How many times do we not offer to perform needed repairs?  How often do we profile clients and decide what they can afford by what they wear or drive? Or is it just the fact that we’ve been refused so many times we’re tired of fighting the price issue! How many of your employees are truly skilled at having money conversations with customers? What percentage of your overall market needs help financially?

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With the aggressive growth of many new lenders offering ingenious methods of Payment Plans, both with and without credit checks, why aren’t we offering multiple solutions to solve money problems for our clients?

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Let’s face it, many of us have this stigma, that you don’t want to feel like the consumer is robbed over a term payment plan that you yourself wouldn’t sign up for. When the truth is more consumers are credit conscious and know exactly what they are doing accepting either the 6 months no interest plan or the many different no credit check plans available. I’m just saying that if you’re not on board with multiple forms of payment plans for your clients maybe you should watch what happens as online retailers and tire manufacturers and even parts stores offer multiple ways to pay. Why are we still offering a payment solution as a last ditch effort to save the sale?

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Make your own decision that’s right for your store but watch as you turn people away and see those same clients with new tires and maintenance performed by someone willing to help them with that!

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I’m from the independent world and always want to be sure my clients are clear on what their future looks like. I tend to shy away from things that make us look expensive or cause undue expenses for our clients. I use certain parts because I know if I use others they are more likely to fail. So we use multiple parts stores and multiple distributors so why not multiple lenders.

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By offering Payment Plans early and often in your conversation you can open doors that otherwise could only be opened by being the cheapest provider. With multiple options on lending, we can now paint a really bright future for the customer which includes a car that is running right and is safe to drive.  Offering multiple payment options is no different than explaining features and benefits. It may not be something you focus on now, but by becoming an expert in the domain of money, you can help many more customers and yourself.

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You can drive all the traffic to the stores on the phone and on foot, but if you don’t communicate effectively and close the sale you just have lots of traffic.

Becoming skilled at offering payment plans is one important thing we can do to increase our sales closing rate with existing customers. Most of us don’t need more phone calls or more prospective customers we just need to do a much better job helping the ones we have. Just caring enough to help our clients with their problem. Many times we think price is the issue and feel we need to give it away or just give up due to exhaustion. It’s not the price it’s the money.

Becoming skilled and competent at offering financial solutions changes the game. By using a multitude of quality lenders you effectively lower your credit card processing expense and increase your average invoice and help the customers. We all know that when clients use special credit terms they spend more.

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So I’ll ask- are YOU limiting your sales because you don’t offer payment solutions effectively? They came to you with a car problem, you gave them a money problem. Dealers need to be the complete CAR GUY. That is, you fix the CAR PROBLEM and you fix THE MONEY PROBLEM… because that’s what competent CAR GUYS & GALS do.

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Jeff Tucker is the owner of Triple T Tire a three store chain in Dyersburg, TN. He’s also the inventor of TAPPS-Pay an innovative software and training program designed to help dealers become experts at having money discussions with their customers.

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Learn more at www.tappspay.com