PUT TOGETHER A PLAN

A maintenance plan is important. Make a list of all your dealership customers and prioritize them by which ones need maintenance first.

Don’t just place the weaker relationships at the top of the list, however. In many cases, it makes sense to tackle some minor maintenance with your stronger clients first before attacking the heavier lifts required by some of your weaker partnerships.

Once you have them prioritized, then decide how you want to maintain them. Is there a need to find out how things are going overall, or is the first step to address specific parts of your business partnership that needs attention?

Then, as your plan comes together, create a timetable for each step and customer in order to stay focused and not get sidetracked. Adopt a realistic timeframe with hours built in to do some “on-the-spot repairs” if the relationship calls for it.

PERFORM CHECKUPS WHEN THINGS ARE GOOD

Whether it’s a doctor’s visit or a piece of equipment, checkups can reveal a lot. So, how do you do a “checkup” with a dealership that’s a good customer?

It’s important to be personally involved, which means an in-person visit—even if you already have a rep or manager taking care of their everyday needs.

Before you go, look at the data. Are sales up or down? Are orders up or down? Have they stopped doing preloads or are those steady?

Once you’re sitting down in their office, ask them questions like:

• “How are we doing as a company servicing your needs?”

• “Have we let you or your customers down in any way?”

• “Is there anything you’d like to see us do differently?”

Simple questions, yes, but they can quickly reveal the status and health of your relationship. Be ready for the truth. Hopefully, they’ll tell you that everything is good and even give an example or two of how your company has helped them out or done the right thing recently.

REPAIRS ARE PART OF MAINTENANCE

If you examine a piece of equipment and it shows signs of a worn part, what do you do? You fix or replace it.

The good thing about ongoing relationship maintenance checks is that now you can repair things on your timetable instead of after the equipment has already failed.

So, again, what does the data show? If sales are down, orders are coming in slowly or there’s a lack of preloads, then maybe something needs “fixed” upon inspection.

As before, you’ll want to visit the client in person and ask the same questions. But, make sure you get complete, truthful answers. Some customers will simply say everything is “fine”—which, to me, is the worst possible answer, because I then wonder if it’s really the truth.

During these conversations, explain that it’s much more helpful if they mention any issues and explain what’s happening. Your job is to simply listen, apologize if necessary and then let them know what you can do to try to improve or make things better.

Sometimes the solutions require you to dig a little deeper. You may have to talk to other employees at the dealership about the situation or come back at another time and start the conversation over again to see if you can get a different answer.

Once you form a hypothesis on what the real answer might be, put on the “full-court press” to get it resolved. Be involved as much as possible with any orders that come in, making visits and following up on any concerns or issues, as needed.

These steps will slowly repair the relationship and get it back to being solid and healthy.

ONGOING PROCESS

The good thing about a consistent maintenance program is that you maximize the relationship and are in a good position to get things back on track when issues arise and repairs are needed.

The downside, of course, is that maintenance never ends. It will always be a part of the business relationship-building process—however, it will take less time, energy and stress overall than losing the relationship completely and needing to start over from scratch.