AWS Outage, Langham on Growth Strategy, Ortega on Creative, Dean on BDC Evolution | Daily Dealer Live

We're doing better as a result of social media presence.

It doesn't do those three things, then it's on the chopping block.

It's in return on investment discussion.

Hey everybody, welcome back to The Daily Dealer Live.

I'm your host, Sam Dark.

And this is the space where all automotive comes together

to learn, to share, to grow.

Thanks for joining us today.

Whether you're a dealer, a vendor, or someone just

passionate about where automotive is headed,

you're in the right place.

Let's jump into today's breaking news.

First up today, rideshare and mobility company Uber

is taking another big swing at autonomous driving

by teaming up with NVIDIA and Stylianus

to build what the company calls, quote,

the world's largest self-driving vehicle networks.

The partnership announced Tuesday

will power Uber's next generation of robo-taxis

and delivery vehicles using NVIDIA's latest AI computing

platform.

Stylianus will provide the first phase

of the fleet, which includes at least 5,000 cars built

with NVIDIA's hardware and software

for level four autonomy, meaning the vehicles

can drive without human supervision under most conditions.

The big picture here, the idea is

to blend Uber's global ride-hailing network

with NVIDIA's AI backbone and Stylianus's manufacturing

scale, creating a plug-and-play model for autonomous vehicles.

And a big question for our social media,

everybody across all CDG social platforms,

answer this question in the comments.

Do you think they can pull it off?

100,000 robo-taxis, that's a steep number.

Give us your comments.

We'll bring them into today's show.

That plus other comments as we come up on today's show.

All right, so next up today, Stylianus

is recalling over 24,000 Jeep Wrangler plug-in hybrids,

plus nearly 300,000 RAM ProMaster vehicles

are being recalled by Chrysler in a CDG recall watch.

Stylianus is issuing two major recalls this month.

One is for Jeep's plug-in hybrid Wrangler,

and another for RAM's popular ProMaster fleet vans.

First, more than 24,000 Wrangler 4-by-E hybrids from 23 to 25

are being recalled after an over-the-air software update

caused some vehicles to completely lose power.

Reportedly, the glitch disrupted communication

between two control modules and essentially

bricked the vehicle.

Stylianus says every affected Wrangler likely has the defect

in that a permanent software fix is still in development.

Separately, nearly 290,000 RAM ProMaster vans

are being recalled for a potential fire risk tied

to cooling fan modules with weak fuse protection,

ultimately creating a big disruption for fleet operations

that depend on these vehicles for daily revenue.

To find out more about these recalls,

head on over to CDG Recall Tracker,

powered by Busycar at cdgrecalls.com.

Next up today, Google adds is tightening the rules

on misleading pricing by rolling out new transparency

requirements that could help build customer trust

in online car shopping.

Effective now, any dealer advertising through Google

will have to clearly disclose full prices, payment models,

and any conditions tied to, quote, free offers.

For context, the policy directly targets

bait and switch tactics, i.e.

those too good to be true prices that vanish

once a customer shows up to the dealership lot.

The rules also tightens the standard for app promotions

as well as advertising funnels that offer a trial period

without warning users that charges kick in later.

Violators will get a seven day warning

before Google suspends their accounts.

Industry voices say the policy levels

the playing field for those already operating

with transparency, while also helping weed out

bad actors who hurt the industry's reputation.

What's the bottom line on this?

Well, Google's new policy matches the direction many,

but not all dealers are already heading cleaner,

more straightforward, and more transparent

car buying experiences.

Fascinating that they have to create a policy to do that.

Hopefully everybody's already doing it.

And then finally up today, we turn to the cdgbycel.com

tracker, cdgbycel.

Lithium Motors is expanding its portfolio yet again

by acquiring three Hyundai dealerships

in Orange County, California, including Anaheim Hyundai.

That's right at Disneyland for everyone,

Huntington Beach Hyundai and Garden Grove Hyundai,

which were all purchased from Norie Shaver Automotive Group.

The deal boosts Lithia's Southern California footprint

and adds roughly $440 million in annual revenue.

Year to date, Lithia's US acquisitions are now expected

to contribute more than a billion in new revenue.

Bottom line, this transaction is a textbook example

of how the big publics are using scale and market density

to accelerate growth.

And don't forget, of course, you can see this deal

and more throughout the entire year

by visiting the cdgbycel tracker at cdgbycel.com.

And for all those, I love it, I love it.

And actually, let's turn to welcome to the show, Yuli.

Welcome back.

That's a wrap on today's news.

It's up guys.

Yuli, welcome back.

Yuli, I've got a brand new teleprompter

and I'm having a little bit of a challenge

getting the words to scroll down.

So for everybody that's talking about this.

It seems like mostly good news.

Yeah, yeah, dude, this is very, it's awesome.

It's awesome.

Hey, so for everybody back again to the comment

about our social media platforms,

we're live streaming as we always are

across all the social media properties.

Bring your comments in.

They help us make today's show awesome.

We'll bring them into the comments as we go.

We hear from Jeff Reveal first

and we hear High Valley Toyota second.

So first and second.

I have no idea what that means.

What does that mean?

First comment, second comment.

There we go.

All right, we'll take it.

Remember those threads where people would

always try to be first.

Yeah, maybe it's that.

Yeah, that's what we're going here.

So all right, well, hey, let's turn to our first guest today.

COO Coleman Auto Group, Jamie Lane.

Welcome to the show, Jamie.

Hey, Jamie.

Hi.

Jamie, we are pumped to have you here.

So actually, before we go in and we ask you

our banner question, how's biz?

We'd also like to have you tell us a little bit

about yourself and what you do there

at the Coleman Auto Group.

