It’s not unusual for the typical sales consultant (particularly green peas) to make repeated trips to the desk to get answers, payments, and help moving their deal across the line. As Managers we are taken away from overseeing the entire showroom or closing deals on the bubble. And worse yet, when our consultants leave their customers, the customer is freed up to search 3rd- party sites for pricing information or email other dealers. 

On another note, today’s customers are more informed about financing than ever, often coming into the dealership aware of rates and payments. In fact, research shows that 87% of new car buyers researched financing prior to purchase.*

It’s important for dealers to empower their sales consultants with the tools to engage customers and to move their prospects down the road to the sale. AutoFi’s newest showroom platform, Deal Center brings the same accuracy and convenience of AutoFi’s online consumer shopping experience into your showroom, complete with a slick user interface for customers and most importantly, management guardrails that protect your staff and your bottom line.

1. Set Your Consultants Up to Work Payments on Vehicles Side by Side

I know what you’re thinking, “This will never work. Some sales consultants can’t land a customer on a &%$! car without me stepping in!”

AutoFi had your team in mind when we built Deal Center functionality that allows your Greenest Pea to show multiple vehicles and deal structures side-by-side and let customers land themselves on a car.

Customer not sure if they want the SE or SEL? Finance vs. Lease? 10K mile or 12k mile lease? Deal Center enables your Sales Consultant to simply add vehicles and empower the customer to choose the deal that’s best for them.

By setting your consultants up to smoothly land customers on the right vehicle and deal, you as the desk manager have more time to quarterback other opportunities, ensuring that your team is executing on the process you want.

2. Enable Customers to Edit Their Payments on Your Terms


When the pencil comes out, there’s risk of erasing profit; so keep that pencil in the drawer and empower your customers to edit Term, Down payment, and Vehicle to get to their target payment (including your fees and accurate taxes).

Moreover, when a customer goes back and forth from one term to another smoothly and efficiently – there’s no waiting. No need for you to get involved in the micro details.

When a stone cold buyer edits the terms of their deal, without you having to get involved with every single change, you have freed yourself up to lean in with customers who aren’t ready to buy yet and put incremental numbers on the board.

3. Create F&I Efficiency to Unlock Cash Flow and Sell Product

A deal isn’t done until it’s through F&I and you’re funded FAST. With so many folks talking about “end-to-end,” AutoFi redefines “end” as real lender decisions in your RouteOne (or DealerTrack) with the Upward Arrow, ready for you to eContract and get paid. On busy Saturdays, when visiting dealerships it’s F&I where the real backup is. Additionally, we all know those dealers who are perpetually “Slammed in F&I.” This “business” creates a perpetual backup where it matters: selling products and managing contracts in transit.

Don’t compromise your business, instead have your sales consultants get a secure AutoFi Digital credit app from the comfort of their sales desk in Deal Center. It will have the collateral from the vehicle the customer landed on, and the deal structure that the customer agreed upon.

When the consultant walks to the manager to tell them about a customer ready for F&I, the manager has already seen the customer and the lender’s decision in RouteOne (or DealerTrack). I’ve overheard managers say, “wow – it’s already in here with an upward facing arrow. And you got all the right fees, and a rate bump. Nice work.”

And when it comes to F&I – faster is better and enables you to sell more products and to get funded faster.This frees F&I up to spend more time on deals where they can make more money – like flipping a cash customer to a single pay lease, converting a customer with a pre-arranged loan to a dealer loan at retention, and adding products.

Don’t look now desk managers, but you just saved yourself 10-15 minutes of messing around with each UP. This gives you the time to focus on proactive “Flybys” and T.O.s that close.

Deal Center from AutoFi has the capabilities to set your sales team up to be top performers, free managers up to quarterback the floor, and give F&I ink ready fundable deals while saving time.  A win-win for everyone!

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*Source: Cox Automotive Car Buying Financing Journey Study
Patrick Wyld is Director of Training at AutoFi, celebrating a 25 year automotive career that begin in retail in 1997.