Latest / Auto Collabs / Hello From The Other Side with Brian Kramer

Transcript

Hello From The Other Side with Brian Kramer · Auto Collabs

• 0:00
  As far as I know, there is only one person in the automotive industry [upbeat music] This is Auto Collabs... that has a fake Google listing where his house is as a Seinfeld reference. Really?
• 0:18
  Yeah. Should we all at the same time name who we think it is? [laughs] Yeah, go ahead. Who do you think it is? One, two, three. Brian- Brian... Kramer. [laughs] I knew the answer to this.
• 0:29
  [laughs] [laughs] I knew the answer. I did, too, but I was trying to be goofy, like- So you tried to see what Michael- So, uh, yeah... was gonna say. Did you know the answer to that? Or were you just messing?
• 0:36
  Well, I knew who we were doing the episode on, so yes. Well, how did you know I was gonna be talking about that? I did, I didn't. I just- It could've just been a left field thing. Well...
• 0:44
  [laughs] Well, on episode zero- Yeah... since we don't start with the number one in the United States, uh, um, we talked about how we were so inside of each other's brains that we finish each other's- Sandwich...
• 0:56
  sandwiches. Sandwiches. Right? [laughs] Yeah, I see, see you haven't seen the movie in long enough. Man. You don't know how many times- These kids are too old... I've seen that movie. My kids have been in the play.
• 1:04
  They've sang the songs. I know it. [laughs] You were a tree in the background, understudy? No. That gets you arrested when it's kids' plays, [laughs] Michael.
• 1:13
  But who we're talking about today, speaking of getting arrested. [laughs] [laughs] I don't know where we're going with that segment. I don't know if he's ever been arrested.
• 1:20
  But Brian [laughs] Kramer, that was the weirdest intro ever. But Brian Kramer is someone who loves a good laugh, right? He's probably laughing along with this right now. Without a doubt.
• 1:29
  But with, without a doubt also, he is one of the sharpest people, like I know, period. Not in the automotive industry, it's every year. Whenever he starts talking, I s- think to myself, "I hope I can keep up." Yeah.
• 1:42
  I, uh... And here's the thing, it's unassuming as all get out, right? Because- Because he thinks every- makes sense to everybody the way he says it. Well, and it's so matter of fact.
• 1:50
  Like, well, if you, if you read the Carvana report on their latest quarterly earnings call- [laughs]... and you're like, skrrrt, right? [laughs] That just ended and you already wrote 20,000 words on it. Yes, exactly.
• 2:00
  Uh, yeah, I think he's, he's unassuming about it, but he's dialed in on his thought processes. And he is, he's someone that really understands how to marry tech to people really, really well. Yeah.
• 2:13
  Understanding how they dynamically work with each other. You know, when we, when we got the first recording of him, uh, doing the Metaverse signing- Mm... he was not too proud to say like, "People aren't ready for this.
• 2:27
  Even us, we struggled. And yes, it's maybe on the horizon, but it's way far out over the horizon. And the, maybe the tech isn't ready, the 5G isn't there." Even the customer, right, recognized that it wasn't right.
• 2:40
  So- Right. He didn't pretend this is gonna fix everything. Exactly. Exactly. But he's not afraid to get his hands dirty and try something, right? Like, I, I...
• 2:48
  When I had him on my show, we talked a lot about that, and I really think the term for him is pioneer. Mm-hmm. I like that.
• 2:53
  He, he is a pioneer, 'cause he's willing to go where [laughs] no one else has gone before- [laughs]... really.
• 2:59
  To your point, like, first a paperless transaction for his stores, and, and he talks about the ups and downs of trying to figure that out. Now the Metaverse, doing the first car transaction in the Metaverse.
• 3:09
  And, and, uh, when I tried to book him on my show the last time, he's like, "Why don't we do it in the Metaverse?" [laughs] I was like, "Oh." Like, I haven't even- He's not afraid. Yeah.
• 3:17
  Where I think most people are like, "That sounds expensive." Yeah, well, you know what?
• 3:21
  If you're playing the long game and you're looking, to your point, uh, to the, to the tip of the horizon, that's the name of the game.
• 3:27
  And so for me, he's a real pioneer because he can see that horizon and he's, he's constantly thinking about, to your point, how to connect the consumer experience to the tech.
• 3:38
  Well, and I think, you know, what a lot of people when they see that, they just think, "Oh, that's so over the horizon. That's not for me. That's..."
• 3:45
  And I think we just have to be r- realize that there are people in business that will always go before. And that's okay, right? Mm-hmm.
• 3:53
  That, that you don't have to just be Brian Kramer and go before, and do the newest- Right... and greatest, and that type of thing.
• 3:59
  But being aware that he's doing that, pushing the boundaries and, and seeking to understand it w- alongside of him. And knowing that he wants you to be there with him- Yeah...
• 4:07
  is important for every business operator all the way down to someone that's just entered a business. Yeah. Absolutely.