So how's biz, Jamie?

Well, business is great.

I have, I just started with the Coleman Automotive Group

on like last Monday.

So my life has been a little bit of a whirlwind

getting associated with all of the stores

and kind of how they operate.

I have been in the industry for 29 years.

The majority of it was spent in the finance world.

And then I've been the GM of Toyota Lexus stores.

And I've done a little bit of marketing, websites, internet,

BDCs, sales, finance directors.

I've done a little bit of everything.

Yeah.

What drew you to the COO role and the Coleman Auto Group?

That's a big change.

So you go from the Fort Wayne market to the Midwest.

You go from one or two stores to the Coleman Auto Groups,

scaled from one to five stores in just a year.

And Kyle was on here and he talks

about how he wants to grow to 40 within the next decade.

What prompted your leap?

So I love the challenge.

I've known Kyle for quite a while, actually.

I've known Kyle and his brother Ryan.

And when he was looking at doing the dealerships,

I was one of the early investors.

So I'm a shareholder and decided that maybe I

would use my talents and gifts to help grow something

that I'm a part of.

And I believe in Kyle.

He is crazy.

And when he sets his mind to something, it will happen.

If he says he's going to have 40 stores,

he's going to have 40 stores.

Yeah.

So when you think about it, what are the foundational steps

that you've put in place as you come over?

I mean, you're brand new, right?

So you're probably still trying to figure things out.

But as you think about that rapid expansion,

what steps are you putting in place

to help ensure consistent growth as you grow so rapidly?

Like going one to five in 12 months is tough.

And then from five to 40 in a decade is also a challenge.

How are you approaching that, scaling it?

So my initial, whenever I go into somewhere new,

I never think that I have all the answers.

So I like to go in and kind of look and see

how things are running, what I think is doing well,

what I think could probably be tweaked.

So my goal to start out with is to make it to each store.

I'm at the second store that I've been to.

So I started with the Nissan store in Warsaw.

That's closest to me.

And this week, I'm at the Mount Pleasant store,

kind of just going through a little bit of everything,

seeing the processes from sales to service,

looking at the financial statements, looking at basically

how everything is running.

I will come up with a game plan for what I think is working well,

what I think could probably use improvements,

get with the general manager of that store,

get with Kyle, Jay, and go from there

on implementing what I think they could benefit from.

So at the Roarman Auto Group,

in your prior place of employment at Fort Wayne Toyota,

you were recognized at least once as the top GM

in the Roarman Auto Group with the Alpha Award,

which, by the way, is not a...

Yes, I was.

Something Kyle must have told you that,

because I did not.

Yes.

That's a great name for an award, by the way, the Alpha Award.

Hey, what did you think of that?

And then what does it take to get that award?

How did you earn that?

So they set out metrics, like at the beginning of the year,

that you have to hit.

And they have a program there

that all of the departments have to be in.

So your sales, your service, your parts, the finance,

everything has to be firing on all cylinders.

You have to have a specific net to sales.

You have to win your President's Award.

Like there was just different categories that I had to do.

There's 21 stores.

And I was the only GM who got the Alpha Award last year.

And yeah, I was super proud of that.

So Jamie, like getting that last year,

that it's in a tough business environment,

give our audience one strategy that you applied last year

to win that Alpha Award,

to become the best of the best in the Roarman Auto Group.

So I looked at it every day.

Like I knew what I had to do.

I knew what the metrics were.

Look, Ryan Roarman's a pretty smart guy.

So I figured if I follow his program

and I do what he's asking me to do,

my store's gonna be successful.

So I kept it in front of me.

I kept it in front of my employees.

Every week, my guys knew where we were.

If we were on track, I'm a big metric person.

And I believe that when everybody knows the goal

and everybody knows what we're driving for,

then they all get on board

and they all feel like they're a part of something

and they helped drive it.

I didn't do it by myself.

I did it with my team.

I did it with everyone around me

and everyone knew what the goal was.

Everyone knew that that's what we were going for.

And they were proud to have the only Alpha GM.

That's awesome of it.

So Todd, in the green room before you came on,

we talked a little bit about how unique it is

to have someone like yourself

in a senior executive position for a group.

You're a woman in an industry

that is really male-driven, male-dominated.

What, give us your take on where you are today,

how you got there, and what gave you the confidence

to say, hey, I'm gonna become the CEO of a large group

and we're gonna go grow this in an industry

where you don't see a lot of women

in those senior executive positions.

Yeah, so when I was coming up through the mic,

so I started in sales.

I did sales for three years

and I wanted to move into the finance department.

And I never felt like I was being held back

to move into the finance department because I was a woman.

I felt they were doing it because I sold too many cars

and they didn't want to move me out of it.

So I just never thought about being a woman

that it was that big of a deal.

It wasn't until I became a GM

and people started saying crazy things to me

that I was a woman and I'm like, oh, oh goodness.

I had one gentleman, I was at a Alexis event

and the only people invited to this event

were dealer principals, GMs.

I mean, everybody couldn't come to this meeting.

So obviously I had to be one of those two people.

And he's sitting down next to me and he says,

oh, what do you do at the store?

And I said, well, I'm the general manager of the store.

And he pats me on the leg and says,

or not yet, he doesn't pat me.

He says, oh, do your parents own the store?

And I said, no, no, no, no, no, I'm actually

one of those women that actually has a brain

and I did it all on my own.

I worked really hard and I came up through the ranks

and learned everything I could

and I actually became a GM on my own with my own brain.

He pats me on the leg and says, oh, sweetie, good for you.

So yes, I've kind of heard it all,

but it was actually kind of shocking to me

because I've never thought about being a woman

that it was a hindrance.

I was seen it as a superpower.

