Category: Upcoming Events

Olympian or Spectator?

Posted on | by Tom Hampton Agency

Truth time my friends. This may be one of the most challenging pieces I have ever written. In November of 2019, my health took a turn, and painfully begin to control my every effort for these last 22 months.   

 

Short personal history: At 8 years old I was told I would never walk; With great perseverance and determination, the brace, wheelchair, and crutches were gone by 10 years old! I took 6 years of speech therapy as a child because I stuttered severely; I have since then, spoken freely and effortlessly. I have lived with chronic nerve pain ALL my life and put on mass doses of pain killers as a young adult; I have not taken a prescribed pain pill with any kind of regularity for over 30 years. For the past 14 years, 70 + hour work weeks were the norm and I traveled at a minimum of one week a month. For 7 of those years, I successfully managed my family’s business in conjunction with my own, after my dad passed.  

 

I tell you these pieces of my personal history to show you, my friends, that you are not alone. We are all overcoming personal and business hurdles of all varieties. Please, take care of your health. Drink plenty of water. Stay positive. And embrace challenges head-on with strength and determination! Through it all, with much support from my amazing team, I have been able to keep pursuing my goals to grow my business helping to support dealers in their own growth.  

 

Things are changing, both here at Car Guys Agency and with me personally. Most of you are used to having me pop by your lot, check up on you, and dish out some awesome advice while I am there! (Toot, Toot!! 😉)  

 

Those days my friends can sadly be no more. As much as I dislike it, my decreasing mobility has become the reality of my days. So, in the future, I will be reaching out to you via telephone, email, and text. By the way, as always, my team and I are here in any way we can help support our fellow dealers.  

 

I know how hard you are pushing yourselves, especially in this unstable market, just to keep afloat. We are not out of the woods yet. Markets are predicting there are another 6 to 8 more months of retail-priced units rolling across the auction blocks nationwide. It is unnerving to have a 60-car lot with only 14 units on it. I am also betting we will soon see Floor Plan companies start dropping dealers and smaller dealerships with limited financial resources who just cannot buy. Sooner, rather than later, the public will start pushing back at the higher retail prices and sales may just keep tanking.  

 

The nationwide market is constantly readjusting itself. The dealerships that survive and thrive over the next wave of challenges, yet again- must reinvent themselves and how they do business.  A growing dealership will be operating with new resource partners, rely even more on their communities, and embrace & adapt to changing paradigms.   

 

The large dealerships have 20+ groups of high-paid professionals that use their collective knowledge to market the company. So, with my own advice in mind, we too are adapting and redesigning how we grow as a company. To our loyal readers and longtime customers, we want to personally extend a VIP Invitation to be a part of our newest upcoming project! In June/July of 2021, Tom Hampton Agency will be forming a new group focused on bringing together like-minded dealers motivated to be a part of creating Strategic Growth Plans for the benefit of all.  If you are interested in joining and growing with us, email us here! 

 

Change is uncomfortable and often painful. I remind you; Olympians never won a medal because it was easy. They got it because they pushed, shaped, and molded their potential until the dream met reality. You have got to MOVE and DO to accomplish your goals. Repetition WILL create change in you, your salespeople, and your entire organization.   

 

To best survive this next incoming wave of industry evolution, we must grow; Grow new resources, new alliances, and more courage to jump in and start now. Waiting to see how things may go, could leave you left behind to play catch up. With great new products added to their lineup, Tom Hampton Agency is a great place to start finding those new and inventive (additional income bringing) resources! 

 

Here is to YOUR bright and successful future! Let us face this evolving world together to do and create what others say is impossible!   

  

Create-A-Great-Day,   

Tom Hampton 
832-723-3976  
[email protected]  

Turning Back

Posted on | by Tom Hampton Agency

By Tom Hampton

There are times that one must go past a problem to get at a solution. Recently, I had to get back into a wheelchair to assist with mobility and surgery recovery. Although I am no stranger to them, having spent lots of time in wheelchairs and on crutches during my childhood, I had forgotten the issues of tight quarters maneuvering.

As the family cook, the challenges have been unique both with height issues and retrieving ingredients; The biggest challenge being the fridge. To access it, I must roll past it a bit, then turn around 180 degrees so that I am at the right angle to retrieve what I need.

Challenges in our business really are not much different. There are many times in our day we do just that, roll past a problem, only to turn around and find the solution readily available! To follow-the-logic of rolling past challenges & problems and turning back for solutions; we must see that our emotions are why we get stuck on the wrong side of any given challenge. When we learn to get past the emotional charge surrounding the challenge, then we can move forward in finding available, possibly unseen solutions.

