Creating an Appointment Culture – Part 16

Creating an Appointment Culture – Part 16

TRANSCRIPT: The third step in having a perfect appointment is something called Pre-Appointment Preparation. Remember, managers need to be deeply involved in all four of these appointment processes otherwise you will not have a Perfect Appointment, and you will not close them at eighty percent. Part of the Pre-Appointment Preparation is making sure that the vehicle is cleaned, has gas, and is parked in a designated area. You also want to make sure that this happens thirty to forty minutes prior to the appointment time. The reason for that is that the prospect can arrive at any time. They generally don’t arrive more than thirty minutes before their appointment time, but the worst thing that can happen is for the prospect to pull up while you are pushing the jumper cable and battery box over to go jump the car. See, we understand that the reason the car doesn’t start is that it has been sitting in the same spot for four months and no one has test driven it, but the prospect now thinks that the car is just unreliable. You want to make sure that you never do this in front of the prospect. You want to make sure that the vehicle is cleaned and ready to go. You should treat every appointment like a delivery. You would never deliver a car that is dirty with no gas that does not run, and you want to do the same with an appointment.

I also recommend that you have special VIP parking. Hopefully you can put up some signs that say, “VIP Parking – Reserved for (Insert prospect’s name)”. You should put their name in dry erase markers. When you confirm that appointment with the prospect, you can tell her that there will be VIP Parking with a sign that has her name on it. There are lots of reasons you can give the prospect for this special parking. First, you can tell her that no salesman will attack her when she shows up in that space because everyone will know she is there for a VIP appointment. Second, you can tell her that you will know where the car is so that someone can go to appraise it quickly. This way she will understand the reasons it will benefit her. Another reason you want her to park there is that you will know she is there. If someone shows up and parks in a spot specified for a particular person, it is probably that person.

Another important piece is that you want to have the deal jacket ready. Why should you do this? You are going to close this deal at eighty percent, right? This means that four out of five appointments that show are going to buy from you. You should go ahead and get the deal jacket ready, but do something a little different with this deal jacket. Even if it is a phony deal jacket, you should put the prospect’s name on it with VIP circled in Sharpie writing. You also want the keys with the deal jacket. The reason you want the keys with the jacket and the jacket started, and by the way, you want this all at the sales desk, is because in the VIP treatment you are going to do a management TO early in the process before the test drive. You are going to do this because it breaks down a ton of barriers.

Now, managers and sales reps should memorize as many details as possible about the appointment. The reason for this is that you cannot do the VIP treatment in store if you are fumbling around or going back to the Road to the Sale with this prospect. If you use the traditional meet and greet and Road to the Sale questions, it will throw you off. This will lead you closer to a twenty percent closing percentage instead of the eighty percent closing from the Perfect Appointment.