My inside guy tells me that website traffic for powersports/marine/RV dealers is down about 35% from its pandemic peak. Aligns with the dealer data that I have access to. Where are those customers going? Back to work, back to the bars and restaurants, or just out of money now that a lot of the pandemic benefits have expired and reality is starting to set in.
The one thing I know for sure is that most dealers are not ready for a slowdown. When it comes to process and procedure, the pandemic has set most dealers back by 5-10 years. Customers aren’t getting logged in the CRM. Lead follow up times exceeding a week or more (if the staff even follow up). Service backlogs of 10 weeks or more. Google reviews in the toilet. Expenses and payroll completely out of control. Employee standards not being enforced. I’ll stop as LinkedIn limits how many of these items I can list.
Most of those skills were hard won over many years of extreme focus, yet they were the first to go out the window. John Spader often says that “Good habits are made during bad times, and bad habits during good times.”
It’s taken 5 months to develop a lot of bad habits. How many years will it take to break them? What’s your plan?
#Powersports #Marine #RV #BadHabits #Trouble