I feel an example is in order:

Monday morning at the office checking voicemails and an upset client has left 6 messages over the weekend – each one getting a bit more heated. The phone begins ringing and caller I.D. shows – guess who? The upset client calling again, loaded for bear and aiming at whoever picks up.

Some owners would let the call go to voice mail again, thus angering an upset client even more. Instead, we know the issue is not personal. Be like water off a duck’s back, and patiently listen to your client and their concerns to find a solution.

I suggest having a pencil and paper to mark relevant points and only address the clients concern(s) once their frustrations have been fully vented. Once past the initial challenge, now it is time to turn back to the challenge and seek solutions. Those notes you took are the key!

First and foremost, people want to feel as if they have been heard, especially after an uncomfortable situation has occurred and they feel mistreated or cheated. Many times, due to charged emotions on both sides, it can be far too easy to misinterpret the facts of the situation. Clarity of your clients concerns and challenges, brings opportunities. Once your client has expressed their concerns, restate what the perceived problem is to verify with the client that YES; You are listening! The restatement of the challenge adds clarity and shows your client their concerns are important. This is not your first time as a business owner solving difficulties with clients, you are an EXPERT at it!

With our emotions out of the way and the client being heard, solutions will quickly follow and is generally a compromise between client and owner. Sometimes there is nothing we can do for our clients concerns due to outside circumstances; however, most challenges do rest within our abilities to solve equitably. It is taking the effort to go past the challenge and turn around – aka – clarity without emotion – to see or access the solutions!

Practice makes perfect my friends…

Create-A-Great-Day,

Tom

To buy or not to buy…

Posted on | by Tom Hampton Agency

April showers bring may flowers, but this year’s February freezes brought us auction squeezes! We are seeing prices are far above normal tax-time hikes, with no signs of tapering off. Playing the usual Price Game is the surest way to the poor house in our current market!

 

How are the new car dealerships holding on to high mileage trades and still getting their money for those units? Trust, transparency, and a supply-and-demand mentality! With less inventory on hand, we know that that means every unit we already have needs to get adjusted for retail. Time to re-appraise all your current inventory and start looking at replacement cost / availability.

Trust and Transparency are a symbiotic relationship. The more transparent you become in all your processes and procedures; the more trust is built along the way. Make sure your website is easy to navigate and all your policies and procedures are outlined in detail. Finance options/information should be easy to understand and access and make darn sure it is all secure!

There has been so much success in providing customers with an online credit application. Financing and an approved loan amount first, vehicle second, then delivery in minutes (not hours!) Knowledge of one’s financial abilities in any type of purchase is empowering and removes a lot of fear from the entire process! For us, it removes having to show them 20 different cars, only to find out 3 hours later, they can’t even afford the porters ’98 hooptie!

Find your technique to symbiotically build Trust and Transparency in today’s marketplace and on your website. Remember my friends. Without us, the independent used car dealer – most Americans would be walking! The better you serve your prospects, the greater your client base becomes.

Create-A-Great-Day

Tom

Masters of Change

Posted on | by Tom Hampton Agency

There is one thing that every century has agreed upon; the one true constant in life is – Change!

Ok, so we are Dealers; we are used to having to think on our feet, and YET – we are the ones to resist “change” the most. Go figure. We are comfortable at “change” in OUR Arena of Expertise.  Some of us are “stallions” at buying units, some at selling them, a few of us are great at customer relations or promotions . . . and the list goes on.

So, where does that Expertise come from?

Practicing whatever skill or action “it” is, and doing “it” a gazillion times until we do not have to even think – we just DO “it”.

So it seems that the “change” we fight most is in the arenas of our life we know little about.

Follow along with me while I explain – If we know little in a certain area of our business and we find a “work around” that gets the job done, we do not “change” it – we depend upon that work-around.

Hey, we are cool with it; the work-around is good and functioning correctly, so we go about doing everything else in our day, right?

Well, what if our “work around” catches a flat or blows a head gasket? (so-to-speak) –if that were to happen to us on any given day; most of us go straight into either panic or piss-off.

Why?

Why is this? – we are busting our butt to keep the dealership making money and moving forward and NOW this situation blows up in our face and the only way that you know how to do it doesn’t work; it just got a flat / blew a gasket (remember).

Now we have to stop our day and try & figure out how to “fix” the situation; so who do we have to call to get the knowledge and then implement it?

Here is an example:

 Jim has a 7-year old business, he turns 20 units a month; the lot holds 38 units and is usually full.

 He has 1 full time salesman, a part time porter, a woman that keeps his books and answers the phones (she is 9am to 3 pm Monday through Friday).

