As a baby boomer, I’m confident that a lot of you out there are WWII buffs like me, which means I often watch the History Channel. I most enjoy the episodes where things look grim and someone with optimism, vision, and drive succeeds when everyone thought it was impossible.

Recently, I watched a program about the impossibilities of the D-Day landing on a French beach and creating a beachhead for all of the men and equipment to get ashore. The British allies had already tried once and everyone was wiped out, but the only way that the allies could defeat the Nazis was to have a permanent harbor from which to supply their troops.

Winston Churchill had the idea of creating a floating harbor (later known as Mulbury Harbour) that would be constructed and floated across the English Channel 100 miles in 200 foot sections to create a two mile long landing dock in two separate locations. The American generals thought he was nuts but he convinced them anyway. His instructions to his generals were to build it and “Don't argue about difficulties. The difficulties will argue for themselves...” Long story short, Churchill’s idea worked and we won the war.
Now why am I telling you all of this? That’s easy, you are being bombarded with all kinds of reasons you can’t sell cars. No leasing, bad economy, high gas prices, the list goes on, and I’m telling you “Don't argue about difficulties. The difficulties will argue for themselves...”
How do you do that? You make sure that all of your systems are sound, in place, and adhered to. Here are some of the systems I’m talking about.

1)    Your selling system: Do you have a specific track that you use for your salespeople to run on without deviation or do most of your sales people just “wing it?” Does this system give you consistent results? One of my customers devised what they call a ten-step program. Their system goes from the meet and greet, all the way through the test drive, trade-in, sale, and delivery. I didn’t give you all the steps because it’s not mine to give. I am confident, however, that this system has helped them sell way over a million cars and they have been around over 100 years. This is a tried and true system and they use it religiously. If their closing ratio drops they know where to start looking. Do you have something in place like that? If you do, adhere to it and if not find one and always use it.

2)    The same argument I just made goes for every aspect of your dealership, especially how the phones are handled.

3)    Do not forget that having the right people in the right positions is critical to your success.

Nothing worthwhile is easy and I know for a lot of you it’s tough, but you need your systems and people in place to fight through these difficulties and make lemonade out of lemons. The right people and systems can be your harbor in this storm. Make it strong and capable of withstanding whatever comes along. Then you too can say like the great Sir Winston Churchill “Don't argue about difficulties. The difficulties will argue for themselves...” Now get on with it.

David Alan “The Automotive Direct Mail Guruä” is CEO of MAIL-RITE INTERNATIONAL INC. David is also the author of the best seller The $100 Million Dollar Playbook and the just released Direct Mail for Business Book. He can be reached at 440-519-1515 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .