared overheads; the rest is profit. Two hundred extra visits therefore bring in €16,000 a year.
The workshop has free slots for additional work, so the business doesn't have to turn other customers away or pay overtime because of the new jobs. It sends out offers and arranges appointments so as to fill the weeks when it is quieter.
Contacting customers and the follow-up care cost €4,000 a year on top of existing spending: €1,600 for preparing and sending offers and €2,400 for staff time spent phoning, handling replies and managing the system. This is the budget for this particular customer care, not the price of an Omnetic licence.
| What changes over a year | Result |
|---|---|
| Additional returning customers | 100 |
| Their additional service visits | 200 |
| Amount from jobs after direct costs | €16,000 |
| Contacting customers and follow-up care | −€4,000 |
| Annual benefit for the dealership | €12,000 |
The dealership's annual result improves by €12,000. The cost of customer care would already be covered if just 25 more people came back: with two visits each, they would bring in exactly €4,000 after direct costs.
More customers, but €20,000 lower earnings
Offering a discount is easy. The customer sees the benefit immediately, and staff have a simple reason to call. But a blanket discount also lowers the price of servicing for people who would have come at the original price. The business can therefore win more jobs and still earn less.
In our dealership, 400 customers come in after better outreach, each twice a year – 800 visits. If the business gives a €40 discount on each of them, it gives away €32,000 in discounts.
Two hundred extra visits bring in €16,000 after direct costs, before discounts. But the blanket price cut swallows this amount and also eats into earnings on visits that would have happened anyway. After paying €4,000 for customer care, the result is €20,000 worse than before.
| The same 100 additional customers | Without a blanket discount | With a €40 discount on every visit |
|---|---|---|
| Additional jobs after direct costs, before discounts | €16,000 | €16,000 |
| Discounts on all 800 visits | €0 | −€32,000 |
| Contacting customers and follow-up care | −€4,000 | −€4,000 |
| Change compared with the original annual result | +€12,000 | −€20,000 |
Omnetic makes it possible to divide customers into groups based on the available data and tailor the offer to them. The business therefore doesn't have to send everyone the same discount message. It can follow up on a specific need the customer mentioned and win the job at the normal price.
Better arrangements can be a reason to come back
For one customer, it is enough for the workshop to remind them of a repair they postponed at their last visit. Another will appreciate being able to drop the car off at the workshop in the morning and pick it up on the way home from work.
For the business, these are different offers, even though both can end in the same service job. Knowing about the previous conversation helps distinguish what to offer whom. The call can then start with something specific: “Last time you postponed replacing the brake pads until the autumn. We now have a free slot on Thursday, and we'll tell you the price in advance.”
In Omnetic, the service advisor can read in the customer's record what they postponed during their last job in Workshop, what they asked about and when a colleague agreed with them on the next contact. Someone else can take over the scheduled call, and the customer doesn't have to introduce themselves again or explain the whole problem.
Care like this also makes workshop planning calmer. Some customers book in advance for weeks when the workshop is quieter. The dealership makes better use of its mechanics' time, and the customer has more appointments to choose from. There are fewer reasons to look for another workshop just because they couldn't agree on a time with their own.
Sales and service know different things about the same customer
The service advisor may be the first to hear that the family needs a bigger car. When handing over the keys, the customer says they may not want to pay for another repair and would rather change the car. For a salesperson, that is more valuable information than the car's age alone.
If this remark stays only in a conversation at the service desk, no offer comes of it. In Omnetic, colleagues in sales can find it too, along with an overview of the car and its workshop visits. The salesperson can then contact the customer with an offer that matches what they are currently dealing with.
If Mrs Novotná had mentioned at her next service visit that the family needed a bigger car, the salesperson would have found out in time thanks to the note in the CRM. They could have offered a suitable SUV and valued her estate as a trade-in at the same time. She wouldn't have had to deal with selling the old car, finding a new one and further servicing separately. The dealership would have handled the whole changeover for her – including buying back the car it had itself sold and serviced.
It also works the other way round. When buying, a new owner mentions that work makes it hard to find time for servicing. If colleagues know this, they can propose an appointment that takes it into account when making the next offer. Connected data in Omnetic thus shows up in something ordinary but important to the customer: the business remembers what they told it.
The next car can earn money for a used car dealer without a workshop too
An independent used car dealer doesn't earn from regular maintenance, but it can sell the customer their next car and buy their current one. During the first deal, it already learns a lot about the customer's budget, requirements and how they use the car. If this information stays in the CRM, the dealer can pick up on it even several years later.
