Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
Success is simple. It has never been easy.
I’ve spent decades studying automotive sales success habits — the theories, the principles, the steps that separate professionals who build lasting careers from those who flame out chasing shortcuts. You can go back three thousand years to Solomon. You can read what Stephen Covey wrote in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. You can pick up the latest bestseller from the business section of any airport bookstore.
Guess what? They’re essentially all saying the same thing.
The principles of success, the steps to pursue excellence — they’re universal. They don’t change with the market. They don’t go out of style when inventory normalizes or margins compress. They apply to every field, every era, every person willing to take them seriously.
I’ve always appreciated how Truett Cathy, founder of Chick-fil-A, distilled it down. Everywhere he went, people told him they wanted to be successful. And everywhere he went, he observed that most were unwilling to actually do what success required. His framework cuts through all the noise.
The 3 Keys to Success:
- Desire and Drive
- Develop the Know-How
- Take Daily Action
Key 1: Desire and Drive
Desire and drive aren’t measured by what you say — they’re measured by where you spend your time and energy. You can’t talk your way to excellence. You can’t wish your way to a better close rate or a higher PVR. At some point, intention has to meet action.
The honest question to ask yourself is this: Are you spending the time and energy it actually takes to be excellent? Not the time you feel like spending. Not the effort that’s convenient. The consistent, daily investment that excellence demands — even on slow days, even when the floor is dead, even when you don’t feel like it.
That’s where desire proves itself. And that’s where most people quietly opt out.
Key 2: Develop the Know-How
If you want to live with excellence — in any profession, in any area of life — you have to learn how. That’s not a weakness. That’s wisdom. Every great performer, in every field, got that way by studying those who were already doing it with excellence and then putting in the reps to make it their own.
Coach Vince Lombardi understood this. His framework — what we call the Lombardi 5 — is as applicable on the dealership floor as it ever was on the football field:
1. Know what to do. What are you doing every day, with every customer, every time? Is there a standard, or are you winging it? The Dealership Ambassador doesn’t improvise their professionalism — they practice it until it becomes automatic.
2. Know why you do it. You have to believe in your process before you can execute it under pressure. What’s your motivation? Why does it matter? When you understand your why, you stop looking for shortcuts and start looking for mastery.
3. Know how to do it well. Who is already doing what you want to do — and doing it with excellence? Study them. Learn from them. In 35+ years of training dealership professionals, the pattern is always the same: top performers are students of their craft. They watch, they study, they improve.
4. Develop the skill. There is no substitute for practice and repetition. Skills aren’t downloaded — they’re built. The 21-Day Fast Start exists because that’s how long it takes to begin forming a new habit. The next 90 days exist because that’s how long it takes to make that habit a lifestyle.
5. Take action. All the knowledge in the world means nothing until you do something with it. Repeated, daily action is what separates the professionals from the people who just attended the training.
Key 3: Take Daily Action
Daily action is another word for diligence. And diligence is the one quality that will outlast talent, outlast motivation, and outlast every market shift the automotive industry throws at you.
Here’s the hard truth: your commitment to excellence cannot be driven by how you feel. Feelings are unreliable. Feelings take days off. Feelings quit when deals fall apart. The standard you hold yourself to — as a Dealership Ambassador, as a professional, as someone who takes their craft seriously — that standard doesn’t change based on your mood.
You take action every day. Regardless of how you feel. That’s diligence. That’s what Better Today Than Yesterday actually looks like when it gets difficult.
So What About You?
Living with excellence is simple. It has never been easy. But if you apply these three keys — genuine desire backed by your time and energy, a commitment to developing your know-how, and the daily diligence to take action — you will get better. You will build the kind of professional identity that turns customers into lifetime relationships and a job into a calling.
Most people say they want success. Most people say they want to live with excellence. Most people want the result, but resist the process that creates it.
The Dealership Playbook was built for the ones who don’t. For the professionals who are done being comfortable and ready to become the standard in their market.
Here’s my challenge to you: make the choice to seek excellence today. Not tomorrow. Not when the market gets better. Today.
Good Selling. — David Lowe
Watch today’s video to go deeper on what it looks like to put all three keys to work in your daily routine.
The decision to pursue excellence starts today.
If you’re ready to build a team that actually lives this standard — every customer, every deal, every day — let’s talk about what that looks like for your store.
