BackDriving in new technology at auto showrooms
Auto firms are using new technology to enhance customer experience at their showrooms
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Mumbai: Sometime in April 2011, when Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd (M&M), India’s largest sports utility vehicle maker, was gearing for the launch of the XUV5OO, its most expensive utility vehicle, chief sales and customer care officer Arun Malhotra had to make sure that the staff at dealer showrooms could understand and explain to potential buyers the hi-tech features it offered.
They needed to grasp technologies such as the anti-lock braking system, electronic brake force distribution and electronic stability programme and brief customers about them with a degree of ease and conviction.
After brainstorming with Bishwadeep Ghosh, chief information officer, Mahindra Group, and Anupam Bhattacharjee, deputy general manager (special business initiatives) of the automotive division, Malhotra’s team developed a software package for a kiosk that could address multiple needs–explain various product features in a simple, easy-to-understand fashion, through a combination of video, infographics and voice-over—anytime, anywhere.
It also included a tool to address inquiries, train the dealers and make the interaction more feedback-oriented. Based on the time spent by potential customers at the kiosks, and hits and touches on the screen, the sales team received instant feedback. Today, close to 4,000 salespersons at 3,000 showrooms in locations ranging from a metropolis like Mumbai to a tehsil like Tohana in Haryana, have access to the interactive kiosks, each costing around ₹ 160,000, and low-cost hand-held devices, which can explain any product—from an XUV5OO to a Mahindra pick-up truck—in seven languages.
“It (technology) should appeal to those with an intelligence quotient below 80 and also a 10-year-old school goer," said Malhotra, adding, “today 35% of our inquiries for the pick-ups come through kiosks".
Malhotra, who believes that the use of technology in interacting with customers also leads to a positive rub-off effect on the brand, is now looking at extending the technology to vehicle services and diagnostics that enable owners to get their vehicles checked by an expert from anywhere.
M&M is not the lone car maker to use technology to enhance customer experience at showrooms.
In January this year, Tata Motors Ltd, India’s largest automaker by sales revenue, opened a corporate showroom in South-Central Mumbai with a customer lounge area, Wi-Fi connectivity, a café, children’s play area and installed videos on walls where customers can configure their cars in real time using tablet devices.
Such solutions help because sales staff in dealerships are typically under-trained on vehicle technologies and unable to field questions on new models, said Deepesh Rathore, director and co-founder of Emerging Markets Automotive Advisers, a Gurgaon, Haryana-based consulting firm.
Puneet Gupta, principal analyst at I.H.S Automotive, a sector-specific consulting firm, said the use of technology to improve customer experience is becoming more common in India’s automobile sector. Some service centres of car market leader Maruti Suzuki India Ltd have replaced physical job cards with iPads to maintain service history of cars that, in turn, has helped reduce time taken for servicing the vehicles.
“Technology is likely to play a bigger role at car firms in India in the forthcoming years as offering quality sales and service becomes critical in a competitive market with growing number of car buyers," said Gupta.
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