Steve Smith is the managing partner of EquipmentFX, a marketing solutions company. He shares his experience turning around a struggling equipment dealership through implementing a comprehensive marketing system. This involved researching customer data and trends, designing targeted marketing campaigns, and establishing metrics to measure returns. The results included a 1200% increase in leads, 54% increase in total sales, and improved performance in underperforming areas through a strategic, measurable approach to marketing. He emphasizes starting slowly, assessing needs, and committing to building marketing capabilities over time for long-term success.

1. EquipmentFX… On Target
Marketing Solutions

2. Who I Am
 Steve Smith, Managing Partner,
EquipmentFX
 Former VP/GM of Johnson Machinery, a
CAT dealer located on the West Coast
 Experience at all levels, including:
Equipment sales, operations management
(parts, service, rentals), finance
management

3. Who I Am cont…
 2 Term Chairman of Hyster Dealer
Marketing Council
 Dealership studied as example of “What
it’s like when it’s right”… NMHG Theme
 Committed to research, application and
elimination of wasted marketing spend
and measuring returns

4. What I Do
 Focus on practical marketing solutions
using YOUR internal resources,
outsourced vendors when necessary
 Design Fortune 500 level sales and
marketing systems without the cost or
complexity, generate leads from every
possible angle
 Constantly ask “WHAT IF” questions

5. What I Do cont…
 Research the competition
 Help build a better service organization
 Look at trends that affect us from a
different perspective
 Apply what makes sense in the most
cost effective manner possible

6. Have You Ever…
 Had month end panic attacks because
orders weren’t predictable?
 Had the “pit in the stomach” feeling of
things being out of control?
 Felt overwhelmed because change
happens so fast we can’t keep up?

7. Me Too…
 Here’s the brief story of my struggle:
 Promoted to VP/GM at the age of 36
 Trained under an industry veteran that had
spearheaded a large acquisition of product
and territory (doubled our territory, and had
two databases of customers we could pull
from… for awhile)

8. I Was Presented with a
Formative Situation by the
Owner…
 “Steve, we’re losing customers, and I’m
not sure why”
 To which I responded… “What is our
customer acquisition strategy?”
 The response…”That’s a good
question… you’ll have to figure that one
out.”

9. An Early Term AHA!
Moment
 Early research showed high
dependence on two large accounts, both
of which we were losing for reasons
beyond our control
 We had no long term strategy to get new
customers and preserve the ones we
had.

10. More Research Revealed…
 Other large customer defections to the
product supplier we had just changed
from due to price
 An over dependence on too many other
large accounts
 No systematic sales and marketing
program

11. So… I dove in and asked more
hard questions…
 Where does new business come from
and why?
 What marketing and promotion mediums
do we use and why? Do they work?
 How do we use our existing database,
and how to we augment it?

12. What is the Salespersons
Role?
 Hard realization #1: They were tasked
with doing battle for us, plan and all.
 Hard realization #2: They had no clue
about MOST of the opportunity.
 Hard realization #3: We didn’t talk about
progressive sales and marketing
“strategy”

13. The Big “U OH” Moment…
 This was happening on my watch…
 We’re losing business…
 We need a plan NOW…
 What do I do NOW?

14. The Lockdown Month…
 What I hoped to find ASAP was…
 Sources of data and how to use it
 What expenses to eliminate and where to
channel future investment that we could
measure
 How to keep from throwing bodies at the
problem until I understood the problem!

15. What I hoped to Emerge With…
 A business plan that took into
consideration current and future trends
 A way to gauge Return on Investment
 A plan that was predictable and reliable

16. The Story of My Findings…
 A comprehensive “plan” was possible,
but would require patience
 Other industries have been using some
tools and technologies for years that we
could benefit from
 It would take a full commitment to pull it
off

17. A Ratio No One Wants To Talk
About
 Our industry has a low “Asset to Aptitude”
Ratio
 Translation: Huge investments in capital,
low application of strategy to create,
communicate with and manage customers
 Other industries that are more competitive
than ours routinely use better strategy…
WHY?

18. Trends That Affected Us
Then… And Still Do Now…
 Year 2000: Huge shift from “outbound
marketing” to “inbound marketing”
 Translation: Customers now could find
you when and how THEY wanted, and
ignored most of the other efforts.

19. Stats and Trends That WE
MUST ACT ON
 88% of capital equipment buyers go
online first, regardless of the relationship
they have with you
 4 in 10 sales originate from a web based
inquiry
 The totals are climbing higher every
SINGLE DAY!

20. What I Identified as
Components of a true “System”
 Website Design: How to plan for the
future and not reinvent your site every
two years
 SEO: How to make your site found
 Lead Generation & Management: What
happens when someone contacts us?

