After-hours customer service is one of the most effective strategies to make your car dealership tremendously successful and beat the competition.
Statistics show that 79% expect a fast response when customers contact a business without jumping multiple hoops.
Indeed, consumers truly value a business that delivers excellent service. So, as a dealership, you can’t afford to lose your existing customers or prospects to poor customer service that only operates within the set hours.
The good news is that you can have cost-effective after-hours customer service without hiring additional personnel.
Sounds too good to be true? Continue reading this article to discover the benefits of after-hours service to your dealership and why you should adopt it immediately.
Customer Relationship Management Tools
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems are not some buzzword but a must-have data management platform for modern dealerships.
Automotive CRM software allows auto dealers to collect, process, and organize all relevant data about customers and prospects. Including visits, purchases, preferred vehicles, and subscriptions.
In addition, having a CRM helps to better target potential car buyers through the perfect synthesis of their data hub via multiple digital touchpoints.
What Is After-Hours Customer Service?
In a nutshell, after-hours service or support refers to customer service outside the usual business hours. After-hour service allows businesses to provide support 24 hours a day and seven days a week, ensuring business continuity and fast resolution of customer queries.
Three Benefits of After-Hour Service for Your Car Dealership
1. Obtain More Leads Faster and Increase Revenue
Operating and only attending to customers during your dealership’s set working hours means limiting yourself in terms of the deals you can strike with prospective car buyers and the revenue you can generate.
Offering flexible, consistent after-hours service allows you to provide brilliant 24/7 support to your customers and capture leads that you might have missed otherwise.
Think about it. If your competitor provides helpful, ‘always-on’ customer assistance and you don’t, which dealership will a potential vehicle buyer choose?
2. Boost Customer Satisfaction & Dealership’s Reputation
Customer satisfaction in the car dealership industry should be one of the most important metrics to pay attention to. Having consistently high customer satisfaction scores boosts your dealership’s reputation and increases your chances of getting repeat clients.
According to one report, outstanding customer service is essential for 78% of consumers to remain loyal and continue purchasing from the same company. So, by providing after-hours support, you can increase customer satisfaction and turn customers into advocates of your car business.
3. Automate Your Support in a Cost-Effective Way
You probably think that after-hours customer service is expensive, that you might need to hire additional staff members or pay your existing team a night rate. In reality, you can invest in customer service automation tools that do everything for you.
By using AI automation to cover your after-service support needs, you can give more control to your customers. For example, they can find answers they’re looking for while performing specific actions, such as arranging a test drive without needing to call a customer service agent and hang on the line for hours.
All in All
Your car dealership’s customers don’t want to wait long hours to get resolutions to their questions or issues. They’re prepared to switch to your competitor if you can’t meet and exceed their expectations for customer support.
DealerAI is the only fully automated customer service solution for automotive dealerships that will win new customers like no other tool can.
Our conversational AI chatbot delivers instant helpful responses to customer queries. Besides for help capture leads, DealerAI enables dealerships to provide accurate vehicle inventory data, answer car-related inquiries, book appointments and test drives, and much more.
Get your hands on DealerAI—a fully automated conversational AI chatbot for car dealerships!
See How DealerAI Can Boost Sales and Revenue for Your Dealership