Ondar Tarlow: Activate More Car Buyers with VIP Events | Car Sales | Ep. 676
The Dealer Playbook
The Dealer Playbook Sep 4, 2025
Ondar Tarlow: Activate More Car Buyers with VIP Events | Car Sales | Ep. 676

Ondar Tarlow: Activate More Car Buyers with VIP Events | Car Sales | Ep. 676

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So for the dealers listening in, what's a place that they can start?
After they have an understanding of their audience, then what does it look like to make
sure that an event they put on does not fall flat?
So I come from the marketing world, and of course, marketing and sales being deeply
connected. So the first thing you need to know is...
One of the things that I enjoy most about producing the dealer playbook is
hearing from you the messages that I get of people who are getting so much
value out of the podcast, applying it to their day-to-day workflows, and finding
a thriving career right here in the retail auto industry. It means the world to me.
And you know, one of the ways that we make doing this possible is through my
agency, Flex Dealer. And of course, in the spirit of providing value,
I think this is a perfect time to head over to www.flexdealer.com
to show even further support for you, my beloved DPB gang.
Right now, if you go to my website, flexdealer.com, you can get a full,
free PDF of my number one best-selling book, Don't Wait Dominate.
And the reason I think it's so special is that a lot of the topics that are
discussed in this book are even more relevant today than ever with this
surge in popularized AI and people wondering, well, what can I do next?
How can I have a competitive advantage? Well, that's all here in this book.
And so I'd love to be able to offer you a free copy of this.
If you go to flexdealer.com, it would mean the world to me because that is how we
continue to produce this show for you.
Ondar Tarlo is a marketing strategist with more than 20 years experience
leading award-winning campaigns.
When he was the CMO at Connect to Federal Credit Union and Pacific
Premier Bank, his data-driven and creative storytelling delivered over 1.7
billion in product volume and tens of thousands of new customers.
He's worked with brands like Fastlane Drive, producing sponsorship
activations for the LA Chargers, the Galaxy, Anaheim Ducks,
Hanna Center and Beach Life Festival, which I mean, ever heard of any one
of these brands people? Of course you have.
Known for leveraging AI to increase campaign performance five-fold,
he's passionate about turning events into high-impact, story-driven experiences.
The DPB gang knows a bio that invigorates me to ask questions and learn more
is exactly what just happened.
Ondar, I got to ask you this right out of the gates,
especially in the context of automotive dealers.
They love the idea of community activation.
They love the idea of bringing more people into the dealership,
getting more foot traffic.
Some of them have tried cocktail parties and quote-unquote VIP events.
This idea of a VIP activation I think really stimulates a lot of desire
in the dealer community, but I'm curious from your perspective,
from all the events you've worked on, what makes them underwhelming?
What makes them great to be at?
And can you share an example of maybe to start a poorly conceived event
that missed the mark?
Absolutely, and this is a great question and I'm happy to be here today with you.
What's interesting is you have dealers, of course,
who are dealing in luxury and super luxury automobiles,
exotic cars, hypercars, which I'm all very familiar with.
And when you say VIP, I believe that VIP means different things
to different people at different levels.
And so the first thing you need to know is who is your audience?
And that's key.
So I come from the marketing world and, of course, marketing and sales
being deeply connected.
The first thing is who is your audience?
You have to make sure that you have segmented your audience.
You know exactly who you're going after.
What is the demographic?
What is the household income?
What is the area or areas from the geographic standpoint that you're going after?
What is it that you're looking for in terms of the cars
that they're looking to purchase and from there really identifying
something that is going to be unique to that segment, unique to that demographic?
Because you have to remember, of course, there's a lot of competitors
out there, dealers, et cetera, manufacturers.
They're all vying for this small population.
And so you have to differentiate yourself.
And so if you're kind of leaning on kind of the same traditional things
that you've done in the past, well, you may be a little disappointed with the results.
And so you have to focus on how to differentiate to come up with something
that's actually unique, that's different.
So if you're Stan, if you're starting, a point is, hey, we're bringing
in cocktail tables and we're bringing in champagne.
And this is really great because we have the cars on display.
