Drive the Auto Market with New Concepts
Distributors steer the automotive market with high-speed ideas and nontraditional solutions.
It may be a pie-in-the-sky vision, but it is one that Dick Ipsen, president of Portland, Oregon-based DiversiForm believes is attainable. The idea of selling e-form solutions to auto dealerships in order to allow financial contracts, motor vehicle information and dealership invoices to be quickly and easily processed, signed and routed online to their appropriate destinations is, according to Ipsen, indicative of the future of business forms. With the click of a button, he explained, these types of documents could go exactly where they need to with minimal paperwork and in minimal time.
"We can foresee offering a routing solution that allows documents to be sent from dealerships to banks and the department of motor vehicle in an instant," said Ipsen. "For us the first step in doing so has meant becoming more Internet friendly by making a back-end change in the computer system."
For car dealers, the electronic concept would resolve the hurry-up-and-wait reputation that comes with the purchase of a car. As Ipsen explained, DiversiForm would provide the e-form software along with a signature pad for electronic customer signatures. As each document comes up on the computer screen, the buyer signs and the dealer clicks "OK." The main contract is e-mailed to the customer's home, the financial contract is routed to the bank and both are sent to the department of motor vehicles. One hard copy will be provided to the customer to keep in the glove box or file, he added.
"There are all kinds of ways to help clients reach their customers, as long as distributors are willing to go beyond traditional forms," he said.
In the meantime, DiversiForm has excelled by helping its clients connect in other ways. For instance, through its Trax-branded series of products, DiversiForm has been able to keep track of clients' customer satisfaction ratings. With its phone trax service, data is pulled from dealers' computer systems and transferred to DiversiForm's call center.
"We have people call to see if customers enjoyed their buying experience," said Ipsen. "The person responsible for the sale receives an e-mail—or hot alert— immediately following the call so that he or she is aware of the response."
Another idea for offering better service to the auto market is to turn an ordinary product into an extraordinary one. DiversiForm did just that with its basic hangtag—the jumbo-numbered tag that hangs from the rear view mirror of a car being serviced.
"We added another level of value to that hangtag after asking our clients what they were doing with them," said Ipsen. "After learning that information, we realized we could build the product into a survey card that allows us to track and trend the nuances."
Known as Scantrax CSI, the survey hangtag includes questions regarding the customer's experience at the repair shop that they can respond to by filling in bubbles. Ipsen added that while 90 percent of customers are satisfied, there is always that last 10 percent that is not happy with some aspect of what a client is doing. The hang tag, he said, is able to provide that client with helpful information.
Ipsen explained that customer relationship services like this are what distinguishes DiversiForm from major directs, like Reynolds & Reynolds, Kettering, Ohio, which is considered a giant in the automotive market.
Steve Stone, president, Western Business Forms, San Jose, Calif., agreed. Describing Reynolds & Reynolds as a company that tends to have a strong hold on the auto market, Stone said, "From my understanding Reynolds & Reynolds and other directs have lost some of the auto market share because a lot of independent distributors are breaking in to it."
Receiving most of its automotive business through referrals, Western Business Forms provides end-users in the industry with invoice and repair forms for third-party software, in addition to other products such as parking lot and vehicle identification labels.
Since Stone has realized that automotive opportunities are so versatile, he conceded that if he had the manpower he would focus more on developing prospects in that area. For those that do have the manpower, or are able to devote marketing strictly to this market, Stone suggested acquiring a database of all automotive establishments, or other auto-related areas to be cultivated, and then either conduct a mailing or telemarketing campaign or pay a personal visit in order to ascertain what interests exist.
Offering a few ideas, Stone said auto dealerships need everything from paper floor mats to the tags on rear view mirrors that are assigned with order numbers, to tags on keys that give order numbers.
"The situations for which one can sell automotive products seem endless," said Stone. "For instance, we sold to an airport parking facility that needed ID labels to be placed on each vehicle's mirror for identification purposes."
Ipsen concurred with the idea that the automotive industry is in its prime stating that his company's focus is to sell a few products to a lot of car dealers.
"We can go into every state and find a customer," he said. "The idea is that companies like us need to move in ways that are mutually beneficial and profitable with our clients."
By Sharon R. Cole
- Companies:
- DiversiForm Software Compatible Checks
- People:
- Dick Ipsen
- Reynolds Reynolds
- Places:
- Portland, Oregon