17 Issue 1, 2023 and prospects, and maintain a historical profile of these interactions to help grow relationships. This software costs $2,000 per month. • Equity Mining software helps a dealer use customer information from a CRM and evaluate the revenue potential of a customer, considering trade-ins, future potential services, and more. This tool costs $2,000 per month. • Vehicle Inventory Management is software that holds the details for each vehicle on the lot, including owner history, the going market value, photos, and more. This software averages $1,700 per month. Amounts vary by category, but all tools contribute to this significant monthly cost. Knowing the value of each tool will allow you to evaluate your needs and consider how you might reduce costs. How to Evaluate Your Software Integrations Take stock of the software vendors you use. Gather your contracts, invoices, and any other information. The tools are likely integrated with your DMS. Here are some suggestions on how to evaluate them: • Take Note of Redundant Services: As tools evolve and update, the features between some of them can become similar. After several enhancements, the CRM you originally purchased to manage communications with your contacts may now be able to manage your website. This may no longer be necessary if you are also paying for a website maintenance tool. Do not immediately cut out every duplicative resource. Make sure any tool you decide to remove from your stack can be sufficiently replaced. Consider how much longer you have on individual product contracts. It may be financially beneficial to wait before ending your relationship with one or more of them. • Tie The Value of Each Vendor to Historical Revenue: Some software in your dealership may play a significant role in the success of your business, and others may have less of an impact. If you find some tools fall into the latter category, you may want to consider eliminating them. Beyond expense control at your dealership, consider why a particular tool is not benefiting your business. Is it not doing its intended job, or has your business changed in ways that make the tool no longer a good fit? This is a great opportunity to involve your staff by discussing their usage of the software and how well they like it. Hit your target market Get more exposure • Increase revenue To advertise in this magazine, contact us today. 801.676.9722 | 855.747.4003 thenewslinkgroup.org sales@thenewslinkgroup.com If the general purpose of the software is valuable, but the current product does not provide a good experience for your staff, consider replacing the software with another vendor rather than removing it altogether. Replacing a key tool that the staff does not value with a better one could increase your revenue. • Consider How Efficiently the Software Works Together: Dealership software should be integrated in a way that can share data efficiently. Data typically flows through the DMS, so consider this during your evaluation. If your tools are not communicating with each other, that means some of your staff may need to log into different interfaces and move data manually. It could also mean you are not getting the complete picture of what is happening in your dealership. Your staff may spend more time dealing with the tools and less time bringing in revenue. Putting a focus on the integration of your software with your DMS can increase the efficiency of your dealership and offset costs. • Reduce Your Software Costs but Not the Value: Now that you have evaluated your software stack, chosen what software can be removed, and have a better picture of how your tools tie to overall revenue, it is time to take action. Talk to selected software vendors about finishing but not renewing contracts. Make sure your chosen tools integrate
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy ODQxMjUw