• 4:13
  You know, aside from that horizon of the Metaverse and, you know, thinking of where we might be going and, you know, putting some feelers out and seeing, he was one of the best operators, especially on the used car side of the business.
• 4:26
  Yep. Uh, which is why, if you didn't know, he recently made a transition from being a general manager of a dealership to being the EVP at cars.com and the GM of Accu-Trade.
• 4:35
  So we hope you enjoy this interview with Brian Kramer. [upbeat music] So I'm reading a DiSC profile that was sent to me from Brian Kramer.
• 4:53
  It says, "Most likely you'll want to have the freedom to set your own course." Ladies and gentlemen, we're hanging out with [laughs] if you didn't know, Brian Kramer.
• 5:04
  And there's not, uh, there's not a more aptly positioned line in a DiSC profile of which w- we just found out that, uh, that Brian Kramer is a DI. He's not a high D, he's a DI. So we can, we can talk about that.
• 5:18
  But Brian, thanks for joining us here on Auto Collabs. Thanks for, uh, having me. All right. So- I, this is gonna be a good crew. Yeah.
• 5:25
  Well, look, every time on a, every time I'm on a Zoom call with Brian Kramer, I'm reminded of how handsome I'm not. [laughs] This is what I really wanna know.
• 5:34
  Well, I'm the, I'm by far the oldest person on this whole call. Which is even more discouraging to me.
• 5:39
  [laughs] This might be the first time, this might be the first time I've seen him with a real backdrop, unless it's a green screen. [laughs] Is that real? Move your head quickly like this. That's the real thing.
• 5:46
  Go, go, go. You're not in the Metaverse. [laughs] Oh, man, it's real. Wow. Impressive. He's come from the Metaverse into the real world. The real world. So we're going back in.
• 5:55
  So in the corporate world, do you get your hair cut once a week? Is that a thing now? Is that like you've gotta be trimmed up and ready to go with the, uh, with the angle?
• 6:02
  [laughs] Well, so I'm getting my hair cut tomorrow. But it's actually, um-I've got a few different weird things Shareholder requirement. Okay. It is. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 6:11
  With a certain, you know, no, uh, sideburns and all the standard issue. [laughs] But the day that... Actually, the, yeah, I think the la- the second to last day I was working at Germain.
• 6:22
  I was going, going over to, uh, get my hair cut, running late, 'cause I was going out of town or something. I ended up buying my daughter's car in the barber chair, now that you bring it up.
• 6:31
  [laughs] And, it was, did it completely digitally. My, the, my barber's sitting there, he goes, "What are you doing?" I said, "What's it look like I'm doing? I'm buying a car." He goes, "On your phone?"
• 6:37
  "What are you doing?" I go, "Where have you been living, bro, under a rock? How do you buy your cars?" [laughs] I go, "I didn't know that was even a thing."
• 6:42
  He's like, "I work at a th- a dealership- And he's like, "Well, first of all- "... and I'm buying it on my phone." [laughs] I don't know I'm giving sass to the dude with scissors near my head.
• 6:50
  [laughs] Well, he, he's only using, uh, the t- uh, the what do you call it? The clippers? The clippers, yeah. The clippers. Okay, okay. Fair enough, fair, fair.
• 6:58
  [laughs] Actually, I was on the call with Spizak one time talking about the metaverse, and he goes, "What?" He goes, "Brian, can I ask you a question?" I go, "Yeah, yeah. What's up, Spiz?" I'll put you on speaker.
• 7:05
  And I keep on using it, you know. And he said, "In the background, are you getting your hair cut?" "I am." [laughs] He goes, "I thought so." [laughs] He wasn't phased by it. He was just trying to, like, connect the dots.
• 7:16
  He just wanted to make sure. He wanted, he wanted to, to lean in and make sure.
• 7:20
  Well, so if you don't know, Brian- But that weekend, having weekends off, I almost don't know what to do with my life, to answer your question. So if you don't know, Brian Cramer has recently left Dealership World.
• 7:29
  [laughs] This is what we're talking about.
• 7:31
  He was at, uh, Germain Toyota, uh, of Naples, and before that spent some time with AutoNation and has been in Dealership World for years and years, probably, what, 30-plus years at this point, right? Close. Wow.
• 7:42
  Close to it. Yeah, almost 30 years. Wow. And has transitioned, uh, to the EVP and general manager of, I hope I got that right, of AccuTrade at Cars.com.
• 7:52
  Uh, and, and so is, uh, enjoying weekends, uh, to himself, and going to Kentucky Derbies and things like that, that you do, uh, when you're an EVP at Cars.com. No, they do a ton more. So, uh, Brian- [laughs]...
• 8:03
  we kind of wanted to hear a little bit about, I know, I know across the interwebs a lot of people know a little bit of your story, but what, uh, what, what was the, what's the move s- been like since moving out of the dealership into, uh, this vendor world?
