In an increasingly competitive and struggling automotive sector, Cox Automotive, an automotive services organisation, is bucking trends and driving customer retention and meaningful sales by arming its salespeople to sell across the whole business.
Cox Automotive offers everything from an auction service to vehicle delivery and inventory finance, recognised the need for its salespeople to talk about the business as one comprehensive solution provider. This helps to differentiate it from its competitors and to get more out of its current customers. To do this, Cox Automotive’s sales teams needed the right marketing content to address all its customers’ different challenges. It enlisted Showpad to harness the power of sales enablement to help curate content, improve training and create and close cross-selling opportunities, ultimately increasing sales.
Gavin Laubscher, sales enablement manager at Cox Automotive said: “Showpad gives our people all the content they need in one place. Not only that, but it’s also easy to navigate and the feedback from both our salespeople and our customers has been excellent.”
Previously, salespeople at Cox Automotive existed in silos. This not only made them look disorganised but it also meant vital cross-sell opportunities may have been missed. Now, every salesperson is a universal company expert – all content, information and notes on previous customer interactions are available to every salesperson. Cox Automotive can operate more effectively as a team, creating a simplified buyer experience and more opportunities to sell multiple services.
“Showpad helped us not step on each other’s toes. We’re now working in tandem and there is more synergy, which is really important in showing our customers what our competition can’t: that we give them the complete package,” said Laubscher. “Showpad makes our customers aware of everything we offer. It’s so easy for our people to raise opportunities.”
In addition to a better buyer experience, Cox Automotive has effectively improved internal training and overall engagement with customers. With Showpad, visual maps were created for training purposes to demonstrate which pieces of content would work for each customer’s individual needs, regardless of which segment of the business they were buying from. Salespeople are now able to understand their responsibilities and offer a proof of concept.
The use of reporting analytics has also improved visibility into content efficacy, granting better insights into what customers want, helping to improve sales presentations and support better-informed customer conversations. Customers don’t leave and are now retained longer than before, ultimately resulting in more sales.
“As a salesperson, the map is all about preparation — If I’m seeing an independent dealer, it gives me critical details like the size of the business so I can talk with confidence about the common problems companies their size struggle with, and how we can fix them. That makes the prospect lead the conversation and the salesperson provide the knowledge. Showpad helps us keep them engaged. That is where we show value,” commented Laubscher.
Jim Preston, VP EMEA Sales at Showpad added: “With continued uncertainty in 2021, retaining customers and making the most of the customer base you already have will be an increasingly important means to drive sales and growth. Through aligning its sales teams, providing all the required content and insights, Cox Automotive has been able to better maximise on what it has at its fingertips.”
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