I do care about people and they tend to follow me.

I have very loyal employees.

Yeah, what message would you give to other women

looking to either own a dealership,

get into senior executive positions in a dealership,

become a general manager,

and not because of family relationships,

but just because that's where they see their path?

And what message would you deliver to them?

I would say soak it all up.

Your women do have the ability to multitask.

They just do.

I know that they say it's not a real thing,

but yes it is.

I can multitask with the best of them.

Take it all in and never think that you can't do it.

Like there is absolutely no reason.

Learn, pay close attention to everything

and if you set your mind to it, you can absolutely do it.

And you can do it with a family.

I raised three boys through this craziness.

My husband and I have been together 35 years,

just celebrated 30th wedding anniversary.

You can have it all, you really can.

Yeah, that's awesome.

All right, we're gonna turn with you

to some of the industry news popping up from today

because I'd love to get your perspective again

as part of a brand new group.

We saw this news of Google's new ad policies

now requiring clear pricing to fight deception.

What's your take on that?

Is there a need for this type of a policy

from a lead aggregator, lead distributor,

lead generator like Google to take a stand on pricing?

And how are your stores

or how will your stores adapt to this new policy

to build customer trust?

So to me it's sad that we would need a policy like this,

but I suppose it is necessary.

I mean, there are people that are deceptive,

which gives, you know, there's deceptive people

in any industry, but it gives the car business a bad name.

Transparency is the best way to go.

We live in a world where everything

is at everyone's fingertips.

Why you would think that you would get away

with deceptive practices in today's world,

you're just setting yourself up for failure.

So it's unfortunate that this even needs to be spoken of

or a policy, but the industry, you know,

people do desperate things, you know,

when they're trying to get ahead, which is sad.

If you just, in my opinion,

I've always just done the right thing,

tried to do it the best way for the customer

and you always, you always win.

Yeah, the other thing that's in the news

that's kind of interesting right now,

earlier this week we've been reporting actually

for the last two weeks of potential chip shortages

stemming from a shortage from a Dutch chip supplier

and an argument with China.

And it's actually trickling down,

we're starting to see some delays in Honda

and some other OEMs are saying

they're scaling back some production.

From your level and position, how do you deal with that?

You know, it seems like we're always seeing

these market shifts in automotive

and if we start to see less new cars in the marketplace,

you know, growing auto groups such as yourself

with Ford, CDJR, Chevy, Buick, Lincoln Toyota,

how will you adjust and adapt to that?

Well, you're gonna have to go back to, you know,

used is gonna have to be,

if the new car market is dwindling,

again, you're gonna have to go back to the used market.

And that's a tough market.

I mean, acquiring vehicles is not an easy,

it's not for the faint of heart, that is for sure.

But also, you know, I do think

that there will still be some cars there.

You need to have good relationships with your OEM.

You do need to, you know, these cars are not,

you know, heirloom pieces.

It's okay to separate from a car, sell the car,

you know, get them on, get them out, get them circulating.

They're gonna come back to your service department.

So I think probably lean a little bit heavier again

on used cars, but, you know, hopefully we don't go back

to that huge pendulum swing that we did with used cars

and it doesn't, you know, kinda spike up quite as much

as it did and we stay a little bit more even keeled this time.

We learned from our mistakes, we'll hope.

Hopefully.

Jamie, a few questions from social media.

Mustapha says, which processes are best to operationalize

and standardize across multiple episodes,

or multiple rooftops?

So I think that each store is a little bit unique

and it depends on, you know, your market

and your surroundings.

But I think the way that we're looking

at actually maybe standardizing some pay plans,

those are always good to kinda standardize

and the process from the desk to the customer,

to the service department, the handoff.

I think those are good processes to have equal across all,

with all the organizations.

But, you know, I do have different brands

that I'm dealing with and I did just start

and I don't like to change everybody's situation

by first day.

So maybe I can come back on after I'm here six, seven months

and I can answer that question a little bit better

for our group.

Yeah.

And actually, so I am curious, you know,

in my own COO role, I think one of the things

when I think about standardizing to Mustapha's point

and getting operations consistent across a group,

finding good vendor partners are key, right?

So whether it's a DMS, whether it's a CRM,

whether it's lead providers,

because you develop those relationships

and you can ask them to outpunt, you know,

and help you become better.

Are there any tools out there from your time at Toyota

or history in the automotive experience

that have really provided a valuable return

that you lean into as you take on this new role?

So our DMS, we have Techian.

I had Techian at Toyota Lexus

and we also have Techian with the Coleman Automotive Group.

I personally like them a lot.

I know, you know, you hear mixed reviews,

but I do like them.

Their superpower is it can do everything

and it has so much information.

And then the negative is that they can do everything.

So it's there, you know, it's just,

it's a lot of information that you can get.

I love their executive dashboard.

You know, we are going to implement a few things

rolling out for November that I want to see

in the Techian DMS.

But the Techian I do think is one of the things

that I like the best.

I can really dive into the information

and see how a store is really performing.

So your former boss, Ryan Rormans,

been on the show once and he did kind of a masterclass

on the AI tech stack and tech stacks in general.

Anything that you're taking from your experience there

and implementing into the new group

as it relates to the AI world,

which we've talked about ad nauseam for many episodes, right?

As has the entire industry.

So AI, I have a love hate relationship with AI.

I do, I mean, I love the human touch.

It is, but I think there is a need for it.

And, you know, some of the stuff being automated,

I think is definitely an advantage.

So yes, there are some things that I will be bringing over

from my former group to here.

There's a lot of things that they did well.

It's a great group.

I mean, they're warm and automotive group.

They are amazing and it's a great group.

And, you know, we're hoping here

as a Coleman automotive group to, you know, grow bigger.