• 8:20
  Well, I got a taste, I guess, like you did, Paul, probably when, when you sold your business and you stopped working. And I sat there and thought to myself, I go... [laughs] Right?
• 8:30
  But, what, the week before you started another business? No. And- I just had a rolling start from one into the other. [laughs] So, so I'm sitting there, I'm like, "What am I gonna do now?"
• 8:40
  Like, on Saturday I'm pacing around my courtyard. I'm, like, trying to, "Who can I call?" And everybody's like, "Dude, what are you calling me for? I'm working." Yeah. And I'm like- Ugh...
• 8:48
  "What do you do on the weekends?" And my wife goes, "Yeah, I don't know what you're doing. You gotta get out of here." Right? She's like- "Whatever you're doing, you can't-"...
• 8:52
  "I didn't sign up for you to be home, that's for sure." [laughs] Right. So then she said, "You gotta get an office." So I had to get an office space for- [laughs]... she goes, "This is just too disruptive.
• 9:02
  You're distracting everybody." It's your Saturday office. [laughs] I go, "I'm not even..." [laughs] So, trying to figure that out. Oh.
• 9:09
  And then I'm like, man, the, the, you know, waking up in the morning, I gotta be there for the meeting, but no, I don't. I'm like... But then you, you miss...
• 9:14
  It's like going to church when you're a, when you're a dealer, right? And that's, like, one of the... Luckily, I got to attend Ben Stock Saturday- Saturday morning meeting. Right... right. So it's like everybody gets...
• 9:23
  And I, and that, that's probably what I miss the most is that camaraderie or whatever, or, or that kind of stuff.
• 9:28
  But the Saturday morning meetings, so I just go and try to hijack other people's Saturday morning meetings now- Yes... and attend theirs.
• 9:35
  [laughs] Which is li- it's like, kind of like babysitting somebody else's kids, you know? All right. An- answer this for me... you get something back at the end of the day. So what is...
• 9:41
  You, you like, we all like to think we understand the other side, right? And we try to empathize. We're like, "Oh, I know," right? And you make demands of other people on the other side and you have expectations.
• 9:52
  What is the biggest surprise about being on the other side that you realize now that you as a dealer did not understand? [clears throat] I don't know that I didn't understand it. I would say I more just didn't care.
• 10:06
  But now I feel it on the other side of when, uh, I get on a call with, with somebody who scheduled a call- Careful. Careful... "Who, who are you? And what are, and why are you calling me? I'm selling cars.
• 10:20
  I'm doing this." And I'm like, "That was, I was on the other end of this call tens of thousands of times," whatever. "Bro, I'll call you back when I can call you back. I don't..."
• 10:28
  You know, the, you know, I've got a, you know, on this side, a schedule that's really rigorous, a lot more structured than anything I've ever done.
• 10:36
  So there's, everything's planned out to the minute, and that doesn't work, right? So I never sat there and looked at it from that lens.
• 10:43
  Man, these guys, I, I've just figured they were like, you know, some of us on a slow day. They're just sitting around, "Who am I gonna call? You know who I'm gonna call? I'm gonna call Germain Toyota."
• 10:52
  [laughs] "And just let's, let's see what they're doing." You know, like, [laughs] like some save a deal training or something. [laughs] And, and, you know, but it's not like that, you know?
• 11:02
  [laughs] And then on the other end, I'm like, y- you know, "It's the last day of the month. Do you even know anything about the car business? It's the last day of the month." [laughs] And e- everybody's like, you know...
• 11:10
  And, 'cause most people outside of retail don't know that, that...
• 11:14
  You know, even my extended family didn't know that for the longest time, and I would get really offended when they would ask me if I'm coming over, you know, for around the holidays. I'd be like, "H- are you kidding me?
• 11:21
  It's December to November." [laughs] What... You, you... That's half my income. [laughs] Why would I come over to your house- Right... to, to do all these promos? For eggnog. [laughs] Are you...
• 11:32
  I'm go- I'm going door- ding to dong, bell to bell, baby. This is the, this is the time. Think I'm gonna sit there? I'll come see you in January and we can open up some gifts and eat pie.
• 11:39
  And they all, they get off the phone and they look at each other and they just shake their head. Right. God, yes. I told, I told my wife, Stephanie. Yes, God, yes. I said, uh... She goes, "Yeah."
• 11:46
  She goes, "That's probably why everybody thought you were, like, a, a prick for so long. Yeah, that's what they, that... You're looking at it the right way, Brian." [laughs] And I'm like, "Wow."
• 11:55
  [laughs] I'd never do it any other way, 'cause it's, since I was 16, 17 years old, I'm working, you know, washing cars and stuff.
• 11:59
  So I've never really experienced anything else besides automotive retail and the, uh, rawness of it, right? And then looked at it li- you know, like, I call it like a civilian, I guess- Yeah... is what I am now.
