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At Powersports Marketing, we have a Book of the Month Club. The entire sales team reads one book per month focusing on sales, business or self-development. Our December book is called Fanatical Prospecting, by Jeb Blount. Jeb says, “Miss even a single day of prospecting and you will pay for it in the near future. Miss a week, and you will destroy a month of sales.” 

Many Powersports Dealers fail to catch Jeb’s point with regards to their marketing because they fail to plan. They end up shooting from the hip and getting sucked into lengthy Radio, TV, Billboard and/or Newspaper contracts that claim to start their business on fire. 

What ends up happening is they fail to prospect for months or even an entire year because 97% of their advertising funds are hitting people who don’t ride, probably never will ride, and even if they fall into $20,000 they’re not all of a sudden going to walk into their dealership and buy a motorcycle. The vast majority of the 3% of riders who exist in their backyard are missing their message due to technology like satellite radio, Bluetooth compatible vehicles that stream internet radio, DVR and the internet.

So they don’t prospect, because they aren’t talking to their buying base. They’re not calling, mailing and emailing consistently to drive qualified traffic and generate an on-going pipeline of leads for each of their departments. Without a solid marketing plan to depend on, they depend on the weather, market and economy. 

Your plan for 2016 must include a consistent, multi-touch marketing program that targets your dealership’s buying base. These are made up of two groups of customers 1) Past sales, service and parts customers and 2) Conquest Customers, those who ride what you sell, live in your backyard, but have never bought from you. 

This should be the first step in planning your 2016 Marketing Calendar and we will help you with a FREE Market Analysis. We’ll determine where the majority of your sales come from in a radius around your dealership, then identify every past customer and conquest customer that own what you sell in that area. If the majority of your sales comes from within 30 miles of your dealership, once we’ve done this, you’ll effectively be marketing to every real opportunity you have to sell a unit in your backyard. With hundreds of existing campaign options and the ability to create custom campaigns, 2016 could be your best year yet.

You’d be amazed by the number of dealers upset about flat or declining numbers for years, but who continue to use the same marketing mix they have every year since the Bears last won the Superbowl. Those same dealers often tell me some of their biggest marketing challenges are 1) Quantifying the effectiveness of their marketing & 2) Getting a better Return On Investment.

You know what the definition of insanity is? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. If you haven’t put your marketing plan in place yet for 2016, ask yourself the following questions: How are my sales year over year? What does my marketing mix look like? Can I quantify my results? And, am I satisfied with those results? If sales are stagnant and the answer to the last two questions are ‘No’ then it’s time to ask, “What changes am I going to make with my 2016 Marketing Plan?” 

Make this year the year you’re finally going to make the change. Join the list of over 700 dealerships who have used the Sharp Shooter Program to reach their Right Target Audience through the Right Media Channels with the Right Message at just the Right Time to grow their business.

Wolverine’s one of those dealers who plan their marketing out well in advance with multiple dealership events each month. For those of you who don’t think you can sell bikes and drive traffic with snow on the ground, check out what George did at Wolverine H-D last January 19th:
“I fed over 780 people one Saturday and had well over 1,000 people through the door. Rolled 6 units and planted a lot of seeds. It was incredible!”

The Sharp Shooter Program drove 1227 people to their custom URL with 1037 completing the survey.  Below is a snapshot of those results, which included 123 responses interested in upgrading their bike.

Those are incredible results for a dealership in any part of the country. However, the results on the day of the event are a happy by-product of following a consistent marketing plan, touching your buying base 52-104 times per year so that you can increase customer retention and carve off market share to grow your business quantifiably.

Four years ago they canceled $250,000 of advertising and started doing one Sharp Shooter per month. 2 years ago, they started doing 2 per month. In 4 years, they’ve grown from 600 units $11 million to 1200+ units, $30 million+ because they’re systematically touching their buying base over 104 times per year, and saving a ton of money in advertising.

For more information on the Sharp Shooter Program or to get started with your FREE Market Analysis to begin planning 2016 call me on my direct line 877-242-4472 ext: 112 or chat us up at www.powersportsmarketing.com. Happy New Year!