Sometimes that can be a little flat.
And I have seen that I've experienced that many times.
Folks who are, you're looking to contact and that you're looking to grow your
network with and you're looking to sell vehicles with now and as well as into the future.
Have to be wowed.
Today, everyone again is vying for that same, that same population.
So you have to rise above the fold in terms of what you're doing.
And what I've seen most often in the marketplace is kind of the same thing.
You receive an email, looks good.
You're invited to do a test drive.
You're invited to go to a cocktail party and it's the same old thing again and again and again.
The way that you really stand out is to figure out what your audience is interested in.
Are they also an audience and is there a nearby body of water as an example
where you could do something with respect to a yacht?
So you're incorporating something that is at the level or perhaps even a higher
level than your demographics so that they're looking at this as something that
they're interested in doing and it's an activity as opposed to standing
around a cocktail table and having the same basic conversations that they're going
to do again and again and again.
Right.
Most people will get bored by that very quickly and they're going to turn off
to your dealership, they're going to turn off to your brand.
Oftentimes you'll look at associations and marketing.
If they're interested in a luxury or a high performance supercar,
a hypercar type of vehicle, they're probably interested in other things where
that you can integrate other brands.
Watches are a natural fit.
Anything to do with types racing, of course, like F1 as an example or Indy car
that you could integrate into your event or maybe you're having an event at
one of those locations in a suite at a booth or perhaps you're bringing a
vehicle, a driver or a combination thereof to your event to really spice
things up.
Now, of course, I'm talking about various things at different budget levels,
but when you're focusing on this audience, you know that you're going to
have to spend money to make money and that's key.
This is, there's a lot to unpack here.
I'm looking at my notes right out of the gates.
I mean, the poke, the poke in the eyes for me is, do you even know
your audience?
And it sounds so crazy because I think to your point, you brought up
the manufacturers earlier, they do a lot of that heavy lifting for us.
They're doing the market research.
They're, you know, figuring out what vehicles they should be building
and who those vehicles are for.
They're spending gazillions of dollars.
Don't fact check the number on marketing budgets and things that nature.
But then I think when it delineates to the dealer body, some of that
gets lost in translation and to your point and to the question, right?
Why do these fall flat?
I love how you, you bring it back to a foundational piece.
Who's your audience?
Who's your market?
Who are you trying to activate?
Um, you brought up different budgets and I'm curious about this
because it sounds like this is something, whether you're super
lux or a luxury brand.
And by the way, love the watch reference because I, I'm not going
to say I'm collector status yet, but I'm definitely a dial guy.
My wife sometimes will come into our bedroom on darts.
She'll be like, what are you watching on your iPad?
And I'll turn it around and that some guy assembling the watch.
I've been there too.
So it could be worse.
It could be worse.
Um, but this sounds like, I mean, gosh, if you're a Jeep dealer to
have some sort of off-road fun, you know, activity, and I love
that you use the word activity.
So for the dealers listening in, what's a place that they can start?
Where do they need to be paid after they have an understanding of their
audience, then what does it look like to make sure that, that an
event they put on does not fall flat?
Well, I think you said it.
So first budget, what is it that you have available as far as your
budget is concerned?
How many, how many potential customers or existing customers are
you looking to entertain?
And then from there, you've got to do research and really identify
the types of events or activities that are available and that you can
connect with other companies to support and help you, or are you
creating something completely bespoke?
One area to look at, we mentioned watches, watches as well as
beverage brands to think about the brands that kind of revolve around
automotive and then figure out if you can also align with those other
brands to help support you in your needs, which also is a way to
offset your budget so that's not completely set up to be supported
by your individual dealership or dealership network.
Because those other brands, this is the same audience.
We talked about watches or whether it is boating or whether it is hospitality.
You know, there's kind of the basic tenants.
If you think about this type of lifestyle as far as cars are
concerned and we'll get to the Jeep reference as well, but it makes
sense is what are, what are, what are activities that this
audience is interested in?
And so they interested in travel are interested in adventure travel.
And can you set something up so that you're taking that
event and that activation to the next level?
So we mentioned racing.
We mentioned watches.