Yeah. All right.

Last question up, because I'm super curious about this.

You're new to the role.

You know, Kyle, you know,

probably some of the other employees,

but one of the biggest tasks right out the gate

in your COO roles to establish credibility with the GMs,

the different employees that you work with.

What's your tip and strategy

to develop that relationship and that credibility

so that you can steer the ship again,

one to five in a year is a lot of growth,

but certainly five to where you want to go

as an organization over the next decade is tremendous growth.

How do you get that buy in

and build that credibility among your team?

So like I do with anyone when I come in somewhere,

I think I'm very personable.

People, I genuinely care about each and every one.

I want every store to succeed.

And I think if you pour into your people,

I think they really can feel that.

I do know what I'm talking about.

So that definitely helps when we have conversations,

they can see that I'm not just blowing smoke

and I'm not asking them to do something

that I never did myself.

So I think my 29 years experience, that definitely helps.

And I genuinely care about each and every person

that I am going to be leading.

I want them to have the best life possible.

I want all their employees to have the best life possible

because when you pour into those people,

it makes everybody feel like a team.

It makes everyone, we're all driving for the same thing.

And that's when you have the best results,

when everyone feels like they're a part of something.

So I feel like I do a decent job of relaying that

because it's genuine.

Yeah.

Well, some great comments for you off social media.

We'll just read a couple of them.

Lauren Klein says, women in automotive are super women.

Great inspiration.

So props to you from Lauren.

Somebody's saying CRM down for you.

I don't know where that's coming from, but maybe it is.

Maybe it seems like there's always a CRM down.

I don't know, I'm not on there right now, maybe.

Yeah, we're not either.

And then the CDG were saying, hey,

who does everybody want to see on the next episode

of The Daily Deal Alive?

You can post that and other comments to there.

But Jamie, we absolutely appreciate you being on the show.

By the way, Friday we're going to have a big announcement

about this 20 group tech circles

that the Cardiola Ship Guide Network is creating.

You can join basically chat conversations

with other people in the industry in your role.

It would be awesome to have you join the COO,

Chief Operating Officer, chat groups with myself

and some others.

It's an incredible, it's a great resource

to be able to kind of share ideas and best practices

and talk about vendors and all the other things.

So when that pops up, come join it.

Fill out the deal and join us.

So we appreciate you being on the show today.

Jamie Langham, COO, Coleman Automotive Group.

And again, we'd love to have you back

once you've got some time under your feet

and learn lessons as you grow this organization.

Jamie, thanks for being on the show.

Thank you so much, Jamie.

I appreciate you.

Thank you.

My question, Yuli, is what CRM is down and where

and what's it got?

I got the chills when I read that.

I'm like, ouch.

Yeah, yeah.

Nothing, nothing, nothing to do with that.

So let's go to our support here one moment.

So I am learning this whole new deal.

And it's going to take me just a minute.

But let's talk escalating fines and enforcement.

Escalating fines and enforcement actions

are hitting dealers hard.

KPIs complete compliance suite protects you

from every compliance risk while helping

to reduce insurance premiums and liability exposure.

Visit kpa.io forward slash automotive to learn more.

Or you can click on the QR code if you're on the live show

or you can go to the show notes.

If you're not either way, we'd love

to have you learn more about KPA.

And props to KPA for supporting today's content,

including that awesome conversation

about the Coleman Auto Group.

So very cool.

Lauren Klein says it always goes down

at the end of the month.

So an ortega ortega ortego says Jeff Rovilla.

So some fun comments and heated lots coming over there.

So all right, let's turn to our next guest, Yuli.

You ready for this?

Brian Ortega, Creative Director of Alley High Toyota.

Welcome to the show.

Thank you guys.

Appreciate it.

We're pumped to have you.

Oh my god.

AWS CRM.

My mind's racking because I could just hear my GMs.

Is that what went down?

Yeah, my IT guy, I was trying to get everything ready.

He's like, yeah, AWS maybe down again.

So look out.

Well, we got you here.

So that's the most important piece for us

in the very short term, but hopefully everything else

gets straightened out for our dealer friends.

Brian, we got to ask you our signature question.

And obviously, as we do, tell us a little bit

about who you are and what you do.

But how's biz?

Biz is a little slow right now.

People are kind of hesitant, especially

in this area of California.

But all in all, it's good.

We're ramping, getting ready for the holidays.

Very cool.

And what are you doing in the stores?

So I'm the Creative Director at Valley High Toyota.

And since last year, Valley High Kia as well.

We're in the high desert of California.

So if you're driving from LA to Vegas,

we're right there on your way there.

And I've been doing this for about, well,

I've been here for about 12 years,

but doing this position about 10.

I started off as a picture taker of used cars.

And this industry is so awesome that you get to evolve.

Yeah.

Creative Director is not a position

that is in every dealership.

So I mean, to me, it's exciting because it sounds like probably

the most fun part, aside from closing deals and shaking hands.

So give us a little bit in the day to day

of what you're doing and how you help businesses scale

and get new customers through the showroom.

Yeah.

So Creative Director was a self-imposed.

I kind of created that.

But yeah, it's doing the marketing for the stores,

getting the word out, whether I'm creating videos

or writing banners or putting up billboards

or writing radio scripts and things like that.

So obviously we're trying to judge up some traffic

and get people in the doors.

We're still seeing these comments come through on AWS.

How has things like this with AWS being tied into so many systems

that we use on the day to day, how has this impacted you guys?

And what are you guys doing to kind of hedge against in the future?

Yeah.

So we, well, with the CRM and things like that,

I kind of oversee the tech from between both stores.

How we try to mitigate it is just get on the phones.

