By: Gov Auctions | 26 October 2012

Having a Career Selling Cars

One of the most interesting and entertaining careers you can have working with cars is selling them, but to enjoy a successful in career in car sales you need to work hard at your job. The following is a brief look at some of the things you can do to increase your chances of a successful career in car sales.

You’ll need to know stuff

To be any good at selling cars, you will first need to know a thing or two about them, so whether you take a basic mechanic course or make a point of learning all about those latest high-tech features, the better you know those vehicles, the easier it will be to sell them. You should also make a point of staying up on the latest developments in the auto industry, because having an educated opinion will make you look like an expert to all those potential customers, and therefore increase the chance of making a few more sales.

Work on your listening skills

Unless you can present those potential customers with options they like, you aren’t much chance of making any sales, and to work out what type of vehicle people are looking for, you will need to either get good at reading minds or improve your listening skills. You may need to ask a lot of questions in order to find out what each customer’s idea of the perfect car is, but the better a listener you are, the fewer questions you will need to ask, and the more chance you are of finding those perfect vehicles and making sales.

Pick your selling arena

There are a lot of ways you can make a career out of selling cars and they are all extremely different, so if you are hyped to pursue employment in car sales keep an open mind, because you have more than a few job options. If you are someone that likes to buy cheap cars and fix them up, you may be able to start your own car yard selling second-hand vehicles, or you could work as an auctioneer at one of the many private or government car auctions instead.

If you have always wanted to work with higher-end luxury vehicles, you may be able to get employment as a showroom salesperson, or depending on your educational background, you could even work on television advertisements selling cars. Regardless of what drew you to the industry, there are a huge amount of jobs selling cars, so take your time finding the one that suits you best.

Learn about financing

Most people looking to buy a car will also be looking for some sort of financing in order to afford it, so a great way to boost your chances of making a few more sales is by knowing something about how the various types of loans and financing options work. By knowing more about the process of securing financial assistance, you may be able to help potential customers to get financed when they didn’t think it was possible, which is virtually guaranteed to boost your sales.

Get licensed

Depending on where you are based, you’ll almost certainly need a dealer’s license to sell cars for a profit. While you can get away with not having a license if you are selling under a certain number of cars, obtaining a license has its advantages. It will give you access to private wholesale dealer auctions, a variety of tax breaks, and dealer discounts to name a few. Be sure to look into the requirements in your state.