Successful branding can attract potential employees just as it does shoppers

Through transparent pricing and comprehensive vehicle listings, U.S. dealerships are changing how they market cars to improve customer experience and generate higher quality leads.

If only dealers applied the same marketing focus to potential employees.

Employee turnover at U.S. dealerships has continued to climb — and from a point that dealers already considered untenable. Many recruiting experts say dealers aren't doing enough to combat the consistent churn of workers in and out of their stores. One potential solution that many dealers are missing, according to those experts? Developing an employment brand to market the dealership group's positives and promises as an employer.

"Jobs, like vehicles, are products. And those products have to be retailed, online, first, and direct to the consumer in a way that speaks to the consumer you're trying to reach," Adam Robinson, CEO of Hireology, a Chicago hiring management platform provider, told Automotive News.

Annual dealership turnover was 46 percent across all departments in 2017, the most recent year for which data is available from the National Automobile Dealers Association through its annual Dealership Workforce Study. That was up from 40 percent in 2016. Turnover for salespeople was 80 percent in 2017, according to the 2018 NADA study, up from 74 percent in 2016.

Mike Poskey, CEO of Dallas consulting firm ZeroRisk HR, says dealership turnover is often a vicious cycle, particularly when management figures are moving in and out of a store. Stability in dealership culture and process is less likely under a rotating cast of authority figures, Poskey said.

"Dealers don't physically have to write a check for the costs associated with turnover," he said. "But if they did have to write that check, they would do something about it."

One dealership employment expert — Ted Kraybill, president of ESI Trends, a Clearwater, Fla., consulting firm that conducts the annual NADA study — has estimated that turnover costs dealerships collectively $8 billion annually.

To solve the hiring problem, dealership hiring experts say dealers should apply the same principles in marketing jobs to seek talent as they use in marketing cars to seek customers.

Qualities key to attracting customers to showrooms in the Internet age — transparency and persuasive details about the promised experience — work just as effectively in job postings.

Dealership executives working at the stores featured on Automotive News' Best Dealerships To Work For list described job listings and creating detailed processes in human resources as among their most successful hiring avenues. But the information contained in those job listings is key.

At Bergstrom Automotive Group in Neenah, Wis., which has eight stores on the list, hiring success is tied to getting the word out about the kind of employer the dealership group strives to be.

"Our culture is one of family and giving back to our community, and this culture is our employment brand. We market our brand extensively on social media sites like Facebook and Glassdoor," Kevin Montney, Bergstrom's director of human resources and compliance, wrote in a response to an Automotive News survey of the retailers on the list. "During the recruiting process, we are transparent about earning potential, listing average salaries on our job postings."

Bergstrom's position as a large dealership group enables it to offer many career growth opportunities, and examples of that are shared with candidates during interviews, Montney said.

Many repeat winners on the list market their Best Dealerships To Work For accomplishments as part of their hiring efforts.

"We heavily brand our dealership [as] a great place to work; we advertise our awards we've received" as a top employer, Doug Jones, general manager of Faulkner Subaru Harrisburg in Pennsylvania, wrote in response to the Automotive News survey. Career advancement and training opportunities are part of that message.

The dealership also talks up its community involvement and charitable efforts. "We do this because it's the right thing to do, but it also helps us with recruiting because applicants know we care about our community and employees," Jones said.

Many dealerships also have found value in cash incentives for referrals, which include bonuses tethered to how long the new hire lasts at the store.

Hireology's Robinson says most dealerships are marketing jobs the same way they used to market vehicles in the early days of the Internet — generically.

Dealers should be thoughtful in how they describe prospective positions and upfront about attributes they're seeking. Just as a vehicle description is designed with a certain customer in mind, a job description should be similarly targeted, Robinson said.

"We market these jobs as if all sales jobswere the same. It's not effective," he said.

A dealer looking to fill a job on the sales floor must first determine what he or she wants from an applicant.

If the store needs a recent college grad for an entry-level position, the ad copy should spotlight the potential career path that lies ahead, Robinson said.

Or if the dealership seeks an experienced sales rep, the advertisement should underscore better management practices, flexibility in working hours or even a choice between base pay and full commission.

Marketing employment opportunities is only one piece of the puzzle. Dana Hughes, director of Cox Automotive's dealer education programming, said dealerships should work on their culture first. That way, incoming applicants can see the benefits before they arrive.

"If you want to attract the best talent, you have to do business in the best way. And create an environment the minute they walk in," Hughes said.

Once a company's culture is worthy of attracting applicants, dealers should take advantage of the strength of their brand online.

Robinson said dealerships underuse their most effective virtual real estate — their websites.

When dealerships have dedicated career sites attached to their consumer- facing platform, their odds of attracting employees significantly increase.

"Your dealership's consumer brand and your dealership's employment brand are not separate. It's the same consumer, and the experience on the employment side is often related to whether or not they decide to do business with you," Robinson said.

Getting a job at Mini of Warwick in Rhode Island, a Penske Automotive Group store, is difficult. And that's the way General Manager Brian Peruggi likes it.

"We don't just hire people right off the street," Peruggi said.

Before setting foot in the dealership, applicants are screened by three regional Penske recruiters, who meet regularly with general managers to determine the jobs that need to be filled and the qualities managers are seeking. Prospective employees find out what Penske is all about in that process.

"Back in the old days of the car business, the idea was, you hire a body. You hired as many bodies as you could. Some of them sank, and some of them swam, and you just went from there," Peruggi said. "That ends up being a horrible practice these days."

Hiring candidates without dealership experience has been the most effective for Ray DeSimone, general manager at DCH Academy Honda in Old Bridge, N.J. Some of his most effective employees come from information technology, retail and hospitality.

DeSimone avoids hiring multiple people who left the same dealership.

"It usually doesn't play out well," DeSimone said. "They're not interested in following our process, and now all of a sudden you have four people not following the process instead of one."

For large dealership groups, branding stores as places of business and employment is typically managed at the corporate level.

Hendrick Automotive Group's brand is embodied by owner Rick Hendrick.

"Our brand is extremely important. Our brand is the individual who owns the company. His name is on every building," Hendrick CEO Ed Brown told Automotive News. "Mr. H is our chairman and founder. The rest of us are employed by him to protect his brand, to elevate this brand and to take care of him and his legacy. That's how we all think."

The company's Hendrick Cares corporate social responsibility program is focused on caring for people, both employees and community members.

Promoting those efforts have helped with hiring and retention, Hendrick executives said. Recruits are told about and invited to Hendrick Cares events.

When employees enter the Hendrick organization, they are joining a family, Brown said, and the retailer, with nine stores on the 2019 Best Dealerships To Work For list, wants to see them do well.

Hendrick is focused on promoting from within and recently kicked off its eighth Hendrick Leadership Academy in which talented individuals from across its organization are exposed to all parts of the business and how a dealership is run.

That academy is also, Brown said, a "source of our future leaders."

Melissa Burden contributed to this report.