BDC best practicesand the scriptsthat go with them

Speed first, then persistence, then measurement. Contact every new lead within minutes rather than hours. Keep attempting for at least two weeks across phone, text and email rather than quitting after two tries. Confirm every appointment the day before. And track contact rate, set rate and show rate separately, because a store with a great set rate and a poor show rate has a completely different problem from one that cannot reach anyone at all.

Inside five minutes if you can, and certainly within the hour. Buyers lose interest quickly once they move on to the next listing, and the dealership that makes contact first usually books the appointment. Practically, this means someone owns the lead queue during the hours your leads actually arrive, which for most stores means evenings and weekends, not nine to five.

Far more than most stores do. Plan for six to eight touches over roughly two weeks, mixing phone, text and email, then move the lead to a slower monthly cadence rather than deleting it. Many dealerships stop after two attempts, which is exactly the point where persistence starts to pay off.

Your name, the dealership, the specific vehicle they inquired about, one qualifying question, and a choice of two appointment times. That is it. The most common script failure is talking for ninety seconds before asking anything, which gives the customer a chance to end the call before you have learned anything useful.

No. Use them as the shape of the call, not a recital. A script's job is to make sure the vehicle gets mentioned, one qualifying question gets asked and an appointment gets offered with two specific times. How the rep gets there should sound like a person. Customers can hear reading, and it costs you the call.

Short and frequent beats a day-long session once a quarter. Fifteen minutes each morning on one skill, reps listening back to their own call recordings, and role play on the objection that came up most last week. New reps should be dialing with someone listening in on day two rather than shadowing for two weeks, because the job is only learned on the phone.

It can replace the first touch, not the whole job. AI is genuinely good at instant replies at two in the morning, simple qualifying questions and appointment reminders, and using it for those is a straightforward win. It is much weaker where a buyer is hesitant, worried about credit, or comparing you against the store down the road. Use automation for speed and coverage, and people for the conversations that decide whether someone drives over.

Four, in this order. Contact rate, the share of leads you reach at all. Appointment set rate, the share of contacts that book. Show rate, the share of bookings that arrive. And sold rate from shown appointments. Tracking only the last number hides where the problem is, and most stores that think they have a closing problem have a contact problem.