CitNOW Group welcomed as an Associate Member by NFDA

We’re pleased to announce we are now affiliate members of the NFDA.

The National Franchised Dealers Association (NFDA) represents franchised car and commercial vehicle retailers in the UK. There are more than 4,500 franchise outlets in the UK and over 540,000 people working in the automotive retail sector.

Through our membership, we aim to glean valuable insights from key retailers regarding evolving customer expectations and intend to support them with the challenges they face through the development of our applications and solutions.

Carol Fairchild, Chief Operating Officer, commented, “Becoming a member of the NFDA marks a significant milestone for CitNOW Group. Partnering with this key automotive association reinforces our commitment to supporting the industry and helps us to achieve our mission of making retailer’s lives easier whilst ensuring the customer experience is always the best it can be.”

Symon Cook NFDA’s Head of Operations responded, “NFDA is pleased to welcome CitNOW Group into associate membership. CitNOW Group are automotive powerhouses with a great deal of experience both in the UK and internationally; we are certain they will be able to provide support to our franchised dealer members effectively with the expertise in their field.”

CitNOW Group has further expanded its ecosystem of specialist automotive software solutions with the acquisition of Feasa, the UK’s leading dedicated Salesforce automotive software partner. The move enhances CitNOW Group’s ability to provide market-leading software and professional services and will also help it integrate software solutions for the benefit of retailers, OEMs, and their customers.

• Professional services consultancy Feasa will support CitNOW Group efforts to streamline software integrations and developments for OEMs and retailers
• Expansion will help CitNOW Group deliver on its ambition to transform every customer moment, while driving digital transformation and efficiency across the motor retail sector
• Feasa is a Salesforce Consulting Partner with 30 automotive software adapters facilitated by its GetAUTO integration platform

Working closely with Salesforce, Feasa delivered the first implementation in UK and Europe of Salesforce’s new Automotive Cloud within months of its launch in October 2022. Its GetAUTO platform facilitates more than 30 adapters that connect key automotive solutions with Salesforce, delivering a single view of customer and vehicle data – all available in the Salesforce AppExchange. Working closely with Salesforce, Feasa led the implementation of the industry’s first adaptors, migrating retailers to Automotive Cloud within just one year of it launching in October 2022.

CitNOW became one of the first UK automotive retail suppliers to be featured in the Salesforce AppExchange, making CitNOW Sales video functionality and reporting accessible from within the Salesforce Automotive Cloud app. The acquisition of Feasa further strengthens CitNOW Group’s ability to deliver solutions where scalable integration with Salesforce is a strategic priority for the retailer.

Retailers could be operating up to 150 different software solutions across their businesses, and the sharing of data and the integration of functionality between these systems can have a major impact on operational efficiency, as well as the consistency and quality of the omnichannel ‘customer journey’. Feasa’s Showroom 360 and Aftersales 360 services build on the core Automotive Cloud capabilities to improve connections between software systems and enable the development or improvement of processes to streamline operations.

Geoffrey Page-Morris, CEO of CitNOW Group, said: “Feasa is an outstanding automotive services business, and bringing it into the CitNOW Group has the potential to transform the way many businesses operate and communicate with their customers. This strategic move further expands our professional services offering and strengthens our partnership with Salesforce. We will therefore be better placed to provide dealerships with a streamlined ecosystem of software and applications; it is another step forward in our core aim of making life easier for retailers and driving efficiencies to seamlessly transform every customer moment.”

Matthew Simpkins, Regional Vice President | EMEA, Industry Advisor | Manufacturing | Automotive | Energy “Salesforce is committed to supporting a connected omnichannel retail experience and is delighted to see partners come together to make this happen. Using automotive cloud as a platform accelerator, their ISV apps and connectors, CitNOW Group and Feasa will help retailers everywhere deliver a single view of the customer and vehicle. This is just the start of a wider Salesforce ecosystem in auto-retail.”

Drew Tyrell, Managing Director of Feasa added: “For the past 15 years, Feasa has played a pivotal role in streamlining dealership software providers and creating a connected ecosystem. Now with the wider CitNOW Group, we’ll be able to harness those strong connections and expand our service to offer greater benefits for retailers.”

The addition of Feasa to the CitNOW Group enables a more flexible, adaptable, and connected ecosystem for retailers, helping them adapt to change – such as the shift to electrification and the proliferation of the agency model – and better meet customer expectations.

Since its inception, CitNOW Group has rapidly established itself as a global market leader, with over 13 million sales opportunities created, 60 million videos processed and over 10,000 dealer installations across 64 countries. It currently has the highest penetration of any software provider in the UK motor retail sector, with approximately 75% of franchised dealerships using at least one of its products.

