When Larry Schamberger is looking at a potential trade he is already thinking about the next buyer. Schamberger, a Vanderloop sales rep based out of the Beaver Dam, Wis., store, says in some instances they will ask other customers if they’d be interested in some units before they come in, but he cautions that you have to be careful taking that approach. Word can travel fast, and he doesn’t want to lose the trade because another dealer has gotten wind that a customer is considering trading a unit in, he says. 

In some instances, with a customer’s permission, he’s put a unit up on Facebook Marketplace and labels it “Coming Soon,” to gauge the interest and justify the trade-in price. 

Brian Neuman, another sales rep at the Beaver Dam store, agrees and says that not only does having another customer in mind help get the unit sold, it helps in deals down the road, too. 

“If you can have that pre-sold, or sold within two weeks or even a month, that's always your feather in the hat for the next time you go to bat for something,” he says. “That's why it's so important to keep your trades healthy and do all that stuff. And it's just for the next deal, it's always like, ‘Oh, he was right on that one so I better listen to him again.’”

Schamberger and Neuman both keep notes on their customers and the equipment they may be looking for in the future. Both are pretty old school in their notes, still using notebooks and Excel spreadsheets vs. the CRM. But both say they can have their hands on prior year’s notes in minutes.

Neuman says he is always thinking about who he might be able to sell a trade to when talking with customers. He mentally keeps track of his customers' wants and needs. When someone tells him they don’t need anything at the moment, Newman makes sure to ask what’s on the customer’s wish list. “Then the guy goes, ‘I want a 240 horsepower tractor,’” he says. 

Neuman adds that when he is able to come back to a customer with that wish list item when they are ready to buy, they are usually surprised he remembered. 

Schamberger agrees and stresses that cold calls are often key to finding those second and third buyers for future trades. He says he always makes a note of what customers say they’d like to have, tracking it in an Excel spreadsheet to reference down the road. 

“It's not as easy as it was in the old days when you'd be appraising five things a week. Now you're lucky to appraise one a week,” Neuman says. “It’s such a crazy business because we're selling stuff that's $700,000 appraised and stuff that's $250,000 to $300,000. There's a lot at stake there to get that second piece moved, especially as a business because you put that on the lot, that's cash sitting there. That's your profit sitting there, that's your bankroll sitting there.”

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