Let's keep it old school and try to get people in the doors

and obviously through social media and getting the word out

and just trying to get people to head on in.

We live in a digital age.

I mean, it is tough to get people to pivot from that.

Lauren Klein always goes down at the end of the month.

She's right.

Yeah.

And you know what?

It's interesting.

You have a fan base here.

So Cal Cargall channel said, I came here just to hear Brian Ortega.

If you weren't on, we wouldn't have the audience.

So Brian, I'm super curious.

Your dealership ads are like story driven mini movies, right?

Something that you don't see a lot of in automotive.

What inspired you to take that approach of telling a story

like a mini movie?

And how has it impacted that brand awareness that you like to create

and helped you as an organization connect to your customer?

I mean, I always tell the story.

I've never been good in the math or science.

So I actually went to film school at UC Santa Barbara.

I don't know how that implemented, but I got here

and we just started creating content long before, like, you know,

when people were taking pictures of people with their cars,

I wanted to do videos of the truck driving through the desert

with a GoPro cam attached to it and things like that.

So definitely evolved in, you know, everyone has these phones.

You only has the new 17 Pro.

So you can make some great 4K movies.

Yeah. So as you're talking about the 4K movies,

let's check out the down detector and just go through the AWS again.

Breaking news is AWS suffers an outage.

By the way, this isn't the first time in the past couple of weeks it's happened.

It seems to be happening repeatedly and it does have an impact on automotive.

And the question for our audience, anybody else in the know is what the heck is going on?

Why does it keep persisting?

Why does it keep going on?

And so we'll keep we'll keep an eye on that throughout the rest of the show

and report back as we get more information.

All right, next question up.

During some of the inventory shortages, when inventory drive dried up,

you guys pivoted, you cut your ad spend

and instead you gave away $500 gas cards to support the community.

What the heck was that about?

And and and how did that kind of non sales focused marketing

help connect you to your clientele?

And did it result in sales once inventory came back later on down the road?

Oh, it's about the community, right?

It's giving back to the people who have, you know, contributed throughout the years.

And you just wanted it was super genuine.

It was, you know, off the cuff.

But we wanted to do something to just build awareness, build community.

Let everybody know. What did it cost you to do?

Oh, I didn't do the numbers.

OK, you were just handing me out gift car gas cards, right?

So but I love people's were people's were people super pumped to get it.

I mean, did it create a lot of gratitude and goodwill to the brand,

to the dealership, to the dealer group?

Yeah, definitely.

And the way we did it, it was social.

We had contests.

We had user generated content, you know, people contribute.

And I think it was as a win-win between the community and the dealership as well.

You know, so back and forth.

So the other thing you're very well known for is you've dabbled

with some of the generative AI.

Tell us about what you've done in that space.

I played with Sora.

I don't know if you've done much with that, if that's part of it.

I like it is a massively powerful tool and I can create really cool videos.

I just can't figure out what the heck to do with them now.

So as a dealer in October of 2025, what are you doing?

What's working and and how do I make Sora make sense?

It makes sense.

I think, you know, we're in the the beginning infancy ages of AI.

And honestly, I think this will be great for dealerships, especially with with budgets.

And if you're generating content, we have some because this is October,

we have some some spooky designs, right?

We have a witch and a werewolf and a skeleton in the showroom right now.

And I took photos and whether using Sora or any of the other ones

actually had them move and created videos and promoting Trucktober for

going on in October for the Toyota stores.

So, you know, can get really interesting and also creative with that content.

So creating mascots.

Sorry, go ahead, Julie.

Creating mascots, creating characters that you can weave into your story

to help connect with consumers.

That's where you're seeing that generative AI working best, right?

Yeah, definitely.

And our use car manager is quite a character himself.

And obviously he's always busy, you know, whether he's trying to acquire some vehicles.

But we turned him we turned Rowdy Rodney into an AI character.

And whether we're using his actual voice or voice generated through AI,

we're kind of using that for content and advertising.

How do you know it's working?

Like you're creating these cool things.

You've got the cinematic videos.

You've got gift cards.

You've got like you're doing a lot of things to create good will to connect with clients.

How do you know it's working?

Dustin says you're a genius, an auto genius, in fact.

So we're going to give Dustin the props and the benefit of the doubt on that.

But what's your what's your gauge for ROI on it?

Yeah, it's honestly, I mean, are we really going to attach some dollars to it?

If I can get my salespeople to actually say we came in because of the commercial,

that'd be great.

But it's we're building brand equity.

So the ROI is getting people in the stores building trust,

building community, like I said before.

So all right.

To the dealer that says, hey, we're not funny here at this dealership.

We're not all that creative.

What would you say to that dealership team about getting creative if they don't have

a lot of the resources and things similar to what you've done?

They are.

Honestly, everybody is you know what you're attracted to.

You know what you're scrolling through the feed.

I mean, you just have to have the wherewithal and have the audacity to actually venture out

and create that content.

You have people at your stores that are creative that are producing content on their own already.

It's a car dealership, right?

I mean, it's like the funniest people in the world work at car dealerships.

Exactly.

So we can leverage that and get them to create content.

And what I always tell whether it's managers or principals, like,

would you look at the stuff that you're producing right now?

Yeah, it can be so dry and stale.

Yeah.

I got to tell you, my kids sometimes will say they wouldn't watch the stuff sometimes that

that from my own internal podcast and some of the internal clips.

So that is a good gauge.

Would your kids watch it?

Would your employees watch it?

Yuli, go ahead.

My question was just, how are you deciding what direction to go?

I mean, you mentioned some things that are seasonal.

But when you're building these campaigns or implementing these ideas,

like where are you getting your cues from to add on to what Sam asked you?