We mentioned hospitality, luxury vacations.
All of those things match up very, very well.
So in my time as I've been a member and also working to support
Fastlane Drive as far as brand partnerships are concerned, Fastlane
Drive is a 2000 member exclusive network across the world, 23 chapters,
one in Monaco, one in Paris, Tokyo and 20 in the US.
The reason that I bring that up is our audience is this luxury
super lux hypercar style audience.
And what fits well for them is exactly that it is experiences
that are something that they cannot attain in their daily life.
Because when we talk about competitors, it's not only the
automotive brands that you're competing with, but you're also
competing with other luxury brands that are also buying for the
same audience as time.
It is a small population that has the wherewithal and the funds
to be able to purchase these types of vehicles.
And so therefore you have a lot of brands buying for that same
timeframe and same, same mind space.
I love that.
It's not that and tell me if I'm understanding this correctly.
It's not that they can't attain these things because they're in that
audience. It's that they can't attain it in their daily life.
It's it's outside the norm.
It's outside the routine.
It's there's a measure of novelty to this experience.
That's exactly right because it's about access as well.
So oftentimes if you are a high net worth or ultra high
net worth individual, you have access, but you don't
necessarily have the same type of access that can be
achieved through dealer, dealer network, as well as collaborating
with other brands, as I mentioned, kind of the F1 reference.
If you're bringing in someone from an F1 team, which would
really be at a top level, you know, oftentimes an individual
to have that access is going to be difficult for them
unless it revolves around a race.
Or are you bringing in folks from the manufacturer?
Those that are very interested in the automotive lifestyle
find it fascinating to speak with engineers,
to speak with designers face to face.
That is something that is amiss in most events
that I attend as far as automotive is it's really left up
to the dealer and the sales team, which have the best
intentions, which is great.
But at the same time, if they can call upon the engineers,
the designers and others that can speak to the to the
vehicle and how it was developed and how it was designed
with authority and interest and charisma, then you're
getting to that next level where again, the average, you
know, high net worth, ultra high net worth of digital still
does not have access to those folks.
And that can be something that can raise the game.
Because if you're bringing in a, let's say you're an
Aston Martin dealer and you're bringing in a designer
from Aston Martin or an engineer or part of that core
team, that's going to be of high interest to many of
those that might be attending your event.
And then you can use it to market because let's go
back to the to the foundation that we talked about a
second ago, you have to think about how are you marketing
this, you might be marketing in your dealership, you might
be marketing of the direct mail, you might be marketing
it through email and you might be marketing it through
social media, as long as you can target that audience.
But then what is going to bring that audience to
you, beautiful cars, possibly, but it's also people
and stories because automotive, the automotive world
is sold on storytelling.
And so you have to remember that as part of your
marketing as well.
So bringing that audience in, serving them well so that
when they see your brand, no matter where they see it,
they're thinking about the experience that they had
that was truly unique.
I think it's interesting in preparation for our
conversation.
It heightened my awareness of just how much the
associations are in play in day to day life.
For example, my wife works at an all women's gym.
She's a fitness trainer there.
But the owner of the gym also raises and trains horses.
So horse racing horses.
And so of course now I'm paying attention to horse racing
and I don't want to alienate this part of my
audience, but I don't get it yet.
But what I noticed is because I'm a watch guy, I
immediately noticed my favorite watch brand, which
is associated with horse racing, which is long
jeans, and I just love their watch.
They're not the most expensive.
They're not the cheapest.
They're they're kind of they're in they're in
Michael territory.
Let's hit they're in Michael territory.
And I love the way they look.
And so I'm like, oh my gosh.
And you know, it's interesting what happened
immediately.
I was like, do I like horse racing now?
Like, isn't it's a thing because I already liked
the thing I was familiar with.
And then I'm thinking about this, you know, there
are some dealers who do fork out a lot of money
to have maybe a celebrity affiliation.
Maybe it's the local sports team affiliation
or something like that.
But then to your point, I was like, you know,
if that's going to cost me like a hundred grand,
how cool would it be to put on an event instead of
having spending a hundred grand on a celebrity
to say 14 words, to like dial in, no pun intended,
to the watch crew and be like, hey, at our event,
we are giving away Longin, like our guests
at this thing will have will get a Longin
watch as a parting gift.
