‘’Customers would previously come into the showroom four or five times before buying a car,” says Christopher Wehner, managing director of BMW Group Asia, who has oversight of 13 markets, including Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, Philippines, Sri Lanka and Cambodia. “Now it’s more like two or three times, as they use other channels to do their research,” he adds. “Some know exactly what they want before they even come into the showroom.’’
What that means is his sales staff needs to focus more on emotional skills and less on product knowledge. “The sales person has to have emotional skills,” Wehner says. “Because when you meet people, you have to come in and build a trust relationship. Trust is what matters when you decide if you want to buy from this person. We make a lot of training for people to behave in a BMW manner.’’