Entry. Control. Execute.

For those of you that have followed my journey, you know I’m an avid Martial Artist. I’ve been fighting in rings, cages, and on the mats my entire adult life. Martial Arts has not only changed my personal life but my business life as well. For that reason, I use many analogies in my coaching sessions related to my experience with martial Arts.

Today I want to talk about my theory on how to dominate in your F&I department using concepts that I teach to my Jiu Jitsu students.

These concepts are:  Entry  |  Control  |  Execute

In Jiu Jitsu to pull off a submission to win the fight, you have to do a few things. You have to be able to get to your favorite position. You then have to be able to control your opponent. After you have maintained control, you can then execute your submission and win the fight.

One of my old coaches used to tell me, “position before submission”. If you can control and dominate the position, the submission will come to you.

Now let’s talk about the F&I office, shall we?

If you’re looking to maximize every transaction in the F&I office, you have to do several things at the right time.

Your entry is your early F&I manager touch. F&I managers must be involved early in the transaction. The F&I department must communicate well with the sales desk. The entry is very important because you’re setting the table for your customer’s buying experience. The earlier F&I gets involved, the higher the gross profit will be on the deal. I challenge my F&I people to focus on making a wonderful first impression with the customer. If we can establish this, we are on the right path.

Controlling the deal is critical for F&I to maximize the transaction. This is where sales training will come into play. You must have the sales staff trained on how you want them to answer questions about financing or products. How do you want your sales department to set up the T/O to finance? You must answer that question and have continued sales training so everyone is rowing in the same direction. We must communicate well with the retail customer and get them time expectations. After the sale has been made and the sales desk hands the deal to F&I, it’s time to take control and reset the clock.

Now it’s time to execute. The hard part is over. The customer said yes to the deal and now F&I just has to make it final. Assuming you have followed your process and have already established the like and trust of the customer, it’s game time. We can now execute by providing solutions that will enhance the buying experience for the customer. Just like in Jiu Jitsu, when I have complete control over my opponent, it’s much easier to submit them. Same situation with our customers in F&I. When we follow our process and NEVER skip steps, we will be able to sell F&I products at a much higher rate.