A Business Development Center/Company (BDC) is designed to help automotive dealerships with their inbound and outbound communication. It can be a separate department within the dealership or it might be a third-party company the dealership has contracted. The challenge with many BDCs though, is they are focused on two primary channels—calls and emails.
Communication, especially through the pandemic, has become multi-faceted and multi-channel. While people are certainly using their phones and computers for calls and emails, they are doing so much more with them. Communication is coming through instant messaging platforms like Facebook, or through chat enabled features in Google Business Profiles, and most importantly, through texting.
Ninety-five percent (95%) of text messages are read and responded to within three minutes of being received. Yet, most companies haven’t adopted a texting strategy. In fact, 65% of brands don’t have a formal strategy for bulk SMS messaging. This also includes dealers and BDCs.
On the surface, it seems like a simple exercise to send a text, but if you don’t have a platform designed with texting in mind, like Botsplash, you’re going to get tired fingers as you go text by text. Being able to send hundreds, if not thousands, of texts that have tokenized replacements so you can personalize them is a must.
Yet sending mass texts can have its drawbacks, namely spam. Different carriers have different rules and that can affect deliverability and contact rates. Botsplash actively monitors spam filters and makes sure intended messages go through.
It’s also important to follow TCPA restrictions to ensure your texting is done with consent and at the right time, or you might find yourself with a hefty fine. Botsplash has built TCPA into the platform to ensure that no matter when you set up a text campaign, it will recognize the time zone of the recipient. Between time zones and daylight savings time, there are 15 states that might have time differences that senders may not be aware of. Botsplash is.
So what type of messaging could you consider in a text? Your dealers may turn to text and promote special financing offers, new incentives for purchase, lease renewals and on the service side appointment scheduling, dealer suggested maintenance, or even oil change specials. Whatever is important to your client should be important to your messaging, whether it’s sales, service, or a combination of both.
Additionally, if you are using texting, you will want to consider the use of short URLs for any marketing landing pages your clients might have. Long URLs can overwhelm your message with a sea of blue text. Keep it simple and easy for your recipients to click through using Botsplash’s built in URL shortener.
You’ll also want to be sure you can send images and documents through text messages. Not every carrier allows it, so ensure you’re using a carrier that can handle MMS otherwise, those walk around videos, or copies of the window stickers won’t get through.
There are many reasons to use SMS, but the main reason is consumers are using it every day. It’s the communication of choice for most people and it’s read and responded to more than any other communication channel. Botsplash helps keep communication flowing and helps keep track of all your conversations. Whether it’s SMS, web chat, Facebook Messenger, and more. Botsplash helps you be where your customers are.
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