Driven by a vision to transform the way the automotive world communicates, the CitNOW Group wants to unite the retailer and customer through technology. To achieve this the Group is building a global portfolio of businesses which currently include AutoSLM, Auto Imaging, CitNOW, Dealerweb, dealerdesk, Feasa, Quik, Reef, REALtime Communications, Web1on1.

Happily ever aftersales: maximising revenue opportunities

Aftersales is a revenue opportunity for dealerships that isn’t being explored as much as it could or should be. Recent research conducted by the CitNOW Group has found that 70% of retailers feel their aftersales teams could be doing more to maximise their revenue. 

Now is as good a time as any to identify performance gaps in aftersales and find easy and quick ways to maximise revenue. Ongoing changes around electrification, challenges in recruiting and retaining skilled technicians, and the rising cost of living are all having an effect. In this blog, we’ll highlight some of the best ways to ensure your aftersales operations are reaching their full potential, based on findings from our own data and trend analysis.

Retailer opportunities for innovation and change 

Our research has found that there are three particularly pressing challenges in automotive retail right now:

• Technician resource: research by the Institute of the Motor Industry has found that there could be as many as 160,000 vacancies across the sector by 2031, and that 16% of these would be for vehicle technicians. That’s why it’s so important to maximise existing technician resource and minimise wasted time.
   
• Consumer spending: amid the rising cost-of-living customers are naturally becoming more conscious and cautious about their expenditure. For example, Nationwide Building Society research has found that almost half of consumers have put off repairs to their cars because of pressures on their finances.
   
• Business overheads: the cost of doing business has gone up, from equipment purchasing to energy prices and everything in between. The pressures this puts on budgets across a retailer’s operation makes it harder to find the money to invest in staff training, stock and infrastructure.

It’s for these reasons that many retailers – as our recent research and trend analysis has uncovered – are evaluating changes they can make. They’re exploring innovative ways to increase revenue and customer retention, including optimising technician and advisor time; proactively encouraging regular maintenance appointments; and using technology to drive efficiencies for the aftersales team. 

Small changes, making a big difference 

To underline the difference that these changes can make, our recent research looked into aftersales data to see how some retailers have been standing out with exceptional performance.  

The best-performing retailers have found substantial gains in conversion rates of red repair work improving conversion by 11% quarter on quarter during 2023, to an average conversion of 62.7%.  Similarly, they have also improved technician utilisation rates, where technicians are able to get more jobs done each working day. The top-performing locations improved their technician utilisation from 84% to 92% on average in just 12 months: for an average retailer, this means completing up to 377 more jobs per workshop, per year. 

All of this makes a material difference to the bottom line, and if the average retailer were to perform at these levels, could mean an estimated extra £124,825 in service and red work opportunities. 

Unlocking success: How top performers achieved results 

How were these retailers able to generate such huge savings and efficiencies in practice? Consistently delivering superb aftersales performance starts with technology and using the solutions at your disposal to the best possible effect. Three practical and effective ways that we recommend include: 

• Benchmarking: using solutions like REALinsights to evaluate current performance allows you to understand where there are challenges and opportunities to focus on. That way, you can measure your operation against other retailers in your dealer group – as well as wider industry averages – and give yourself realistic goals to work towards.
   
• Monitoring: establishing standards and objectives for aftersales teams and staff can both clarify responsibilities and boost performance. CitNOW Workshop and RTC can help here by tracking eVHC completion rates (connected to the corresponding video) so that time spent per vehicle can be analysed.  

The same principle can also be applied to sales advisors and pinpointing when they should contact customers for the best chances of success. For example, we’ve found contacting customers on Mondays results in a 31% conversion rate, against just 19% on Thursdays. It’s also important to record decline reasons accurately, helping with training and business proposals, and to take advantage of upselling opportunities.   

• Utilisation tracking: working out technician throughput rates allows you to fill in any gaps and maximise their productivity. The starting point of this process is to ensure systems, data and processes are integrated (such as scheduling, part pricing and tyre costs); assign tasks to technicians based on skills and experience; and put the right lines of internal and external communications in place. 

In summary

It’s vital to set realistic targets for improving your aftersales, and that starts with  understanding your current performance levels in relation to market conditions. Based on this analysis, you can then take practical steps to enhance aftersales revenue through team controls for monitoring, efficient work allocation systems and effective communication. 

To find out how technology enables these changes, and how you can seamlessly join the dots from performance to revenue, explore CitNOW Group solutions in more detail here.