Yes, it's a hundred grand, but I get something to
I don't know, you got my brain moving here.
Yeah, no, it's a great point, because again, it's that offer.
Some you may have some folks that, you know,
when they show up to the dealership in the event,
you know, they think, great, I'm ready to buy a car,
but usually it's not all of them.
So there's got to be some connection point after that.
Having some type of tangible and interesting offer
to the audience is great.
It's also a great way to be able to collect
additional data, right, utilizing all the rules
and regulations and transparency so that you can
continue that conversation with them.
You know, you may have their email address
or their mailing address only, and that's how you
contacted them to invite them to the event.
But if they give you permission to be able
to utilize their mobile number or other
information that you can gather, you know,
which is kind of fairly standard when you're
doing offers, then that gives you additional
data that you can use to market to them
types of watches they like, as an example.
And so going back also to the experience
aspect is to your point with watches is, you
bring in, you and collaborate with the
with the watch company or specific boutique
that has multiple watch brands and they're
bringing in, you know, a master watchmaker,
which is going to help their business.
And obviously it's going to be interesting
and intriguing to your guests as well as your customers.
This is, I love this.
I love it because especially in such a
tech focused world where it's like, run Facebook ads,
run Google ads, this sort of a thing.
You can cut through the noise and be the one
dealership who stands out predicated on doing
something that that is out of the norm.
And I think this day and age from a human
connection perspective, people want something to do.
To your point about the experience, rich people,
poor people, middle class, but it doesn't
matter what your demographic is.
We all want something to do and we want
to connect with real human beings.
And I want to ask you this on that kind of sentiment
because you've brought up, I've heard you bring
up some unconventional venues on a yacht or, you
know, some sort of an experience or activity
that would really stand out for that target
audience where dealers sadly still are
challenged with this public perception of, you
know, gimmicks and, you know, those sorts of
things. What would you say to those that are
considering doing something like this so that it's
met with the right intention from their audience?
Well, again, it starts with knowing your audience
and being able to communicate and appeal to
them on a level that's of interest to them.
Right. So it has to be a match.
It has to be a match between the automotive
brand or brands that you're representing and
then the audience that you're looking to gather,
whether, again, that's existing customers and
you're looking potentially for additional sales
or retention or whether you're looking to bring
in new customers. The buzzword, of course,
is authentic. So it has to be something that
aligns with their interests.
If it aligns with their interests, they're
not going to see it as a gimmick. They're
going to see it as, wow, this automotive
dealership knows me and they know me
enough to invite me to something that I
have an interest in. That's a key piece
because people are often proud of the
vehicles that they drive and so they
want things to be able to support that,
you know, themselves being proud and
themselves looking at the brand as
really part of that because oftentimes,
especially in your higher end vehicles,
that persona that you have, the car
that you have, sometimes blends
together to a certain degree. If you
have a sports car or you have a
hypercar, you're obviously typically
interested not only in more of a
collectible style automobile, but then
you're also maybe interested in racing
and other things that go along with it.
So being able to reinforce why they
selected your brand or brands to begin
with is something that people find
important and they find interesting
and they will activate with you.
Hey, does your marketing agency suck?
Listen, before we hop back into this
episode, I know you know me as the host
of the Dealer Playbook, but did you
also know that I'm the CEO of Flex
Dealer, an agency that's helping
dealers capture better quality leads
from local SEO and hypertargeted ads
that convert. So if you want to sell
more cars and finally have a partner
that's in it with you that doesn't
suck, visit FlexDealer.com.
Let's hop back into this episode.
I don't think that we've, and this
is kind of ironic, a car dealer
podcast, cars, racing.
I've never talked so much about or said
the word racing as much as I
have on this episode.
And I want to ask you about that.
It's poignantly placed.
You brought up F1.
You brought up IndyCar earlier.
You've said that sports
sponsorships can galvanize new
markets. And so I'm curious
what some of the takeaways, let's
say from Formula One and pro sports
activations translate directly
to a showroom when crafting
a luxury client experience.
