What the World’s First Retail Automotive Transaction in the Metaverse Taught Me About Transacting in the Real World

Congratulations are in order for Brian Kramer and his team at Germain Toyota of Naples. They've done something incredible. It's not incredible that they have found an early adopter that wanted to buy a vehicle in the Metaverse. It's not incredible to be the team that has an open mind to sell it. True sales teams will find a way to sell anything - especially the first of something - just so they can.

What is truly incredible is they were able to hobble together their tech stack to allow the transaction to take place.

How is it that they were able to plug in CDK and VinSolutions to this modern technology system in order to make this happen? Your guess is as good as mine. But I'd be willing to bet that the actual mechanics of this was more like Marty Fly trying to explain the future to Doc - with a fair amount of manual data entry and programming. 

Nevertheless technology will improve. Systems will develop. Innovators will innovate. And whatever bumpiness and friction this process had will be eliminated. Eventually.

So for the thousands of dealerships out there, not ready to pull the trigger on adding this modern showroom to their already overwhelming day-to-day business operations, what can we learn? The part that stuck out to me was this: 

"Not being able to slow down is probably the #1 barrier to metaverse transactions and the broader digital retail world. A majority of dealership associates are hard-wired with low patience. It's a trait that we actively look for in our organization. Low patience also means high results. Low patience drives the motor to get things done. The downside of low patience is that those individuals are more likely to give up quickly without immediate results. 

The key is to know the difference between being ’in the battle’ & ‘working on the battle plan.’ Those two activities require different mindsets and conduct in different environments. For instance, a Sales Tower is not the ideal location for developing a strategic digital transformation plan. It's more of a battlefield, with plenty of distractions and adrenaline pumping, like a football offensive coordinator up in the box. They're working ON the business rather than IN the business." 

What an eloquent way to summarize it. It's true. A majority of dealership associates are hard-wired with low patience. Low patience means high results. And those with the lowest patience, see the highest results and that results in a promotion to management. Which means managers - and many times owners - in dealerships that have graduated through the ranks of sales are the least patient and feel the most comfortable being "in the battle". 

So who in your business is "working on the battle plan"? And can we talk? I've got a few ideas.