• 12:12
  So, you know, the civilian life, weekends off-Isn't that an interesting way to talk? Civilian life, right? I think that's what we're gonna title this episode, Civilian Life- Civilian... Brian Cramer.
• 12:22
  [laughs] But let me ask you this. Brian, let me ask you this. I mean, we were on, uh, it was one of our other podcasts.
• 12:28
  I think, Kyle, you brought this up, where you were like, um, you know, vendors need to stop with the, the kinda word tracks of like, "Oh, dealers just need to do this."
• 12:40
  Now that you've experienced n- both sides, now that you're on the other side, this is like, this i- this is like, [scoffs] I feel like we're interviewing Anakin as he's about to become- [laughs]... Darth.
• 12:54
  But you still got a grace period. I, I still have a few- You know? I got a, a few months of Street Fred left. Right. It's all- So- I'm telling you, look- Strangely enough-... I did this last year...
• 13:02
  that perishes really quickly. [laughs] You got about thr- three months- Okay... and 23 days, and when you get to the 24th day, it rolls over. You're now a ve- You're done, right? Yeah. It's done.
• 13:11
  That might've worked back then, but that doesn't work [laughs] here now. [laughs] So let me ask you this. As, as a vendor now, how, how does your, how do you think the narrative needs to shift?
• 13:21
  What kinda conversations should we be having? What, what's your approach gonna look like to dealer? I- is it any different? Is it, is it... I, I mean, i- is it more collaborative? Is it...
• 13:32
  Like, how, how do you approach that? That's a heavy question. So- I know... [clears throat] It's like, "Have you risen?" Always good with you. "My name is Michael Scott." So- Yes. "I'm known in 70 countries."
• 13:44
  He's like, "Do you hear my microphone how it's starting to mumble?" Like, rip your chest open. Here's your, here's your heart. I'm gonna show it to you.
• 13:49
  [laughs] Um, so I think that everybody on both sides needs to get a lot more... I was actually just talking to Peter Cooper about this earlier.
• 13:57
  Um, needs to get more sincere, genuine, and authentic across the board, not trying to, as I call it, uh, pitch slapping people, and just, "Oh, hey, by the way, I got this other widget, and I got this other thing I wanna sell you" when you haven't- [laughs]...
• 14:08
  resolved the fuel economy- Maybe that's the title... that was just on the table. [laughs] I'm just thinking the exact same thing. Stop pitch slapping and- Pitch slapping. [laughs] And just, right?
• 14:21
  And, "Oh, here's another pitch." But you haven't fixed my other issue. You haven't- Right... fixed, you know, I thought you were gonna get the, the website fixed. Well, no.
• 14:28
  I'm here, I've got this other product I haven't told you about yet and we need to, you know, talk about that. So not that everybody's doing that. That's an extreme example, whatever. But no more pitch slapping.
• 14:38
  And then, which we were just talking about earlier, really being sincere about, you know, even though dealers might want more leads, I wanted more leads.
• 14:48
  More leads, no differently than a doctor over-prescribing medication to somebody- Mm... there's a responsibility that we have to not over-prescribe leads and not over-prescribe all this other stuff- Wow...
• 14:59
  and say, "Here, you want more? Here, I'll give you some more." Right? And they're OD'ing and they're fishing out and on leads. Wow. Right? I need more. Man, that is smart. How do I get it up year over year? Right?
• 15:09
  And now instead of that, how about we figure out what's the best use of your people's time? Is 68 email-only leads with no cell phone number... And trust me, I've been the guy- [laughs]...
• 15:19
  standing back in the Savey Deal meeting, "I don't care. You get on that phone." [laughs] "Don't get weak on me. Don't get weak." Yeah. "If, if you can't handle it, ha- you know, hand it over here.
• 15:28
  Just take this, email 'em and say, 'I got this number for your trade. What's the best number to text it to you for?'" "Okay." Right? And now everybody's just sitting back there like.
• 15:36
  I'm like, "Dude, you only got 28 more. Come on, let's go. Come on." Then we gotta make the calls, you know? And- Just Glen Gary-... then also they're like- Glen Ross is going through my head.
• 15:44
  [laughs] And they're like, "No more, no- "To weak. You are weak"... no more email leads. I don't, I don't wanna, I don't wanna be in the internet department anymore. I don't wanna..." You, what?
• 15:52
  You think it's just that easy? [laughs] You can just leave? You can't just leave. It's like the, yeah, it's like the mafia. You- "You sit back down"... you're, you'll be...
• 16:00
  This is gonna be looked at on a, you'll be, you know, you'll be dead to the family if you do this. Don't give up on us. Um, just because you give up on yourself, I'm not giving up on you. Pick up the damn phone.
• 16:08
  And- [laughs]... and, and over- "I got a crowbar in my trunk"... and over- "... with your name on it" So instead of trying to sell everybody on why those leads, you know, the, "Hey, it's 2%", but guess what?
