“I find television to be very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go in the other room and read a book.” -Groucho Marx

It's no secret that successful people read a ton of books, so I wasn't surprised to read this interesting fact in an article on Bill Gates, written by copyrighting guru Dan Kennedy:

"[Bill Gates] has a photographic memory. He's not a trained speed-reader but he speed reads. I asked him how many books he read on his vacation and he said 30. He writes up notes in the margins and sends them back to the author."

There is an ocean of business books on the market and it is often hard to weed out the good ones from the junk, so being that I have likely read the majority of business books out there, I have compiled my list of the 17 best business books I have ever read.

Even if you have read these books, they are definitely worth re-reading and adding to your personal library.

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Read the rest of My Top 17 Must Read Business Books of All Time

Every year I take my “Top Dog” Service Advisors away for a weekend workshop. These are the best of the best in C/P sales, C.S.I, and Total Sales…

The Advisors invited came out from New York to Los Angeles. This year the event was in Vegas, and although I was a bit nervous about it getting out of hand, it ended up being a blast and better than I ever imagined!

Our TOP DOG Advisors were not shy to share their secrets and they had a ton of fun masterminding ideas, sharing their techniques, and learning from each other.

One of the best parts was the surprise guest speaker. I managed to get the top casino host from the Hard Rock Casino. The advisors immediately pummeled him with great questions and we learned that attracting and pleasing “the big casino whales” is very similar to what our top Service Advisors do in their service drives. When pressed on what the weirdest thing a big whale guest has ever asked for was, our host finally caved and revealed it was midget strippers!

Hilarious… and in true “Top Dog” form, he delivered for the guest… midget strippers

My top 3 take aways from the event:

#1 -  The Top Dogs spend most of their time building rapport with their customers. The bulk of the conversation revolves around personal stuff like kids, work, gossip, TV… the point was made that they spend 90% of their time building rapport and 10% of the time selling.  They all agreed that selling is really easy when you focus on the personal connection.
It’s really true and since that meeting I have had a couple (Chihuahua) advisors complain about bad CSI and customers not buying. In both situations I asked the advisors where the customer worked, how many kids they had, what their plans were for the day.  You can guess in both situations the Chihuahuas didn’t know anything about the customer. The easiest path to becoming a high performer is developing the ability to genuinely connect and bond with people and make them feel like they are friends and family.

# 2 – Top Dogs are great at leveraging “props” to bond with their customers. Awards and letters from other happy customers are great for building credibility. Pictures of family or hobbies help break the ice and build common ground with customers.
A particular Top Dog I know has letters raving about her great service covering the wall on one side of her desk and awards for customer satisfaction covering the other wall, eye catching photos of her doing fun things with her family are strategically placed on her desk, along with interesting books and puzzles as conversation starters and entertainment. I have watched customers that she has never helped walk by every other desk and wait for her to help them. It works like a charm…

#3 – This is just an observation and should be taken with a grain of salt, but I’m always trying to figure out the DNA of the top performers.It always surprises me that advisors that put up huge numbers are so unassuming. You would think that Advisors writing $350,000+ and $95,000+ in CP sales, and have consistently amazing customer satisfaction scores would be cocky, flashy, or have some sort of edge to them. Not the case in my experience… it ends up that all of the Top Dogs are really humble, easy going, reliable, and family oriented types. They consistently perform at a higher level without any drama or customer heat. They are out there and I am getting pretty good at identifying these Top Dogs (more on those secrets later). Being able to recruit this type of Top Performer affords Managers the ability to focus their attention not on putting out fires and petty issues, but on what really matters… Increasing that bottom line.

Chris Collins

P.S. Can you pick the best Advisor bark? Check out the vid!

Read the rest of What Happens in Vegas… You Can See Here! 2011 Top Dog Event

As you can see from the video, our Top Dog Advisors had a blast at last year's Top Dog Event. I took them to the Hard Rock in San Diego for the weekend and we had them Mastermind and share ideas. Our theme was "You're the Managers of the Future," and they were really into it when we taught them about financials and what discounting does to the bottom line.