 Jim is the one buying and running the units between shops to get them ready. Jim’s typical day starts online at auctions, then at the shops, then at auctions in the afternoons, then back at the shops, a stop or 5 at the dealership, all while fielding 157 phone calls and making 3-4 thousand decisions (is this the right unit/can I make good gross after Recon/which one to the garage first/which is best for the lot in 3 weeks, small SUV’s or Gas Sippers /  Pick-Ups . . . etc.) You all know the drill.

 In the very middle of this normal chaotic routine, Jim gets a call and is informed that the 6 units he bought last night at auction have to be out of the gate by 5 pm today.

 It seems the auction has a special sale and in order for them to have the space for the special inventory, Jim’s units have to get gone. After all, the auction does have 40 rigs in the parking lot right now waiting to unload and 25 more rigs on the way – or at least that’s what the gal from auction told Jim!

 Now, Jim has used the same 2 transport companies for 3 years now and the have never let him down. NOW neither one can send drivers or pick up the units and here it is 1 pm.

What is Jim going to do? – probably call a buddy and get some phone numbers to other transport companies or maybe he will call the auction and see if they have one or – or – or .

 The point is that Jim has to go WAY out of his comfort zone to “call-in-a-favor” for information or help.  So it is natural that Jim falls into either piss-off or panic. After all that is what you or I would do – right? Guess what PEOPLE – it does not have to be that way! We have to get our head around the concept of CHANGE and become Masters at adapting-on-the-fly!

“The most flexible element in a given situation is the one that controls the situation”

In other words – you learn how to “bend” in the windstorm.

Those dealers that have become really adept at their business and seem to constantly grow – are Masters-Of-Change.  They KNOW change is coming – maybe not which direction it will blow in from and yet they are ready for it.

So how does a person get ready for change?

Stay loose – look for the lesson – make the very best of the situation and MOVE ON!

Sounds so simple – yea right!

It is not simple, it takes scads of practice and a supertanker full of patience and time (something all dealers have extra of – right?).

Gee, that situation really sounds familiar – sounds just like Expertise:

To practice “it”, doing “it” a gazillion times until we do not have to even think – we just DO “it”.

At that point we become experts at “change”.

Just like you learned how to buy cars, just like you learned how to sell cars – you have to take “change” at face value.  When you were learning how to either buy or sell it is not like you did not have your fair share of set-backs and mistakes and just rolled with them.

Do not pass judgment on “change” – it is neither good nor bad.  Change is what it is – inevitable.  So something goes awry in your already hectic day – no need to blow a cog or have a melt down. Handle it the VERY best you can, and then get back to your day. It is when we make judgment calls on ourselves, for how we handled the situation that become so destructive to us and our business. Being a master-of-change takes a lot of work and will constantly put you in areas you do not have solutions for – get used to it.

Expect it!

There is a key to all of this – relax, breathe and THINK. Life will not end on this planet if you “mouse-up”. That is not to say there will not be consequences, (bad or good), for the way you did implement the “change” you had to deal with in that situation.  Get the situation handled & get back in the saddle. Finish your day, and keep your goals in sight while you are doing all this.

There will be a course on Masters-of-Change starting in July (dates and pricing to be posted on our webpage). It will be an online class and be specifically aimed at the skills you need in order to truly Master “Change”.  It is going to be somewhere around a dozen classes and each one will be about 90 minutes (enough time to cover the material and answer some questions).

EXPECT homework!

This material is something that I have been teaching my dealers and entrepreneurs for over 2 decades and IT WORKS (when you remember to use it – you know that practice thing)!

OK I have said my peace and my sales pitch.

You guys get out there and create a great Tax Season for yourselves and remember – “change” is waiting out there just for you.  “Change” is stalking you, hunting you and just waiting to “eat your sack lunch” and there is no way you can stop it. You can however be ready for “change” when it strikes.  You are capable of dealing with “change” after all YOU built your dealership and are already a master-of-change in certain areas of your life – remember that fact and be gentle with yourself especially if the situation you were “changing” goes sideways.

The sun will rise tomorrow and “change” is in the air!  Make the best of it – and I look forward to working with you in class!

Tom Hampton

 

 

 

Off to a Great Start

Posted on | by Tom Hampton Agency

Linares Auto Center_Jan2014Class copy

Well, this year is off with a bang!

Just got back from a Sales Training Seminar with Linares Auto Center. If you’re in the McAllen area, drop by their location & check them out. Good People!

We’re heading out again to the first DMV Dealer Training Seminar of the year, on the 16th. It’s going to be at Norris Conference Center in San Antonio. There’s still room available if you’d like to attend. Check out our Upcoming Events page for the Sign Up Link.