General Motors is gearing up to increase repeat business with an incentive program for its employees. The automaker has added a new level of bonus compensation that rises with customer retention rates.
“That is the ultimate result of why we’re doing all of this, right? People come back and buy our cars and trucks,” said President of GM North America Mark Reuss to Automotive News.
While the exact details surrounding the bonus were not announced, the salary component was just added in 2012. Last year, The General added bonuses for the compensation packages of salaried workers that require hitting company-wide targets for vehicle quality. Reuss appointed Alicia Boler-Davis to head up vehicle quality as well as customer experience.
Currently the automaker is hard at work in overhauling the end-customer experience, with Chevy dealers being encouraged to visit Disney World and Cadillac establishments being told to go to Ritz-Carlton hotels to experience first hand the quality service clients should receive at the stores.
The GM Authority Take
It’s terrific to see GM focus on improving customer experience and retention, but shouldn’t something as “common sense” as this be implemented on a global scale, rather than regionally?
Furthermore, we have to wonder how GM’s repeat business bonus plan defines repeat business; for instance, does the plan account for Saturn, Pontiac, Saab, or Hummer customers? And what about attaining new-to-GM customers? Because we can name at least two types of buyers that GM is blatantly ignoring in North America as of this writing… so we have to wonder if employees will be empowered to push their employer into entering new vehicle segments.
Comments
Red Flags… So if I have a bad experience at a Chevy dealership and move away from the brand and GM all together this would impact employees working directly for GM… WT@…
Well, that’s the point. The goal is to prove the entire end-user experience — from the cars to the dealer and everything in between.
However, the dealer experience remains the one single aspect that’s not completely under GM’s control, especially given the usually-high turnover rate for sales people at dealerships.
The GM dealership experience is atrocious, horrific… Fix the dealership experience first… Good Grief… This is comming from a GMer…
All stores should have a Saturn experience… After our recent Chevy dealer experience the wife has already said she wants a Ford next…
Lol I hear ya. But I don’t think it will be any better at a Ford store. 🙁
Does it count if I go to Canada or Europe and buy a Chevy I can’t buy here? Base upper managements compensation on GM’ers buying competitions products that better meets their needs. See how fast the number of choices grow!
This seems to be a program only for North America, so no; hence my question in the post: “but shouldn’t something as “common sense” as this be implemented on a global scale, rather than regionally?”