• 16:19
  It's still some extra deals you wouldn't have had. It's incremental business.
• 16:22
  It's a, it's a waste of time, is what it is, for your people that they can't be contacting somebody else that they do have the contact information on. So it all gets diluted and then- And it emotionally burns them out.
• 16:32
  Yes. Lead fatigue. Yeah. Right? Here's the problem, though. I mean, but, like, here's the thing. Right. How do... W- we're talking about a huge culture shift here.
• 16:39
  This is like when you get married, and on your honeymoon, uh, you and your spouse are, are making breakfast together and you realize, "Why, why does she flip her eggs that way?" [laughs] "That's the weirdest thing ever."
• 16:52
  Like, every, yeah, everything was so- "I married a weird egg flipper"... so far was so sexy. "I married a weird egg flipper. They've been fl- she's been flipping her eggs like this for..." That sounds weird.
• 17:00
  All this talk about pee and eggs and all this kind- Right. How, how do we... 'Cause it's, it's one thing for three bearded dudes and a clean-cut guy with hair to be like, "Yeah, well, you know,
• 17:14
  we just gotta, just gotta- But you know what? The truth is-... make better use of our time"... the truth- What does that look like? The truth crushes and all that other stuff- Right...
• 17:20
  that's kinda what's happening after, you know, everybody... My mentor used to tell me, he goes, "Brian, just remember this. Everybody on an interview, it's like, it's very much like your honeymoon.
• 17:28
  Everybody looks sexy on a honeymoon. But then when you, after the honeymoon, you know, three days later, you're like, 'Okay, we gotta live together.
• 17:35
  Now you move my stuff, and now this, and whoa, why are you taking up that much of the sink?'" And- [laughs]... all these things that go with it. All right, but back, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, back to the leads.
• 17:41
  I- And you gotta take care of the leads the same way. I know, but back to the leads. Okay, so listen, it's employee fatigue, lead fatigue. We get into this place where maybe we look at a lead source.
• 17:50
  I don't care if it's cars.com or Gurus or Autotrader or Facebook or your website or anything like that. If there's lead fatigue, you know they're not getting cared for.
• 17:58
  So what happens is you start to see it go from 8% to 6% to 4% net delivery ratio, and then what happens is, is you go get canceled as, as a, as an, as a vendor, right? Because the BDC can't handle it.
• 18:11
  Well, it's not that, it's not that it w- that there's not good people on the other side of it. It's that there's lead fatigue because of the, the volume of stuff that's not working.
• 18:19
  Here's what's crazy, is I think, you know, Paul and I have been talking about this, that we're really trying to solve for the customer experience.
• 18:24
  And, uh, you know, one of the things that I did, uh, a while back, and I'm just gonna give you this.
• 18:29
  I'm gonna just, like, toss this in your hand now that you're a cars.com employee and I've told everyone there, is I went and I saw, I, I wanted to figure out how many leads I could submit on cars.com, Autotrader, and CarGurus in one minute.
• 18:42
  In one minuteEvery single site, I could submit 13 leads in one minute. So you better believe that customers are doing that, which means now they're getting...
• 18:52
  Let's see, if all 13 dealerships are doing it close to correct, they're getting somewhere in the neighborhood of 39 communications in the next hour. Autoresponders. Pff. Right? Email, text, call, call. There it is.
• 19:08
  So, I, I mean- But then you also lose-... and what you're talking about is- They lose their hope... a sorry customer experience, right?
• 19:12
  And you're treating customers that are buyers like ones that might just be some nameless, faceless entity.
• 19:18
  I'll tell you another thing that was, uh, I just remembered, that was earth-shatter- So I'm sitting there giving this presentation to, um, the cars.com team at our, at the leadership conference, which was amazing.
• 19:28
  Um, but as we're sitting there going up, I'm watching them, like, "Wow, I didn't realize they do all this, and all this SEO and SEM." And I'm like, "Wow, this stuff's so far over my head."
• 19:36
  Um, you know, these people are literally brilliant. I'm, I'm, I was the least educated person in that room, period. Uh, that's, it's not, that's not an opinion, it's just a fact.
• 19:45
  And as I'm looking around, they call on me, I'm like, how am I gonna follow all these, uh, the, the stuff they're talking, all these acronyms? I don't even really know half the stuff they're talking about.
• 19:53
  And I get up there and I said, "Here's all I can really..." When I went completely off track and off script. And I said, "I, I don't know- No... if you realize this or not, but you,
• 20:03
  you have, you're driving, you're doing... I didn't know you were doing all this to, to drive all that traffic and to optimize all these things.
• 20:09
  Do you know what happens when you send, you do all that work and you optimize everything, and then that email-only lead comes in in a group of other, you know, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck leads.
• 20:21
  And there could be somebody who really does wanna buy something, but it's just, you know, and, but al- also on the, on different parts of the website, we make it optional. You don't have to do this.
