What Does “BDC” Stand For?
In the automotive industry, BDC stands for Business Development Center. As its name suggests, a BDC furthers the reach and productivity of a business – in this case, your dealership. BDCs, whether internal or outsourced, handle everything from inbound calls and internet leads to customer follow-ups and appointment setting.
What Does a BDC Do?
BDCs can be as simple as a small team within a car dealership that handles customer communications and lead management or as robust as an outsourced partner like Strolid that handles everything but in-person customer interactions for you.
Think of an automotive BDC like a car’s electrical system and engine control unit combined. Electrical wiring makes sure signals from switches and sensors reach the right places, while the ECU takes in and organizes inputs, then sends out correct responses to keep the car running smoothly. Similarly, an automotive BDC receives customer leads, processes and organizes them in a CRM, and provides consistent customer engagement.
Sales BDC vs. Service BDC
Sales and service BDCs are not competitors; they’re two important players on the same team working toward a common goal. Both provide quick customer responses and reliable information to keep patrons happy, loyal, and spending money at your dealership.
Sales BDC
Sales BDC generates and nurtures leads for the sales team. Sales BDC representatives answer inquiries about vehicles, pricing, and availability; they also follow up with internet leads, phone calls, and showroom visitors, as well as re-engage past customers and lease-end clients.
BDC Sales Goal: To fill your showroom with qualified leads.
Service BDC
Service BDC tasks include booking oil changes, repairs, and maintenance appointments, reminding customers about recommended services or overdue visits, following up on declined service work, and calling no-shows to reschedule. In short, a service BDC keeps your service department busy.
BDC Service Goal: To maximize service department traffic and retention.
In-House vs. Outsourced BDC Models
Chances are, your dealership is running multiple outreach campaigns as we speak. Email blasts, promotional mailers, website lead magnets, and maybe even a trendy social media video, all capturing new leads at lightning speed. You clearly don’t need more leads – but you might need support converting the ones you have. Whether you hand that hefty job to an internal team or outsource it to an expert is up to you.
Where Internal BDC Falls Short
With an in-house-only BDC, automotive sales staff are likely feeling the burn. There aren’t enough hours in the day for even the best associates to keep tabs on every email, phone, social media, and website interaction, let alone connect with past customers, missed appointments, and showroom walk-ins. As your customer base grows, so will the demands on your CRM and sales team. If your staff can’t keep up, and they start leaving customers unanswered, you’ll lose far more than you’ll gain.
Leveling Up With Outsourced Automotive BDC
An automotive BDC partner like Strolid can be your dealership’s performance engine. Our BDC agents will optimize your current customer opportunities, leverage AI-powered accountability, guide your internal team in real time, and prioritize high-converting leads, all while offering complete transparency into every call and conversation. Rather than overtaxing your dealership staff with new responsibilities, Strolid partners with you to lighten the load so you can outsell your competitors.
AI + Human Agents: The New Standard for Automotive BDC
The auto industry has shifted from prioritizing lead volume to valuing lead quality, which means chasing new leads without optimizing the ones you’ve already captured will lead to dealer inefficiency and staff burnout, not a higher ROI. In an attempt to keep pace with this shift, many dealerships have handed BDC responsibilities over to bots, losing the human touch.
Strolid approaches artificial intelligence differently. We see AI in automotive BDC as one tool of many, not a one-size-fits-all substitute for live customer engagement, to deliver these results and more:
- CRM data interpretation
- Predictive analytics
- Streamlined sales and service operations
- Increased staff productivity
- 24/7 customer support
- Mass personalization
- Increased customer retention
- Instant scalability
How To Determine Your Need for Outsourced BDC
Dealerships usually turn to an outsourced BDC partner when their internal teams are stretched too thin or can’t manage consistent engagement. If you’re wondering about the efficacy of your internal BDC, these are telltale signs that could indicate a need for external BDC guidance:
- Unanswered or late-answered inquiries
- Low appointment-to-lead ratio
- No standardized customer experience
- Inconsistent customer follow-ups
- Empty service bays
- Missed revenue from customers who decline add-ons
- No-shows aren’t rescheduled
- Conversion data is ignored or unanalyzed
- Customer satisfaction plummets because customers feel ignored
- Low profits don’t justify digital ad and lead-gen spend
If multiple factors from this list are true for your dealership, we’re certain you would benefit from the structure and proven efficiency of an automotive BDC company like Strolid.
Rest Easy With Strolid’s Auto BDC Best Practices
Strolid was built on a foundation of United States-specific automotive BDC best practices to help dealerships like yours reach and surpass KPIs. Here’s a closer look at Strolid’s automotive BDC best practices; consider it a snapshot of the benefits we bring to our clients.
- CRM Integration: We leverage your existing CRM but expand upon its influence by analyzing its data and extrapolating insights. Say goodbye to data silos and hello to profit growth!
- AI Tracking: Via compliant AI call, email, and text tracking, we bank valuable customer information that enables your dedicated BDC agent to personalize each customer interaction.
- Skilled Representatives: Strolid removes any need for dealerships to spend thousands on internal BDC representative training. Each member of our highly trained team has an average tenure of seven years for optimal performance.
- 24/7 Support: No inquiry will ever go unanswered thanks to 24/7 Strolid agents who are there when customers need them most. We’re available even when your dealership is closed to keep leads warm, appointments full, and sales flowing.
Strolid reps are continually upskilling their product knowledge and training to provide our dealership clients the best possible guidance. Our partnership eliminates the need for expensive external training and instead places one or more seasoned BDC representatives at your service. Maintain your dealer’s relevance and stay current with automotive trends with our BDC professional services.
Pros and Cons of Automotive BDC
Pros
- Builds customer connections at every touchpoint: phone, email, chat, etc.
- Focuses on warm and hot leads to increase appointments and sales.
- External BDC support frees up dealership staff for in-person customer interactions.
Cons
- Internal BDC representatives take extra time and money to train.
- BDC tasks can take sales staff away from more pressing work.
- Mismanaged customer connections produce underwhelming results.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does BDC mean in the automotive industry?
Automotive BDC, or an automotive Business Development Center, is a hub of highly trained customer representatives who focus on generating, nurturing, and following up with sales and service leads. An automotive BDC can be internal or external, depending on your dealership’s needs; both have pros and cons, though an outsourced BDC like Strolid can be more flexible, scalable, and profitable.
What’s the difference between a sales BDC and a service BDC?
Sales BDC is the branch of automotive BDC that handles lead generation and loyalty building. This team answers customer questions about your dealership’s inventory and incentives while also engaging past and new customers online or by phone. Service BDC doesn’t compete with sales BDC; it complements it by filling your service department’s schedule with oil change, repair, and maintenance appointments and rescheduling missed appointments.
How is AI changing automotive BDC?
Artificial intelligence, when properly utilized, presents an exciting new opportunity to reach even more interested customers, build deeper relationships with past patrons, and make every person who reaches out to a dealership feel seen, heard, and understood. At Strolid, we harness AI power to securely and compliantly log personalized customer information so that every future interaction is as customized as possible.
