How To Effectively Use Intelligent Automation Powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI) In Your Service Department
Well-timed, non-intrusive communication with customers is essential for fueling the overall success of your service department. It is imperative to keep your service department at the forefront of customers’ minds from the day they purchase a new or used vehicle from your dealership. Consider these statistics from the Cox Automotive 2018 Service Industry Study:- 41% of car buyers were introduced to the service department at the time of purchase and 53% of these customers cited the introduction as a determining factor in where they took their car for purchase.
- Customers who were shown the service department were 1.5 times more likely to return to the dealership for service in the first 12 months after purchase.
Real Intelligent Automation
The entire purpose of automation is to communicate with customers at the right time, in the right way, while eliminating the need for employees to handle repetitive tasks. However, far too many solutions place a demand on users, requiring them to upload spreadsheets or manually enter information. The makers of TEXT2DRIVE wanted to provide dealers with a better way. As a result, they designed the communications platform with intelligent automation powered by artificial intelligence (AI) - allowing it to execute the majority of tasks on its own - saving your service staff time that is better spent getting repair orders (RO) approved and completing repairs.DMS And BDC Integrations
The TEXT2DRIVE software pulls information from your DMS and other integrated systems to automatically send 17 text messages that are deployed throughout each customer’s lifecycle and powered by AI. You can choose the messages you’d like sent from your dealership.- Sales Follow-Up
- Service Introduction
- First Service Notice
- Appointment Calendar Invitation
- Appointment Reminder
- Welcome Message
- Status Update
- Ready For Pickup*
- Online Bill Pay*
- Thank You Message
- CSI Message
- Declined Service Reminder
- Vehicle Service Reminder
- Safety Recall Message*
- Happy Birthday Message
- Vehicle Anniversary Message
- Lease Expiration Notice
Of these automated messages, safety recall alerts work a bit differently. Since not every customer will have a safety recall on their vehicle, only those who do are targeted. TEXT2DRIVE does most of the work for you, scanning all of the customers in your dealership database and cross-referencing them with open recalls. At this point, the platform sends you a detailed report of all open recalls and the types of recalls that are available. From there, you can sort them according to recall codes, along with the frequency and the number of sends. Safety recall alerts earned dealerships an average total pay of $282.20 per RO in March of 2019.
You can offer your customers the ability to pay invoices on their mobile devices thanks to the software interface’s integration with the DMS. Speed CheckOut™ mobile bill payment manages the payment cycle, sending customers their invoices via text message and giving them the option to pay online. This option spares both your customers and your dealership long lines. The entire process is completed securely through the e-signature feature. Customers love the ability to pay online. 91.92% who received Speed CheckOut requests completed them in March of 2019.
Streamlined internal communications lay the groundwork for superior customer service. Give your service staff the power to remain in contact throughout the day with the group chat feature. Service advisors can set up and customize new chat rooms and invite any number of employees they choose, from one or two employees to the entire service department.
Customers are more inclined to approve recommended repairs when they trust the service staff making them and when they have a firm understanding of the work that needs to be done. The TEXT2DRIVE video integration makes both of these scenarios a reality, allowing service technicians to send customers videos in which they point out recommended repairs. The videos are effective for eliciting RO completion. They created an average of a $125 increase in RO totals for dealerships who sent them.
Making customers aware of issues going on with their vehicles is half the battle when it comes to getting them in for service. The telematics integration captures diagnostic information and deploys text messages to customers notifying them of potential repair issues. It does not stop there. The message sent to the vehicle’s owner triggers a text message conversation between the service department and the customer.
