EPISODE 51

The Vanishing Customer: Why Service Customers Leave Without Saying a Word​

Featuring Guest Kimberly Cowan

Episode Description

Customers don’t always leave with a complaint, a bad survey, or a dramatic service lane moment. Sometimes they leave quietly, choosing the path that feels easier the next time they need an oil change, tire replacement, recall repair, or routine maintenance.

The opportunity for dealerships is to stop waiting for customers to announce they’re leaving and start looking for the quiet signs of churn before they disappear. In this episode, sponsored by DriveSure, Bill Springer sits down with Kimberly Cowan, president of Slydyn, to talk about the “vanishing customer” and why convenience, transparency, and ease now play such a major role in service retention. Kim shares how consumer expectations are changing, why satisfaction scores don’t always predict loyalty, and how dealerships can rethink their processes around the way customers actually make decisions today.

Takeaways from this episode:

  • Why satisfied customers may still stop returning to your dealership
  • How pricing transparency and scheduling flexibility impact retention
  • Why dealerships are no longer just competing with other dealerships
  • What “silent churn” looks like before the customer is officially lost
  • How to meet customers where they are instead of forcing them into your process

BILL SPRINGER

Host of Retention Roadmap
and president of Krex Inc.

Kimberly M Cowan

President of Slydyn

Would you like to Be a guest on our podcast?

The Next Evolution of Video MPI

The Next Evolution of Video MPI

Video inspections are becoming standard in dealership service departments. But simply sending a video is no longer enough. The next opportunity is making sure customers actually watch it, understand it, and see enough value in the experience to trust the recommendation and come back again.

read more
How to Become Your Customer’s First Call for Tires

How to Become Your Customer’s First Call for Tires

Only about one-third of dealership service customers bought their last set of tires from the dealership. That’s not just a missed tire sale. Once a customer heads somewhere else for tires, that shop gets a shot at the rotations, alignments, brakes, maintenance, and repair work that comes next.

read more
Turning Service Visits Into Future Vehicle Sales

Turning Service Visits Into Future Vehicle Sales

Your next vehicle sale may already be sitting in the service drive. Yet while one-third of customers say they would be open to a sales conversation during a service visit, only 14% report that anyone actually starts one. The opportunity is not to pitch every customer who pulls into the lane. It’s to build a defined process that helps sales and service identify the right customers, start relevant conversations, and keep the relationship moving through the entire ownership cycle.

read more

Join our newsletter to stay
up to date with new episodes