Yeah, absolutely.
So it's it's about the imagery
and it's about the experience.
So if you're looking to align
the two, you have to look at what
are you bringing into the
dealership or the dealership
experience again digitally as well
as physically to be able
to, you know, evoke
that type of emotion.
Or as we've talked about
experiences bringing, let's say
your top clientele to the track
or potentially even having a track
day, which I do see some dealers
doing, which I think is a great
idea and works really well.
Because again, it's an activity
you're getting people out into
the mix and they're doing
something again, they can't
typically do each day and is
very exciting for them.
And to a degree, that kind of
runs itself.
One one piece you have to
obviously keep in mind of whether
or not it is professional sports
or F1 as part of professional
sports is, you know, there's
obviously budgets to that as well.
So if you're expending dollars,
you want dollars back.
So the data capture piece and the
follow up is key.
And that's also where I see a lot
of automotive manufacturers, as
well as dealerships fall down
is that follow up.
The follow up is key because
you know as a dealership
that oftentimes that sales
cycle can be very long.
So what are you doing
on a consistent basis to
communicate with that
audience about something that
they're interested in, not
just sales, not just your latest
lease deals, but different
different types of experiences,
different types of subject matter
that they're interested in, you
know, that you're branding as
part of your email or as
part of your website or as part
of direct mail or as part of
any other marketing medium that
you're doing is important to
zero in on.
You talk about plan.
Tell me if I got this quote
right, plan, plan, plan,
then data, data, data.
Yeah, that's from a previous
show, but you're you're spot on
there. So if you don't have
a plan, things are typically
not going to end up really well.
So you've got to literally
create a marketing plan
and you also have to allow
for the budget towards
the things that you believe
will work really well based on
the research and based on the
data that you have and based
on working either with the
manufacturer or other dealerships.
But then also you need to have
a test budget.
And so that plan
needs to incorporate both those
that are kind of strongholds in
terms of being able to bring in
business and retention
and those that you need to test
with. And so that
plan as well as that testing
are key testing
in nowadays is easier
than it used to be in the past.
But with additional data comes
additional complexities.
So the first thing is you have
to make sure that you're
trusting your data
so that when you're planning
and how you're going to utilize
that data to market and then
follow up and then obviously
go down the entire funnel.
It's very clear exactly
what you're looking for as far
as success metrics are
concerned.
And then as you're testing
what's working what's not
what's working perhaps you
double down on that as far as a
budget is concerned and perhaps
you back off from what's not
working. You look at it
revisit it figure out what
you need to tweak and then
test again.
This is this
is quite frankly it's all it
is marketing.
That is the sales piece within
marketing is all part of it.
But you've got to start off with
those basics.
I love that it's it's like you
plan but also
acknowledging this thing that I
don't think a lot of people
who do marketing are comfortable
with which is.
Account for failing in some degree
like what is the experiment if
not identifying the
failure point and then trying
again.
And so I love that you're
you're approaching it from that
angle because it's like we can
plan and plan
and plan and plan
and look at the data but we do
have to pass through this testing
phase to really know how it's
going to land and then the data
that comes out of that gives
us so much more
insight to to work with.
And like you said I love that
you touch on this because I
mean gosh we're this is the
automotive industry
so that there's a positive ROI
on the backside of this like
nobody's
wants to really engage in
anything now just to test or
just to perpetuate
brand if they can't
track ROI.
So I'm curious if you're to
when you're looking at all of
this data what are some of the
key indicators you're looking
forward to to understand
yes this worked.
I mean aside from money because
that's the easy thing.
Oh look we met but like what are
what are some milestone markers
I guess along the way to know
yes this test is going to bear
fruit.
Sure. And you know these are
the things that top brands who
are successful do all the time
but if you're a smaller brand of
your individual dealership or
you're a group of dealerships you
can do this you can do this same
thing and it starts off
with it's a pre-mortem.
So you have to identify
what are the reasons that this
campaign that this activity
that this experience that this
event could fail.
That's important not a post-mortem
sure we can do that and figure
it out but let's do a pre-mortem
and identify all the reasons
that something could go wrong
which simply there's a lot.