This year I am taking them to Las Vegas! Our event will be this weekend and I am expecting to have the best workshop yet. I have a whole agenda for them and they will Mastermind and learn from each other as well as teaching us things too.

I hope Vegas is ready for us!

Read the rest of Last Years "Top Dog" Service Advisor Event

When I first released my book I had offered a free strategy session to anyone who bought a book, and then we sold a ton of books!

So consequently I have had the opportunity to interact with Service Managers and Dealers from all over the country and the world. I love doing the strategy sessions, is my passion to change our industry and help as many people as I can become irreplaceable. In the process, I was surprised to learn a few things that I would like to share with you.

The first thing that I found interesting is that people where surprised to find that it was actually me calling and really digging into their business and not someone just trying to sell them something.

The second thing I learned is that across the board, the most prevalent topic was traffic being down.  With new car sales down during the recession we have seen a drop in repair order counts and it’s only getting worse.

From my own early struggles as a General Manager of a voluminous BMW dealer, I understand the often daunting and intimidating task of trying to put into place an effective and measurable marketing system that would drive traffic into the store.

So I have decided to hold a one-time only Increase Your RO Count Workshop at my office in Los Angeles.

For the first time ever, I will teach the massively powerful marketing system that has created a traffic explosion every time I have ever used it. I have used this same system to help my private clients successively increase their Repair order count and create massive increases in their CP Labor Sales.

So I hope you join us and help us change this downward trend and bring traffic rolling into your service drive!

Be sure to register right away…  my office can literally only fit 25 people, I couldn’t find furniture that could seat more than that.

See You In LA!

Chris Collins

Read the rest of "Increase Your RO Count" Workshop for Service Managers!

I did a case study of what pulls better, direct mail or email marketing. We had two Car Doctor Service Clinics at the same time. One we promoted through direct mail and the other we promoted through email only.

With one we did over $120,000 in c/p parts and labor sales, and sold three cars.

The other one didn't pull as well. The results might surprise you.

Read the rest of Automotive Marketing: Fixed Ops Case Study (Direct Mail vs Email)

I had the idea for the "Circle Of Trust" on a flight back from the east coast. I had been talking to some service advisors and was explaining how to think about the customer relationship long term. Explaining that the real success as a service advisor is in following the same system and thinking long term.

So on my flight I drew it out on my note pad. I later added "Good Beside Manner" before I recorded the video.

The "New Employee/Quick Start" module in "Service Advisor Sales Breakthrough" breaks this down in more detail. Right now its nine videos of each aspect of the system.

Its really about how you can stop selling and become a trusted friend to your customers.

When you become a trusted friend, they will ask you for the sale.

From the Fockers "We are starting our own Circle Of Trust"

Read the rest of Service Advisor Training: Circle Of Trust

Get Your 3 Free Service Advisor Training Videos Here

Online Service Advisor Training Like Nothing You Have Ever Seen.

The video will take you to the opt in page…sign up and get 3 new videos I made for you.

The "Table Of Contents" Video Is For You To Play For Your Advisors And See Instant Results!!!

It Teaches Them One Of  My Proven  Strategies For Increasing Their C/P Sales. I Even Prove How Easy And Simple It Is By Role Playing It With My English Bulldog "Murphy"

Read the rest of New Online Automotive Service Advisor Training

This is a really funny video Mr. X and I shot in Vegas….

I lost a bet and had to take him to the convention…best part is I got my picture taken with with Mr. Shatner.

Trekkies are really loyal fans ….They verge on crazy fans….

So when they love something, they are all in…loyal to the end

William Shatner could do just about anything and not lose the loyalty of his Trek fans.

For example, he could star in a bad tv show like "Stupid Stuff My Dad Says" and…They still love him!

I can't wait till next years Star Trek Convention!

Chris

Read the rest of Star Trek: Are Your Service Advisors Memorable?