• 20:27
  Don't have to do that, because obviously that's gonna affect lead count, right?" So I said, "When they see that, you know what they do?
• 20:33
  Everybody just debates all the different reasons why that person's not gonna buy a car." [laughs] Because it wasn't vetted. Mm.
• 20:38
  Now, conversely, when you tighten up the radius and you do all the things you were just talking about, Kyle, now all of a sudden they're like, "Ooh, these leads, these close, close at 20%."
• 20:47
  They believe it's a, it's a deal. They're just no differently than pre-qualifying customers. You're pre-qualifying leads. It's the same epidemic that we used to have at the curb, but now it's just happening online.
• 20:58
  So- Wow... to a- to answer your question, like that's the, one of the things. And it needs to change as an industry. And they, 'cause they said, "But hold on a second. If people see the lead count go down..." I agree.
• 21:08
  But this, that's why nobody's done it yet, right? 'Cause that's why with digital retail, when I drove over the printers with my, with the FJ Cruiser and crushed them.
• 21:15
  [laughs] With the, you know, like in the office space or whatever. Did you really do that? He actually did. Oh, yeah. I have a video of it. It's amazing. [laughs] Yeah. That's amazing.
• 21:24
  And then, then texted it to the finance team and said, "Hey, by the way, uh, we're going paperless." If you're looking for your printers. [laughs] Yeah. You better go digital, because they, they're not there.
• 21:33
  I traded, I traded Peña. [laughs] Right? He's not playing first base. [laughs] So, but that's what has to happen with this. And it's gonna hurt for a minute, 'cause it always does, right? With any type of transformation.
• 21:45
  But this is a r- uh, a self-correction, I think, that, that's long overdue. And, and on both sides, right?
• 21:52
  The, the dealers also have to, when, when they, we get them a, a lead of we'll buy your car, we can't, like I've...
• 21:57
  You know, 90% of the people that I mystery shop, it comes back and they're trying to sell me a car- Yeah... when I didn't ask to buy one. But that's the way the CRM process works. Mm-hmm.
• 22:05
  And it's all mapped out, and there's no we'll buy your car workflow. So they keep on just pitch slapping me, right? Say, "Hey, wouldn't you be interested in replacing it with something?" "Not really." "Uh-oh." Right?
• 22:15
  And we, and they're not gonna equip the, the sales people to, or BDC to be able to handle that objection. So now it just goes off the rails. You know, that was, you know, stroke. They're not real. It's not a real buyer.
• 22:24
  Probably couldn't even get them approved. Mm. Market lost, or market bad, right? It wouldn't, didn't have all the r- the app- applicable data and all that stuff.
• 22:31
  And then all of a sudden, somebody puts the heat from the dealership, "Hey, why aren't we selling enough cars?" I can tell you why we're not. Look at that right there. It's 6% closing ratio.
• 22:39
  And if anybody, here's my gift to everybody on this call. If anybody wants to know when somebody's gonna cancel a vendor, here's when they're gonna cancel it: when it affects their pay plan.
• 22:49
  So if you know what the pers- the internet sales manager's pay plan's based on, 12%, 14, whatever it is, when your ra- when your closing ratio gets below that, that's a, eh, w- early warning radar to pump the brakes and be proactive, which is what we're gonna do, and we, we're doing already.
• 23:04
  But going out there and saying, "Hey, by the way, this is, you know, I'm noticing your close ratio was going down. Should we tighten up this? Should we change this?" Th- you know, the, what we do, right? Wow.
• 23:15
  I- I just went off the rails on that question. No. No. I'm, I'm infuriated. We're trying to keep up. [laughs] I'm enraged by this conversation. [laughs] You know what you got me thinking, Brian?
• 23:26
  You got me thinking about i- if I could loop this all together. Um, Kyle, Paul having conversations about mapping to the customer experience.
• 23:34
  You just said something to me that makes me want to punch the air like that dude who came out with Tae Bo. You remember that guy? [laughs] Billy Blanks. Billy Blanks. Billy Blanks. Exactly.
• 23:43
  I'm just, I wanna slap somebody. Do we remember him? It's so good. You said the CRM process is mapped to this, like, push them to a sale thing, right? Largely has come from just getting a ton of customer feedback.
• 24:01
  So we look at this, like, compounding ripple effect over the years. That if we're only... So vendors in, y- you know, listening in, if we're only... Okay.
• 24:11
  [laughs] I don't even know how to phrase what I'm, what I'm saying here. Oh, he's couch- I'm- He's stumbling over his words... folks, I'm- He's so frustrated... I'm enraged. [laughs] I'm enraged. He's insane with anger.
• 24:19
  I, I have, like, a- Let's call it passion. Mm. We'll call it passion... curb your enthusiasm rage. [laughs] Um, if you only listen to your customer, but your customer is approaching from a biased position,
• 24:33
  you might end up developing a product that leads the whole industry astray. Ooh, that's a- Oh... keen observation. And cut tape. [laughs] Which is kind of where we're at. Which is kind of where we're at.