21. The “System” continued…
 CRM: We need a foundation from which
to manage sales and marketing
campaigns
 Database Management: We need to
stop using bad data, use better data,
and routinely make this a part of how we
run our businesses. IT IS AN ASSET!

22. The “System” continued…
 Customer Surveys: We need to ask,
constantly, “how are we doing” and work
the findings into our business”
 Sales Force Automation: What are the
processes that can be automated
without removing the personal “closing”
aspect of our business?

23. The “System” continued…
 Graphic Design: We’re still tactile, but
we created crappy material and it left a
bad impression.
 Direct Response Marketing: How do we
actually compel someone to act, and not
throw our stuff in the garbage

24. The “System” continued…
 Research: How can we do the research,
work the findings in to our material, and
create good, compelling copy that
increases our response rate?
 What is the “science and art” of good
copy?

25. We Created the “System”
 We surveyed and did the research
 We mixed up our efforts and tracked the
results
 We TESTED everything
 We COMMITTED!!!

26. Here’s An Overview of The
Results
 Once the “System” was reasonably
installed (meaning, you never finish, but
it was built)
 We clearly established metrics and
measurements that mattered the most
 This is what we found…

27. Website Summary- Example
#1- Annualized totals
 Pageview Totals: 224,796
 Contact Form Page Visits: 32,400
 New Product Inquiries: 41,220
 Used Products Inquiries: 26,978
 Rental Inquiries: 8,848
 Parts Inquiries: 26,995
 Service: 10,135
 Employment: 10,711

28. Lead Summary: Example
#2
 Year 1, 2002: 432 Leads
 Year 5, 2006: 4,836 Leads
 An Increase of 1200%... Market trends
were not increasing at those levels
 Did NOT include internal and a variety of
other lead creating programs

29. Sales Increase: Example #3
 Outside Branch Locations
 Underperforming Departments
 We identified what we perceived to be
areas that were “low hanging fruit”, and
focused our efforts where our sales to
opportunity were the lowest

30. Sales Increase: Example #3
 Total Company: Increase of 54%
 Time period: 2002-2006
 No acquisitions, no new products
 Lost approximately 20% of business
from large accounts that we lost for
reasons beyond our control

31. Sales Increase: Example #3
 Outside Branch Locations:
 El Centro: Took over branch from another
dealer, 5 year increase of 516%
 San Diego: 3 year increase of 80%
 Oxnard: 3 year increase of 98%

32. Department Sales Increase
 Rentals: 4 year increase of 79%
 Used: 2 year increase of 226%
Other Key Metrics
 Credit Applications: Increase of 100%
 Awareness: Increase of 78%
 Share: Increase of 2 basis points without
major accounts

33. Metrics That Matter
 Customer Increase of 27%
 2,837 to 3,602 using rolling 2 year AR
average
 Annual increase of 5%... Unheard of!
 Customer Spend increase of 21%
 From annual spend of $16,919 per customer
to $20,544

34. More Metrics That Matter
 Marketing Expense Decrease of 100%
 Ad/Promo Expense still below .03% of
total sales
 New Sales GP still averaged 9.5%
 Highly focused on marketing to the right
group of prospects

35. So… What’d I Learn?
 The “old world” vs the “new world”
 Relationship selling still matters
 How those relationships are being created is
changing
 How those relationships are managed is
changing
 There can be a good mix of new and old;
and you can do this without adding bodies
and expense

36. Myths & Trends
Debunked…
 They said we were making a mistake
when we got rid of the Yellow Pages
 They said our industry was about
“relationships”
 They said “no one is going to order
anything online”

37. What They Asked… 5 Years
Later
 How long did it take you to “build this
system?”
 What steps do you take to get started?
 How much does this cost to do right?

38. Here’s The Solution
 Start slowly, assess where you are
 Look at internal resources… do you
have what it takes to develop and apply
the right strategy for the next 5-10
years?
 Understand the elements of a plan, talk
internally, commit!

39. Each Step Has a Lesson
 It’s OK to make mistakes, just try and
limit them
 Create forward momentum
 Involve others, constantly seek feedback
 Set up metrics that matter

40. Common Mistakes
 We don’t have the time…
 We don’t have the money…
 We don’t have a plan…
 We don’t have the people…

41. Common Mistakes…
 Waiting for the “perfect moment”
 Not understanding “expense” vs
“investment”
Remember:
Companies that fail to plan, plan to fail!

42. The First Step to Getting
Started
 Ask the hard questions, assess your
readiness
 Take an Online Heath Check
 Take some video tours, understand the
concept.
 Visualize a plan, cost out the key
components
 Commit!

43. Any Questions?
Steve Smith
www.EquipmentFX.com
936-499-4644