If you're identifying them and
then figure out how you how you're
able to identify and figure
out how to make sure that that
doesn't happen as best as
possible you're going to probably
eliminate a lot of those
chances.
So as opposed to kind of a hope
and pray mentality really is
your planning you're planning
it into the additional
point you know that you made
is one a simple example
is email marketing.
So with email marketing there's
some key pieces that you need
to look at. So first off you
need to make sure that you have
clean data and you have to make
sure that all the email
addresses that you have are
delivering.
There are some relatively
inexpensive tools that you can
use in order to identify
is your email list clean or
is it a bunch of junk because
if you've got 100,000 emails
and 90,000 of them are not
going through because they're
old outdated or whatever
the case the value of that
list is dramatically less.
So you have to look at we talked
about data, data, data you have
to look at that email address
that list of email addresses
figure out what are actually
clean email addresses.
Once you have that list there's
your audience.
So let's say that you have a
thousand email addresses.
And once you send out that
first email
what is happening with that
email what is the actual
open rate you need to be able
to track open rate.
I've seen this not too long
ago in various businesses
where they're having trouble
even tracking the open rate,
which is just inexcusable in
today's world with today's
technology.
That was maybe something 25
years ago.
You have to be able to track
open rate and you also have
to be able to track click to
open rate. These are the
basics.
So how many opened
and then how many clicked to
perform an action and if you
don't have a click option
within your email you're
missing out on a ton because
that's your first conversion
action all the way through
the funnel with in this
case the email funnel.
So open rate, click to open
rate and then what actually
happened after they clicked
did they land on a landing page.
Can you track that landing page?
Did they complete a form?
Can you track the completion of
that form to the thank you
page? And then from there is
that information ingested in
some type of CRM at
your dealership to be able
to then track it to an actual
sale.
So those are the basics
I would say as far as data is
concerned but you see misses
along the way in various
companies and dealerships and
this is what you cannot have
happened.
You have to have folks who
understand marketing.
You have to have folks who are
comfortable with data need
to have the right people in
the right seats.
Speaking of people.
We're in an AI
crazed bubble right now
and I want to talk to you a
little bit about this.
How are you seeing
this impacting
the the ecosystem of what we're
talking about now and where do
you see it going in the future
as as the popularization
of AI continues.
Sure.
So let's talk about
generative AI to begin with
and oftentimes that is used
for content development content
ideation as well as design.
So first off if you've got
a marketing team even it's a
small marketing team you need
to identify what do you what
do you mean by AI and
then how can it fit into the
workflow that you already have
to not replace but
assist the team that you have to
be able to do more be able to do
more accurately and be able to
do more quickly so they have
the efficiency game fitting it
into the workflow they have now
or adjusting the workflow so
that it makes more sense in the
AI world and then with Gen AI
utilizing tools and being able
to test those tools so that
you can come up with content
content that's unique that
you check that you fact check
it's not a copy and paste
situation you will make some
very very dire errors if
you're doing copy and paste as
far as generative AI is
concerned whether utilizing a
paid version of chat GPT or
Claude or other tools.
These tools are very handy
but you have to use them in
the right way.
If you're looking one way to
do that is ideation
ideation as far as campaign
ideas but you have to give
and you have to feed the AI
engine a ton of information.
If you're just simply looking
for ideas that you can copy
and paste well likely you're
going to have some other
beginners on that level doing
the same thing and you're
going to come out with stuff
that's very very cookie
cutter.
I cannot emphasize that enough
that it's AI has moved so
quickly especially the Gen
AI side on content the
written word if you will as
part of that content that
people will spot content
and be able to identify if
it is generated by
specific chatbots.
So it's critical that
if you're using it you're
using it in the right way and
you're using it in your fact
checking and you're making sure
that it is not copy and paste
and you're coming up with
original ideas that can be
enhanced as well as research
by AI and when you're doing
research as far as AI is
concerned and you're doing a
prompt because really it's
all about prompts as far as
Gen AI is concerned one of
those prompts should be
providing you with the sources
of the information that the
prompt is getting is
gathering and so that AI is
providing back to you the
sources you're asking for
credible sources and you're
not only asking for sources
but you're asking for linked
sources.
