For most dealerships, dealer groups, and OEMs, customer experience (CX) is, more than ever, the key differentiating factor in market competition, as well as market retention and customer loyalty. Today’s service customers are won or lost based on their experience communicating with the dealership. Yet service drives today remain overwhelmed with balancing the handling of the phones and attending to the customers in the drive, risking multiple customer experience fail points. With 40% of inbound calls being fresh service leads, dealers can no longer ignore the fact that a third of those calls are lost, dropped, or abandoned. Even when the calls are answered, service advisors are rarely equipped to properly verify/capture multiple contact information, appointments are rarely offered and set to fill shop capacity, and additional services are rarely offered.

More dealers and OEMs today have recognized the need for a new contact point between the dealership’s service department and the customer to improve or enhance satisfaction for both customers as well as service lane staff. Done well, this new point of contact - often referred to as the BDC or Customer Care Department - combines inbound call handling with targeted outbound campaigns to drive service absorption and profitability. The problem is that it’s rarely done well - activity rates are low or unmanaged, BDC agents are untrained and unmotivated, turnover rates are high, and return on investment lacks any real context.