DALLAS, TX  – With more than 35 years of experience in finance and insurance in the automotive retail sector, EFG Companies today announced the establishment of its Professional Services division, led by Senior Vice President, Chuck McGraw, to address today’s constantly changing sales atmosphere. The company’s training, recruiting and marketing services take into account not only consumer behavior, but also industry and economic trends that affect profitability in automotive retail finance.

Going into 2012, both automotive retailers and financial institutions are struggling to compete in a different world when it comes to sales. With a more informed and demanding consumer who researches and often makes purchase decisions based on online content,  it is more important than ever for companies to use an integrated approach to recruiting and training their sales force while maintaining brand awareness through all consumer touch points.

“Our expansion is a direct result of the significant resources we invest in equipping our client engagement team to bring both strategic and business perspectives to our clients,” said John Pappanastos, CEO, EFG Companies. “As we have striven to provide the best administration in consumer protection, our training, recruiting and marketing services grew in strength from support functions to primary lines of business that will improve sales cultures for all our clients.”

Turnover is one of the biggest and most costly problems in the automotive and financial services sectors. One large driver of turnover is the poor hiring decision.  A single P.H.D.^SM can cost upwards of $75,400 resulting from the costs associated with the hiring process, the cost of missed sales and foregone customer retention revenue.

EFG developed its Recruitment and Workforce Solutions to answer the persistent and growing need of sourcing and development of staff. The company utilizes a proprietary process that combines its Top Performer behavioral scoring and rigorous personal interviews to consistently place the right person in the right position. Then EFG’s staff of experts uses a custom approach to adapt training to build upon the wealth of experience and unique perspectives that each employee has to offer.  EFG’s trainers spend thousands of hours every year visiting and observing different businesses and developing curriculum designed to keep sales forces engaged and motivated to close more deals.

“After using our top performer hiring model to provide expert hiring and recruiting services, we train recruits by utilizing the ‘Interactive Inductive Process’ or ‘Guided Discovery Model,’” said Chuck McGraw, Senior Vice President, Professional Services, EFG Companies. “People learn in three ways; by seeing, hearing, and doing. Our training successfully incorporates all three of these ways leading to a fantastic learning environment. Our experts model effective behavior and analyze the performance of each individual to precisely identify opportunities for improvement. Our trainees solve real-life problems through role-playing and evaluation that result in sustainable sales performance improvement.”

However, having the best talent on the floor is not enough. Negative online reviews and customer perspectives can exponentially decrease store traffic. Over the past few years, consumers have steadily shifted away from being easily swayed by just the benefits of a product, its price, its proximity for access, or even special promotions. With Google now ranking companies based on consumer reviews, conversations and information regarding products and services on social media, consumers now  conduct extensive research using social networks prior to making their purchasing decisions. According to Automotive News, 35 percent of customers who recently purchased or plan to purchase a vehicle used social networks as a source for research.

“Most automotive retailers and lending institutions have continued to use the same advertising techniques that worked for them in the 80s,” said Jennifer Threet, Chief Marketing Officer, EFG Companies.  “EFG takes advantage of its 35 year history of automotive experience to propel dealerships and lending institutions from their comfort zone into a highly integrated world where online branding and e-Marketing reputation management to builds successful consumer relationships.”

EFG’s Marketing Solutions team works with clients to reallocate where their advertising and marketing dollars can be best utilized to generate the highest ROI. Their consultative approach to marketing includes strategies to implement differentiating messages in all modes of communication designed to generate leads, to significantly enhance a higher degree word of mouth, to facilitate customer loyalty, and make clients’ money.

Together, EFG’s recruiting, training and marketing services provide the full package of professional support to recruit the best talent, train sales teams to reach their full potential, and effectively manage brand reputation.

About EFG Companies

The marketplace and EFG simultaneously evolve. In part by necessity – driven by economic climate, the digital age and a more informed, more demanding consumer. But also through forward-thinking individuals who see these drivers as opportunities. At EFG, we are proud to have served as an industry innovator since 1977. The company was born from a need to plan, design and develop adequately reserved, financially-sound consumer protection products. Today, EFG is a world-class financial service products administrator committed to continuous development of innovative products services supported by go-to-market strategies and execution support across a multitude of channels. The comprehensive services that surround and propel these efforts include training, recruiting, workforce productivity engineering and marketing services.