If you're a dealership that hasn't really leaned into this, what are you looking for?

How are you getting inspiration?

And then how are you implementing that?

Yeah, so it could be what's going on in the world.

What's relevant, right?

So I use this thing called, I call it the prime method.

Is your content personal?

Like, is it something that you enjoy?

Is this something that you can relate to everybody?

Which is the R stands for, is it relatable, relevant?

What's going on in the world today?

Like I said, it's Halloween.

We're getting ready for the holidays and everybody's preparing for that.

That's super relevant.

Is your content informational?

So the I, you can have fun and also share some great content.

Right now with Toyotas, the buy three tires get one for a dollar.

And we produce the video with the fake guy that's bald and comparing that with the tire.

So which leads to the M is your content memorable.

Can people relate to it?

We have nine years worth of zombie commercials that are out right now.

And the E stands for whether engaging or entertaining, right?

So it's like you said, there are little episodes, they're TV things.

We are attached to our devices and we want everybody to see what's going on in our lives.

And so I don't want to put you on the spot here, but the question would be,

rather than a generic hook, like come and check our scary deals for October,

you know, what's something that you could do that could be original?

Or what's something you have done?

If I haven't seen it yet, I apologize.

But oh, yeah, you can go down the valley.

Hi, Toyotas rabbit hole real quickly.

You can type in these things.

Ask Chad GPT.

What's what would be funny?

A spooktacular, you know, scary good deals.

You can definitely do that.

I love it.

So you are a creative director.

You're employed at the store.

The store is obviously seen enough value and ROI in it to invest in your position.

If you ran your own store, would you have the position?

What would your plea be to make sure that that position, you know, sustained itself?

And I mean, I think in our world of generative AI and creativity and social media,

you've got to have somebody like you as part of a dealership.

Well, we know that 70 percent, you know, of shoppers are influenced by video.

We see, you know, everybody's on Instagram, you know, real and in YouTube.

So it's now because you can produce this content straight from your phone.

That's organic.

You know, you don't have to.

And if it hits and if it gets viral and people are sharing that content.

So if you ask Sam, you're asking me about what I would do.

I would hold auditions for my employees.

Yeah, you make it a bigger deal.

Yeah, yeah.

And actually there are dealer groups that we've had on the show where they say,

hey, each one of their salespeople are social media influencers, right?

So they are going to create their own content.

They're going to put it out there.

And someone with your background really is kind of the starting point for that.

So Brian Ortega, creative director of Valley High Toyota.

We appreciate you being on the show sharing your perspectives for everybody wanting to see your work,

your content, go to Valley High Toyota on the different social media platforms.

You can check out these really cool videos, these generated AI images and campaigns and themes.

And we just appreciate you being on the show.

And by the way, going back to our circles, right?

So it's the conversation groups that we have.

We're going to make a big announcement again on Friday.

Brian Benstock is going to join the show.

You'll see the Cardiola ship guy.

We'd love to have you be part of one of the conversation groups as we all seek to learn together.

Any creative director would be great to have as part of that group as well.

So thanks for being on the show.

Thank you guys.

And for our audience, we continue to track the AWS outage and its impact

on dealerships, CRMs.

We'll get more information as they come in.

Lot of comments out there in the world about,

isn't it funny as we get towards the end of the month,

how often some of these different systems go down.

And I can attest to it.

Usually it's a bad API somewhere.

Jim Taylor says Azure down worldwide.

We'll continue to track that.

Bring you more information either today or on Friday's show as well.

I love it.

So Cargal Channel says follow stores that are creative.

Colin Kubik obviously.

Brian is the content king and Justin Jordan Cox says,

Ortega is leading the pack in the creative space for auto.

So actually next time we have them on,

we need to actually bring some of that content on for sure to show our audience.

So, but last up today, we're going to welcome to the show sales BDC manager

from the Van Horn Auto Group, Brittany Dean.

Brittany, welcome to the show.

Brittany, we're pumped to have you on.

Thanks for being here.

Even in this crazy day with some AWS outages and other things kind of impacting automotive.

Tell us how's Biz and as part of that, who are you and what do you do, Brittany?

Absolutely.

So my name is Brittany Dean, sales BDC manager with the Van Horn Automotive Group.

I've been in automotive for the last nine years,

but I also grew up in automotive.

My dad actually owns a small mechanic shop and he does body work as well.

So from little on, I was going on record calls with him.

I was doing estimates.

Then later on in life, I got into hospitality.

You know, did that for a few years, but I've really missed automotive.

So I came on over and joined the Van Horn Automotive Group and started in BDC

and worked my way up to the manager.

Very cool.

So you're the main and how many years have you been part of the BDC there at Van Horn?

Nine years.

Okay.

So over that decade, you have seen Brittany massive changes in customer appetite, customer

desire in terms of like how fast they want to be served, how fast they want to be contacted.

How dramatically have customer expectations changed and how have you and your BDC at Van

Horn adapted to that changing buyer appetite and buyer demand?

Absolutely.

So when I initially started, we had, you know, our response rates were roughly about 15 minutes,

which is a long time.

Now they're under a minute.

Customers want to be followed up with immediately.

They want their questions answered.

It's completely changed from nine years ago and it's really awesome to be a part of it

and keep learning.

And I love empowering my employees.

That's what I love to do because they're the experts in this field.

So I tell them all the time, you know, bring an idea to the table,

try it for a couple of weeks.

And if it works, we'll slowly start to roll it out between all of our locations.

So to get that fast, a lead response time, talk to us a little bit about what you're

implementing to do that.

Obviously you've got some customers that are reaching out at two o'clock in the morning.

And I hope you're not up at two o'clock to give them that one minute response time.