Many of us including myself
when you're doing research
or content ideation and you're
asking for those sources
legitimate sources etc.
Fine that when you receive
links sometimes they don't go
anywhere or sometimes you end
up with information that is
completely incorrect and those
are what's called an AI
hallucination and this may
not be new for some of your
audience and for some of your
audience it may be new but
it's not just as simple as
saying hey chat GPT I want to
make reservations at a great
Italian restaurant this is
much deeper this is a way
where you can actually use
you can utilize AI to help
be a research assistant help
be a be an idea
sounding board as well
and so doing the homework
on AI taking courses
online as far as generative
AI will help tremendously
what we use AI in the past
is being able to take a look
and be able to create models
so propensity models in terms
of how how likely
is person a versus person
be going to purchase
whatever it is whether it is
financial services and a loan
or whether it is an automobile
and I believe there are
resources now available in
the automotive industry to do
just that but when you're
talking to various providers
one thing to always keep
in mind is there's a lot of
what I call paperware right
there's a lot of promises
made that cannot necessarily
be fulfilled so you got to
take everything with a grain
assault but first and foremost
is to understand the technology
I wrote down
paperware in all caps
because I love
I love that I didn't indent
that word but I used it
anytime I love it and
and I mean this is so good
I mean some of the notes right
that I'm thinking about as
or writing as you're as you're
sharing your wisdom with us is
most people are probably
not understanding how much
information you actually have to
feed into a prompt to get
a better response back
and and it's actually quite
tremendous it's if you don't
know how to write you better
start learning because you're
going to have to lengthen and
deepen the the prompt that
you're giving AI so I think
that's a huge call out and I
love you know bringing up the
where you do get a link and it's
a broken link that goes to
nothing but but
what worries me about
it is how many people in a
professional setting especially
are maybe planning on putting
something on utilizing it
for idea creation
or you know a first
draft of something and they're
asking for sources but they're
not checking the work
that's a killer for sure
I mean it starts off with
understanding what you what exactly
you're using and if you're not
understanding it and then I would
not use it
with GPT though because it
single-handedly destroyed the
m-dash from my writing
arsenal and I love
the m-dash
yes professional
writers right often utilize the
m-dash but which had GPT
over uses it
tremendously over uses it
okay I've got one one final question
for you
you've
brought up or we talked a little bit
about fast lane drive and the
expanse of that community
they have something
correct me if I'm wrong the J
a fast lane to success
kind of a philanthropic
purpose to the
the community and I know a lot
of dealers we could go to any of
our investments are investing deeply in communities
but when when we talk
to them it's kind of like yeah we
sponsored something and that's
as far as it went but
you know we see this as a brand
like
and whatnot tell me a little bit
of more about how we can be
more intentional more meaningful
in the philanthropy especially
when many dealerships
are the flagship business
in the community that they live
or reside. Yeah what an excellent
question and philanthropy is dear
dear to my heart so I'm on the
board of junior achievement
in my local area across
a couple of counties in Southern California
and so what we did with fast lane drive
and specifically in Orange County California
as part of that chapter is we teamed
up with junior achievement
which if some of your listeners are
not aware junior achievement is a national
organization it has 99 chapters
there's also an international portion as well
and it focuses and has been
focused for the last hundred years
on financial education
career readiness and entrepreneurship
and
that matches up well I believe with
many dealers and
individuals of those three things so
it's one of many obviously nonprofits
it's something that I see
as really helping
students which is a big piece
in terms of my focus
to your point there are a
lot of businesses out there who do
a great amount of work in terms
of supporting monetarily a
nonprofit and they get a logo
where they get a write up
but what you need to look at is again
is how can you utilize those
dollars better so not only
is it going to help the nonprofit more
but it's also going to be reflective of
your stature in the community
and what you're doing to help the community
be on the logo I
talk a lot about this is that
that you can pay
small or large dollars to get
a logo on something but if somebody
just sees a logo they're going to pass
right by it you have to have an entire
plan and it doesn't need
to be complicated about
the purpose of you investing dollars
into various types of sponsorships
whether it is nonprofit or
whether it is a sports sponsorship