• 24:45
  We'll pick up on this at ASOTU CON. [laughs] Right, right. Like, like we could- We could... well, this, this to me is why we-...
• 24:51
  wanna have these types of conversations on AutoCollab, why I think this is so powerful, is because somebody, somebody's gotta start talking about that. Yeah.
• 24:59
  Um, b- because we need to realize it, it's neither them or us, or us or them against one another. We both created the situation that we're in. We need to start looking at it from a different angle.
• 25:11
  Like, I, I feel like in my business, I need to look at certain activities, to your point, Brian. I need to say, "These activities map to opening doors." That's the KPI. How many doors did that open?
• 25:22
  There are activities that are walk through the door, and then there are activities that say, take money that's on the other side of the door.
• 25:29
  But we've attributed everything to take the money, not realizing that we're skewing our own perspective of how to pursue the business.
• 25:39
  And we made a decision at Cars.com similar to, like, JM Family Southeast Toyota, similar to Auto/Moto State of the Union, to be for the dealer. Right. Which then you've gotta make some decisions, right?
• 25:51
  When it comes down to some tough decisions. Okay, we got some j- no different than in a dealership or any other business, right?
• 25:57
  "Well, yeah, we could generate this much more revenue if we did this," but is it the best thing for the dealer, right? Mm-hmm. Is this going, is this true to our core values? Mm-hmm. Are we, are we arming the rebels?
• 26:07
  And then the decision is clear. And I will say that about Cars.com. It's not even a question, right? When you say that, uh, it, it's clear what the vision is, and it's clear what they're all aligned to.
• 26:16
  And maybe people's minds might go there, but when you, when you go there, they're like, it's, it's clear that they know that that's, you know, out of bounds, whatever, and then everybody comes back on track and then moves forward.
• 26:26
  And I will say, they, they execute and they... You know, I, I'm experiencing it. Work a lot harder than I thought. [laughs] Because it's a- Oh, that's a good deal. [laughs] It's a, it's a lot faster pace.
• 26:38
  But I mean, I'll tell you, there's a lot of people there that are working in, in the same direction to really transform this industry. I mean, Vetter has, has put this north star out there of really,
• 26:48
  uh, empowering dealers for all the disruption that's happening, to be like a safe haven, to be able to sit there and just be arming them, uh, with a, with as many tools as possible to hang with any disruptor that comes into the space- Yeah...
• 27:02
  and make it easier and simpler so that the, they don't have to do an insane amount of work to do it. But with the sourcing, and all of the, all of the things at scale that have always been just a thorn in my side, right?
• 27:12
  To, if somebody gets on the Accutrade website and they wanna know what their car is worth, uh, but they got on the VDP versus the main page, the hero page, is it sourced that way in your CRM?
• 27:23
  Are you able to segment it to be able to dissect it that... And do, does m- do the 80% of the dealers in Middle America have the resources to be able to deep dive that the way that you guys do? Probably not.
• 27:35
  So the more that we can simplify that so that people can translate the reporting and simplify the reporting in a common language, if you will, so that everybody's saying the same things instead of, and being, like I was for a long time, being embarrassed to, to say I didn't fully understand Google Analytics.
• 27:52
  So I just was like, "Psht, I don't need that." You know? Right. "I'm not worried about that." And I don't understand it. "N- there's just, buy more, buy more TV. I don't-" We can fix that. [laughs] Right.
• 27:59
  We can fix that. Well- Love it... Brian, we can't be more excited to do this in person at ASOTU CON [laughs] in September. [laughs] We're gonna try not to get in too much trouble.
• 28:10
  Uh, we appreciate the heart behind Cars.com and Alex's position to be a dealer advocate. Bringing you on board was just... I mean, when we, when we heard, it was like, "Oh, that makes a whole lot of sense."
• 28:20
  And frankly- You're on fire. Yep. Really, really, really excited- And the colors are all-... to see where this goes... the same, uh, logo. That's why we have the purple Uh, integration.
• 28:27
  [laughs] It's exactly why we have the purple. [laughs] Oh, thank you so much for spending a few minutes with us here on AutoCollab.
• 28:34
  We can't wait to see you in Philly and, uh, can't wait to see what trouble you make next.
• 28:40
  [upbeat music] You know, it really did remind me of what happens when someone comes out of combat and they go home and, you know, they don't know... They, they have to calibrate for a minute.
• 28:52
  And like hearing Brian in that, in that mode was, was in my mind l- like a real clear indicator that we should never, ever assume what it's like to be on the other side, whether it's dealer or industry partner, because the pace and the intentionality, um, is so different.
• 29:09
  And even though a lot of us, a lot of us in this audience, in this ASOTU audience, probably think we know, right?