What are some of the tools and technologies that you're using to deliver

that fast a lead response?

Absolutely.

So we have AI, you know, we're using Podium.

AI does a fantastic job.

And AI is really there to provide us with information for the customer

so that when we reach out, we have a connection.

We are prepared.

We don't have to do the research independently ourselves.

So AI really, you know, gives us the ammo to follow up with the customer

and be prepared for that conversation.

So you as a manager, I did an industry spotlight with Podium a couple of weeks ago,

actually.

And it was interesting.

There was a dealer from, I think, Utah, a BMW dealer in Utah.

He talked about how as a GM now, part of his job is managing AI almost like an employee

because you've got these AI agents.

How does, how has your role as a BDC manager changed by implementing AI?

And how do you engage to train that AI so that it looks and feels and answers

and responds like a Van Horn employee?

That's a great question.

It takes a lot of work.

You definitely need somebody that's overlooking it, but everybody has eyes on it.

So we really empower our employees anytime they see that the AI maybe didn't respond

as needed or they want to tweak something.

They go ahead and we have a ticketing system that they submit.

And we have one person, Tina Tashi, who actually was on.

Tina's been on.

Yes.

We work very closely with her.

So she kind of oversees that and she submits any request to Podium.

She manages the AI and you have to have somebody that's heavily involved in that.

So Brittany, what would you say to the dealership employees?

I've heard this in some groups, not my own, not yours, but let's say somewhere out there

where AI doesn't do something right in the response to the BDC inquiry.

And then that employee says, hey, it's just proof the AI doesn't work.

It's off the rails.

It's not ready for prime time yet.

Throw it back in the box.

Let's turn back on the phone lines and let's go back to doing it the manual way.

What do you say to that employee?

AI had to learn from somewhere.

So AI must have learned from the humans at the dealership.

And ultimately we make mistakes as well.

Your employees at the dealership level, BDC, they make mistakes too.

AI learns from somewhere and you need to train and teach that AI how to respond.

And it's very quick and easy to make an adjustment.

And then he will, you know, he or she or the AI will answer the way you want it to.

Yeah.

So there's a new trend in automotive and it's eliminating BDCs either because AI has become

so efficient, proficient, or we had a sales trainer on a few weeks ago and he said, look,

BDC should either be frontline sales.

They're closely integrated with sales team.

They could take it up if they needed to because they're so well trained or turn it to AI and then

connect the customer quickly and directly to the sales person.

What would you say to the person that says, hey, we don't need a BDC as it's existed in the past

today.

Sales people should be able to handle it right out the gate.

If sales people were able to handle it, we wouldn't have BDCs, right?

So to be completely transparent with you, we're here because we really make sure that the follow

up happens that, you know, nothing falls through the cracks.

If you need a team that wants to test something or try something, we keep everything organized

down to your processes, making sure that sales does what they need to, that the customer

experience is there because nowadays it is all about that experience.

You can go and you can answer their questions all day long, but if you don't provide them

with a great experience, they will go right to that next dealership.

Yeah.

Brittany, I got a question for you.

And Sam, to your point, I would like to think that those dealerships that are trying to

eliminate BDC at this point have watched the erosion of what the BDC should be.

And Brittany, this question is for you.

Pre-COVID, I think a BDC was a little more effective, right?

And it's kind of morphed in a lot of places to just a call center.

Now, all of us know that a BDC should not be a call center, but a business development center.

So what are you doing under the rooftops to kind of proactively

mine for that business while you have AI fielding a lot of that inbound?

You know, what's your outbound strategy like?

That's a great question.

So with outbound, I have my agents focus a lot heavily on outbound.

You know, they need to make so many outbound connections every single day.

We are using all of our tools and resources that we have,

making sure that we're following up with our customers,

customers that may have purchased five years ago.

We also are creating specialized BDC departments.

So what I mean by that is, you know, a credit solutions department

that solely works with subprime customers.

We also have a customer relations department that we just started a few years ago

to focus on after the sale because we noticed a need for that.

So that's what we're doing to be proactive.

How has hiring changed as you talk about this evolving role, right?

You've got to be able to work and implement and manage AI.

You've got to be able to work with sales teams and work on that transition piece.

You've got to specialize in different areas like you just mentioned.

How has your hiring changed over the years?

And what do you, what's the best source for new BDC agents or sales people in the BDC?

Hiring has evolved a lot over the last nine years since I've been here.

We really look for people who have a lot of customer experience,

but you have to have a strong training program in place.

You truly do because if you don't have that, it's going to be very difficult

for that employee to be able to learn and adapt to everything that we have going on

in the automotive industry.

And really we want our BDC agents to continue to grow with the automotive group.

We want them to go into sales and become FNI managers.

So that's really what we look for.

Has that happened?

Absolutely.

Has that happened?

So it's kind of a starting step, right?

As you evolve and develop up through.

All right, great question from Lauren Klein and I love this.

How do you guarantee your customers get the same experience when they get into the store?

This is a big challenge in all of automotive.

It's kind of the disjointed steps as I go and are not repeating steps.

Warm transfer, internet salespeople.

What's working for you at the Van Horn Auto Group to ensure a consistent,

as Julie talked about, process all the way across.

Training.

I mentioned it earlier.

You have to have a strong training program in place.

And you have to be making sure that you coach people as time goes on.

So what we do on our end is when we get the customer, we really go ahead

and we call the store and we talk to them about each appointment that we set

and each lead we hand over.

We try to, we do warm transfers as often as we can to the sales floor

as well as to the managers so that everybody knows what's going on.

We also have a save a deal meetings in the morning.

Each BDC team has a meeting and we contact those stores and communicate

and let them know what's going on and what they can expect for the day.