with a nonprofit piece
to your point with dealerships being
an important part of the community
that's key is does the nonprofit
align with what your values are
how is the nonprofit also going to
help to market the support
that you've given I mean it is a two
way street you're obviously doing this for philanthropic
purposes but you're also trying
to make sure that your name gets out
there and that your name is associated
with a nonprofit that is supportive
of the community and of
areas of the community that are important
to the community as well
and sometimes those are smaller nonprofits
who sometimes are a little bit more nimble
and can do more things or
those that have a local chapter like a junior
achievement you have some nonprofits
that are very national in nature
and can help you on a national level
but may not be able to help you as much as far as local
is concerned and that's where I see the difference
as far as dealerships are concerned is
you know oftentimes they are very local
or they're regional and so focusing
on things that can
help them in those local or regional
areas is key and then also obviously
can reflect on them as best as possible
across various types
of marketing medium
and communications on a regular basis
that's powerful I love
it's because you're right
it's really a logo at this point
for many many dealerships
this idea of okay how can we integrate
man I feel like if I was in that
position I would
somebody on my staff would be specifically
responsible for
and have a stewardship for the
philanthropy side of it because I mean
to me and this is stuff
we love talking about on the show
what's the point in doing
any of this if we can't
elevate and lift and help somebody else
it fits
I feel like if it's only about
putting stash in what are we going to do
we're going to stash
wads of cash in the walls like
Pablo Escobar
like what are we actually doing
any of this for I think
the greatest joy in fulfillment
in life comes from
first achieving
one's goal
and then after its achievement
helping somebody else achieve their goal
or helping them find clarity
on their goal I couldn't agree more
and that's the student
aspect is why that's so important to me
because students you know they they haven't
yet become adults right they haven't
yet experienced the world as many as
many of us have and so
to be able to give them
important information share knowledge
with them and then also to to receive
knowledge from the students
and share is very
important and so that's an
aspect that we took in
a fast lane drive in Orange County
and so I'll tell you a little bit about how this worked
and may help your audience as well
and so we combined efforts with not only
fast lane drive in Orange County
but we also did that with
with junior
achievement and then also
Marconi Auto Museum so it was kind of a
perfect blend of the
perfect synergy so we had students
from three high schools over a hundred students
come in and attend
essentially a workshop at Marconi
Auto Museum in Tustin, California
the Marconi Auto Museum if you could
imagine has probably
over a hundred cars
Ferraris Lamborghinis race
cars, amazing motorcycles
and they do this type of work to help their
community and so we talked about
what is the process of buying a car
leasing versus buying, financing
what are the things you need to understand
when you're talking to a dealer
you're going into a dealership and this is
for high school students some of which
and most of which hadn't purchased their
first car yet maybe some of them have
but this is the type of key information
that's helpful for them to understand
and then we
did that with our Fastlane Drive members
who are majority entrepreneurs
successful entrepreneurs who have their own
business or multiple businesses you know
often times like dealers as well
and they talked about their own experience
their own experience as far as education is
concerned, their own experience as far as business
is concerned and the audience
were students, these were students anywhere
between ninth grade and twelfth grade
and they were super interested
and they were interested because
the idea of
exotic cars got them interested
but what held them there were the stories
that our members
and Marconi and Junior Achievement were able
to share
Mom
I'm
I've taken so many notes today
you've got my mind moving
I love it that's what makes this all
worth it what makes it meaningful
seeing
the shimmer
of light in their eyes as they get
it and they see the bigger picture of what's
possible I think it's such powerful stuff
I can't thank you enough for joining me on the
show today how can those
listening or watching connect with you
absolutely and it's been it's been a wonderful
show so I really appreciate being invited to
today's episode and to
find me ideally is on LinkedIn
so if you put in Andar
Tarlo you will find me on LinkedIn
feel free to DM me I'm always available
to answer questions be
able to ideate and share experiences
with those that are interested
Andar Tarlo thanks for
joining me on the dealer playbook podcast
thank you
hey thanks for listening to the dealer playbook podcast
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