It’s day 23 of shelter-in-place, and other than the world needing a haircut, there’s positive news for the auto industry. Sales are certainly down, but they’re not gone. Whether your dealership is open or closed due to COVID-19, you still have leads to work - or your competition will.

Lead volumes are in fact declining, but not consistently across the board. Some brands are even seeing increases right now, and there are still approximately 20,000 vehicle sales happening each and every day. So how are you going to capture them?

At Urban Science, we have a tool called TrafficView™ that shows the highest rate of sales defections happen after 14 days. This means leads that came in during March need to be worked now. So do not shut down, and if you have to, then your internet teams should be working the leads in your CRM from home.

This is a time to be innovative and proactive, whether you are a salesperson, or a manager a GM. Here’s another easy idea. Focus on consumers with lease expirations and positive equity opportunities. Did you know that there are 1.8 Million leases due to expire between now and July of this year? Let’s just start there. You can sustain your business doing only that. In the words of Abraham Lincoln, “The best way to predict the future is to create it.”

In Part 5 of On the Dealer Front Lines, where we’ll cover how dealers can start preparing to capture the pent-up demand once the market recovers. Stay tuned!