So you're essentialized.

I'll bite on the training piece.

You mentioned it twice.

What's your training look like?

Ongoing for your BDC departments that sets you guys apart from the rest?

Absolutely.

So with a brand new hire training is about four weeks long.

First week is really going to be a lot of reading policies, procedures,

things like that.

Second week is going to be AI emails.

Third week is going to be phone calls.

And so as the fourth week, we kind of put all the pieces together.

But beyond that, you have to have training throughout the month and every week.

So I mean, I have three team leads in place.

They are meeting with their teams on a daily base.

They also meet with them on a weekly basis as well.

And then we have a large group training every month.

In the large group, are you involving the sales department as well?

Because I mean, it would stand to reason that you should kind of weave these departments together

to make sure we can solve for that CX.

That's really, that's extremely important.

It's very difficult to get the sales team here.

However, every month we do have the new sales consultants come and BDC puts on a training

for them.

So we show them all the tools, the CRM, everything that they need to know, our call system.

So we kind of train them.

And then we also have them shadow BDC.

We will also go out to the stores on a monthly basis as well so that we can build rapport

with each sales consultant and with management team.

And managers will come to BDC once a month.

So what advice would you give to a sales person wanting to work the best with a BDC agent to

ensure that continuity?

Like, do you have any one thing to do and one thing to stop doing today in October of 2025?

Well, we love food to be completely honest.

So you can always buy us food.

No, in all seriousness though.

So I would say that read the lead before you proceed.

It's one of the golden rules.

And also log your notes and touch base with your BDC.

And I always tell the BD agents as well that if you want to have a great relationship with

the sales consultants, call them.

Even if you can answer the customer question, that might be a great time for you to transition

over to the sales consultant.

Right?

Because that's a piece in the process that's kind of a little bit broken right now.

So make sure we do those transfers and introduce that sales rep.

And who is your CRM and your DMS that you use?

CRM is Vin Solutions and Dealer Track.

Okay.

So you do Dealer Track, Vin Solutions.

Yeah.

It's fascinating.

We've had Glenn Lundy on again.

He talks about BDC agents as really frontline sales.

And you bring up the point about training.

It's all about training and it's all about execution to create that consistent experience

all the way to the front.

If you had to look five years down the road given technology and AI and all the other things,

does the BDC stay the same very similar today to its roles and responsibilities?

Or what do you see as the biggest change last question over the next five years?

Over the next five years, I see that the focus is really going to shift.

And BDC is going to be more involved in the sales process.

We're really going to be focusing on digital retailing and going for,

taking that customer further down the road.

That's what I see the BDC evolving to and having those specialized departments.

You know, like we currently do with credit solutions, which is our subprime.

So Brittany, you would say the sales people go away.

You transfer them right to FNI.

Sales might say BDC goes away.

You're like, let's get rid of sales.

It's the battle between sales and BDC.

We absolutely appreciate you being on the show today.

Great perspectives.

Brittany Dean, sales BDC manager, Van Horn Auto Group.

Before you leave, are you guys impacted by this AWS outage at all?

Have you seen any impact from it?

Yes, we certainly are.

So in what way?

Anything you want to share?

Yeah, I mean, we just have issues with our CRM, of course,

just like everybody else's in the comments.

So we're doing everything we can to kind of stay ahead of it,

using our other resources and tools that we have.

Yeah, awesome.

Well, we appreciate you being on the show.

Thanks for sharing your perspectives

and the ways that you're delivering more elitely in the BDC.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for having me.

All right.

So it's interesting, Amazon reports its earnings tomorrow,

so it'll be fascinating to see is there any blowback, pushback from all of this.

Amazon Web Services outage reports spike just a week after major chaos disruption.

We haven't seen what is causing this.

We've been following this.

Thousands of reports on down detector showing an outage for AWS from Amazon

and also Azure from Microsoft.

This is impacting auto dealers who rely on these services for their CRMs

and countless other systems.

It's unclear what caused this outage,

but interestingly, Microsoft reports earnings after the bell today

and Amazon tomorrow.

Prediction, if they can't figure out what's causing it,

they can't guarantee consistent delivery of services.

It is going to be a challenge.

And Queens gets the money.

Seven says at Dame Damien, it's everything.

So we'll continue to watch this, Yuli.

Yeah, for sure.

Listen, there's a handful of companies that operate in this space

and dominate this space.

So I'm just thinking fictionally to the future

when we all have our little robot assistants following us around

and Amazon or AWS goes out or Azure goes out,

what happens to your sidekick?

Yeah, I mean, we rely more and more on these.

And you know what's interesting?

It's probably not an external force outside the US,

but what better way to create a disruption

than bring down some of these systems, whatever it is.

It impacts all of us.

So we're excited to come back on Friday.

We've got a special show.

We've got a special announcement.

The Cardiola ship guy himself will be joining us on Friday

for an announcement having to do with these circle groups.

We'd love to have as many involved in that as possible.

And then we've got Brian Benstock coming up on Friday.

So we're excited about that.

Until then, we say thank you all for watching Daily Deal Alive.

We break down the biggest moves in the car business

as they happen, including AWS Outage.

It's impact to the automotive industry.

Microsoft Azure will report their earnings on Friday.

Thank you for watching Daily Deal Alive.

We break down the biggest moves.

Don't forget, we're live here every Monday, Wednesday,

Friday, 1 p.m. Eastern.

So if this is your world, hit like, hit subscribe,

turn on those notifications so you never ever miss a beat.

And we'll see you Friday, everybody.

Thanks for being here.

Thanks, guys.

AWS Outage, Langham on Growth Strategy, Ortega on Creative, Dean on BDC Evolution | Daily Dealer Live

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