For used car dealers
Your salesperson is on the lot. The phone is inside.
A buyer ringing about a car on your website is the warmest lead you will get all week, and they are ringing three yards about three cars.
- Price
- $50 a month, no contract.
- Your number
- Stays exactly as it is.
- Setup
- Two minutes. We do it.
- Reply time
- Seconds, not this evening.
01 The moment
Why used car dealers miss calls
Not because you are careless with the phone. Because of where your hands are.
One salesperson, out on the lot, walking a couple around a Prado they have already decided they like. Inside, the phone rings. Answering it means leaving a buyer standing in the sun mid-conversation, so nobody does — and the caller was ringing about the Hilux listed yesterday.
02 What they get
The text that goes out
Within seconds of the call dropping, in your words, with your name on it.
Your business
It’s [BUSINESS] — we’re out on the lot with a customer. Text us which car you’re after and we’ll confirm it’s still available and get straight back to you. Happy to send more photos or hold it for an inspection.
The caller, a minute later
The white Hilux SR5 you listed yesterday — is it still there? Can I come look Saturday morning? Also is there a trade-in on a 2016 Corolla?
That reply is the job written down. You ring back knowing what it is, where it is and whether it is worth stopping for.
03 What changes
What it changes for used car dealers
- 01
You find out which car they mean
A missed number tells you nothing. A reply naming the stock number turns a lost call into a specific buyer for a specific car sitting on your lot.
- 02
"Is it still available" gets answered in minutes
That question opens most enquiries, and it is the one that decides whether they drive out to you or keep scrolling. Answering it fast is most of the job.
- 03
Trade-ins come up early
People mention the car they are getting rid of far more readily in writing than they do in an opening phone call, and it changes the deal before anyone has driven anywhere.
04 Questions
What used car dealers ask
The questions that come up on the phone, answered the way we'd answer them there.
Most of our enquiries come through the listing sites.
Those go into a portal you can watch. The phone calls are the ones with nothing behind them — the buyer saw the number and rang it, and if nobody answered there is no record they existed.
Can it say which cars are still available?
No, and it should not pretend to. It asks which car they mean so your callback opens with a real answer instead of a question.
We have several people on the floor.
Enquiries can go to more than one person, so whoever is free picks it up rather than everything landing on whichever phone happens to be nearest.
What about after hours?
Weekends and evenings are when people browse cars, and they are exactly when the yard is shut. Those calls currently return nothing at all; with a text they return an enquiry waiting on Monday.
See what you’re missing before you pay anything.
The audit counts the calls to your business that went unanswered last month, from your own records. It costs nothing and nothing changes on your line.
05 Read next
Related
- Trade Smash repairers A driver who has just been in an accident rings three shops in the same ten minutes. The first one that answers usually gets the car.
- Trade Car detailers Stopping to answer the phone means stopping the machine, taking the gloves off, and losing the panel you were halfway through.
- Trade Mobile mechanics Your callers are usually stuck. Stuck people ring the next number within about a minute.
- Explainer How missed-call text-back works The mechanism, plainly, including what it does not do.