Erich Gail, who heads a three-state dealership group, is a returning speaker at Thought Leadership Summits’ 13th annual automotive conference this year, and his reprise isn’t just because he did well as a keynoter last year.
As the CEO of Cardinale Group of Companies puts it, “I called them.” He says it is a testament to the quality of the June 20-21 event that’s renamed this year to tie into one of auto retailing’s hottest and broadest topics: the customer experience.
The Automotive CX Summit in Los Angeles evolves from the previous back-to-back Automotive Customer Centricity Summit and the Automotive Social Media Summit.
The new Auto CX Summit will continue to address the core topics of the CRM and social media, while adding other topics that are transforming the customer experience, says Jon Munzel, founder and president of Thought Leadership Summits.
“CX is the evolution of CRM and customer centricity, and because the customer experience is a very broad topic, it makes sense to include social media, along with critical topics such as brand engagement, loyalty, retention, culture and analytics in the new Auto CX Summit,” he says.
Gail, who will speak this year on using actionable in-store processes to maximize sales and performance, lauds the annual event for its interactivity among a diverse group of auto-industry thought leaders.
WardsAuto Managing Director Larry Schlagheck is the conference chairman.
Other participants and presenters include:
- Brian Benstock, general manager and vice president of Paragon Honda in metro New York. He will discuss Paragon Honda and Paragon Acura’s record-breaking year in 2016 and its goal of doubling its business in 24 months.
- Ed Cicale, a vice president at AutoNation, the country’s largest dealership chain. He will provide an analysis of how AutoNation carried out a project to rename its hundreds of dealerships under a single brand and how the company intends to extend the brand to other areas.
- James Reutershan, Google’s strategy development manager, will discuss customer care strategies from outside of the industry that can be adapted to automotive.
- Chuck Kendig of American Honda and Heather Macpherson of The Minery will address the importance of the employee experience and the connection between customer and employee experiences.
- Tom Carney, lead instructor at the National Automobile Dealers Assn., will talk about marketing to Millennials as customers and attracting them as dealership employees.
The CX Summit is at the Ritz-Carlton in Marina del Rey, CA. For more information or to register click here or call 609-216-6998.