In the second example, a used car dealer has 200 customers with whom it can follow up on an earlier conversation about changing their car. Without further effort, 20 of them would buy from it again in the period in question. Thanks to timely offers of suitable cars, 30 do. After paying for the car, preparation and other direct costs, each sale leaves €1,000. Ten extra deals therefore bring in €10,000, from which the business still has to pay for contacting customers.
The trade-in is another advantage. The dealer acquires a car from an owner it has already done business with. And if it also knows the car's service history, it can more easily set the buying-in price. Offering the next car thus also opens the way to buying a car it can sell again.
What's more, the salesperson can offer a car to someone whose requirements they know as soon as it arrives in stock. They don't have to wait for the customer to stumble across it among hundreds of listings. For example, when a well-kept small car with an automatic gearbox comes in, they can get in touch with people who mentioned they were looking for a second family car. The first sale thus leaves the business with more than just a contact: it knows who its next car might interest.
The customer benefits from simple arrangements with a single business. The dealer, in turn, can earn on another deal without first having to persuade a complete stranger to pay it any attention at all. Omnetic helps keep track of who is looking for what and when it makes sense to get in touch.
The next offer shouldn't depend on one salesperson's memory
On a busy day, priority goes to whoever is standing in the showroom or calling. The salesperson may not remember, at the right moment, the customer who wanted a bigger car in six months' time. Yet the business may have a suitable car on the forecourt while paying for advertising to find a buyer for it.
Omnetic makes it possible to schedule the next contact, assign it to a specific colleague and keep the previous communication with it. The salesperson knows why they should get in touch and what the customer expects. Omnetic BRAIN™ can prepare a draft message from the available data and help them pick up on the previous conversation. The salesperson's experience is then put to use in choosing the car and explaining the offer.
The customer receives fewer random messages and more offers related to their car or plans. One time it is an agreed repair, another time a suitable car that has just arrived. The dealership thus has a chance to win more service work or sell another car before the customer starts looking for someone else.
Omnetic connects sales and service around a single customer
Customers drift away quietly mainly where sales and service each keep their own records. In Omnetic, both work with one shared record of the vehicle, customer, orders and money in DMS Core, so a note from the service desk is immediately available to the salesperson too.
- Omnetic CRM manages each customer's sales opportunities, each with an owner and a deadline, and schedules next steps. It keeps no separate copy of the data; it works directly with the customer and vehicle record.
- Workshop manages the service job from the quote through vehicle reception, parts and scheduling to invoicing. It is suitable for both authorised and independent workshops.
- Omnetic BRAIN™ prepares a draft message from the available customer and vehicle data. It acts only within the permissions and approvals set by the dealership.
Book an Omnetic demo and find out how both sales and service can make better use of the customer relationships you already have.
Related articles
- How many deals does a used car dealer lose through slow responses to leads?
- Study: How much can a used car dealer save by automating admin?
- Vehicle handover to the customer: from preparation to follow-up contact
FAQ
How can you bring customers back to the workshop without a blanket discount?
A reason to come back can be a reminder of a postponed repair, a price known in advance or an appointment that suits the customer. Omnetic CRM stores previous arrangements, so the workshop can offer specific help instead of the same discount for everyone.
How much can returning customers bring a dealership?
In our example, 100 additional customers make 200 visits. After direct costs, the jobs leave €16,000. Contacting customers and follow-up care cost €4,000, so the dealership's annual result improves by €12,000.
Why can a discount worsen the result even with more jobs?
If everyone gets it, the business also discounts visits that would have taken place at the original price. In our example, a blanket €40 discount on every visit costs €32,000 a year, and the earnings from new jobs don't cover it.
What does Omnetic offer a used car dealer without its own workshop?
It helps salespeople follow up on a previous purchase and requirements for the next car. When a suitable car comes in, they can contact the customer and also offer a trade-in. In our second example, ten extra sales bring in €10,000 before the cost of contacting customers.
How do sales and service pass important information to each other?
In Omnetic CRM, they find the customer's communication, purchases, service visits and notes. The salesperson may learn, for example, that the owner is considering changing their car. The workshop, in turn, knows what appointments or terms colleagues have agreed with the customer.
How does Omnetic BRAIN™ help with the next offer?
From the available information about the customer and the car, it can prepare a draft message and help pick up on an earlier conversation. The salesperson can then more easily put together an offer that matches the customer's known requirements and spend more time on the deal itself.