• 29:18
  But it's probably been a, a while since we've been on the other side, even if we lived the life on the both sides.
• 29:23
  So for me, it was just a very stark reminder talking to Brian, like, so f- so, like, soon after this transition, that empathy takes a lot of work.
• 29:32
  And the more of it we can have on the dealer industry partner side, like, the better off we're gonna be.
• 29:37
  Yeah, you know, I, I was struck by his kind of like, well, what, w- what are you seeing around the, the Cars.com world? And it was, it was really cool to hear him like, "Man, these people, these people put in the work.
• 29:51
  These people go hard at making sure that the customer and dealer experience is matching, and they are asking questions of the way the website works, and they're digging into SEO, and they're digging into all this type of stuff."
• 30:04
  And he was just, uh, what was really cool was he was like, "Man, they're putting in all this work," but then, like, the, the very tip of the spear is where there's a, there's a miscalibration, right?
• 30:16
  And he talked about how the, the, the quantity of leads has led the conversation over the quality of those interactions that, and that that tip of the spear, if that can get shifted for Cars.com and for the dealers, whether it be the way that you interact with those or the way the customer interacts with the experience, is that...
• 30:35
  And, and I think that's the tip of the spear that we're all talking about, which is how do, how do we actually get to not just like, "We need more leads," or, "We need more of this," or, "Change this process," or, "Flip out this technology."
• 30:45
  It's like the tip of the spear is the customer experience, and if we're, and if we do a disservice at that level, then, then we've, then we've misserved the whole other part of the spectrum.
• 30:55
  It doesn't matter how much SEO, how much marketing, how much process, how much technology, how much people.
• 31:00
  If we misjudge the tip of the spear, then, then we miss everythingIt reminds me of a conversation I was having with one of our, our client partners in Canada. He's, not only is he a dealer, this is Aaron Lang.
• 31:14
  Shout out to, to Aaron. Phenomenal, phenomenal individual. He's also a farmer. [laughs] Y- And he brought me out to his farm. Like, active farmer.
• 31:23
  There have been times where I text him and he's like, "Oh, I'm, I'm in the tractor right now." Like a real farm. I love it. Not like I have a rabbit- Like a real farm... and two chickens. Live- No, no, no, no, no.
• 31:32
  Livestock. In fact, he's got another company kind of like a, not a HelloFresh, but, like, I don't wanna say Omaha Steaks either.
• 31:39
  That's probably an insult, but, like, you can order, like, butcher boxes and stuff from his company.
• 31:43
  But, but when he brought me out to the farm, what I thought was so interesting, and I promise I'll tie this back somehow. [laughs] Um, he was speaking to me about the important elements of the ecosystem.
• 31:55
  He's like, "We don't use certain pesticides and whatnot because there's a ripple effect that if we do that, then w- the soil eventually gets, uh, like, torched or burned up and, and it's no good.
• 32:06
  It doesn't produce the same fruit."
• 32:09
  Kyle, in talking about your tip of the, the, the spear here, I think so often we've w- we've gone through years and years and years of oversimplification of both sides of the fence that we talk about in this episode with Brian.
• 32:21
  Mm-hmm. That now it's like, "Oh, just, uh, run better marketing. Ooh, oh, no, you want better leads? Don't run that or don't do that." And it's like, no. That's like explaining,
• 32:32
  that's like, that's like saying, "You know what? Just get rid of clouds." You don't understand the impact of clouds on your day-to-day life until they disappear and never come back.
• 32:44
  Or you don't understand the ripple effect of, like, y- you know, oversimplifying something as, like, routine as pesticides on the, on the f- you know, soil until the crop doesn't grow the same way.
• 32:57
  And, and for us in the industry, in our pursuit to, like, find attribution and understand how things are working, we've, we've gotten to the point where we're like, "Oh, that's easy.
• 33:06
  You want, you want higher quality leads? Just don't do that anymore."
• 33:10
  Ah, but m- And now all of a sudden we're seeing Brian from a very different vantage point who's getting his fingers in the soil from a different, on a, on a different field. And he's like, "Oh, okay."
• 33:22
  And I think that vantage point really speaks to this whole, um, you know, the importance of this AutoCollabs collaboration. I think it was really very, very insightful. Well, thanks so much for hanging out with us.
• 33:33
  That was our conversation with Brian Cramer. We appreciate you for listening to this episode of AutoCollabs. For myself, Kyle Mountsier, Paul Jay Daly, and Michael Cirillo, we will see you next time.
• 33:44
  Sign up for our free and fun-to-read daily email for a free shot of relevant news in automotive, retail, media, and pop culture. You can get it now at asotu.com. That's A-S-O-T-U.com.
• 33:57
  If you love this podcast, please leave us a review and share it with a friend. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you next time.
• 34:06
  [upbeat music] Welcome to AutoCollabs. Welcome to AutoCollabs. [laughs] Why are we recording? Are we rolling yet? Not yet.