The concept of cost-cutting is an age old mantra in the business world. Spend less money, make more money. In practice it’s not so simple. How do you identify the areas that truly need a trim and how do you get the most out of your cost-cutting measures? We don’t have all the answers here, but we do have a few ideas.
When Cutting Costs, Don’t Cut Corners
There are numerous ways that you can cut your costs, not all of them equally useful. Ultimately what you need to change is how you do things, not necessarily what you do. Finding a quick way to save a few bucks at the end of the month seems nice, sure, but are you making a difference in the long-term? Now, with that said here are a few ways that you can reduce your expenses by changing the way you do business.
Pricing Your Vehicles
The first area to take a look at is how you price your used vehicles. Are you making frequent adjustments? Are you nudging the price in small increments? Do you ever raise your prices, or do you always lower them? A few key points that can get you better results when pricing your vehicles:
- Make adjustments more frequently: A more proactive approach to pricing generally leads to better results. The used vehicle market shifts and swings on a daily basis and your approach to pricing should reflect that.
- Don’t be afraid to raise the price: It’s true that most vehicles depreciate in value in the long-term, but short-term prices aren’t constantly trending downward. Sometimes the market dictates an increase in price and you shouldn’t be afraid to take advantage of that. When combined with more frequent price adjustments you are primed to capitalize on favorable market trends.
What you should glean from this is that proactive, market-based pricing is far superior to the traditional reactive downward spiral that all too many dealers find themselves in.
Your Used Car Reconditioning Process
Each and every day that your used vehicle isn’t out on the market is a missed opportunity. This news surely comes as no surprise to you and it’s why so much money and effort are spent on streamlining the used car reconditioning process. You turn your vehicles around faster, and you make more money. It’s a simple equation that can be frustrating to get right.
The most important aspect of the used car reconditioning process is transparency. Do you know where each and every car is in the process? Do you know exactly how much is being spent on each step of the process? Having your reconditioning process be a black box is a quick way to lose money.
It’s easy to spot the flaws in your used car reconditioning process. Coming up with a solution is the hard part. With our ReconTRAC program we believe we’ve found a solution that works. We work with dealerships to create streamlined and efficient used car reconditioning workflows that can reduce time to market by up to 50 percent. The ReconTRAC program provides low-cost tracking with real-time reporting that allows you to track and optimize your entire reconditioning process, removing the mystery and allowing you to see what’s working and what’s not.
Now that you know what we can do for you, here’s what you can do for us. Simply contact us at Green Cloud today for a free demonstration of our powerful ReconTRAC software.
