When Video Sold My First Luxury Sedan
When Video Sold My First Luxury Sedan
Rain lashed against the dealership windows as I stared at another ghosted inquiry - this one for a pearl-white Genesis G90. "Saw online, pls send specs" read the message now rotting in our CRM graveyard. My knuckles whitened around cold coffee. Eighteen years selling cars taught me this ache: digital leads die silent deaths. That metallic taste of failure? Swallowed it daily.
Then Dave from used cars barged in dripping rainwater and smugness. "Sent a video walkaround using that new tool - closed before lunch." He tossed his keys. Real-time video personalization wasn't in my vocabulary then. But desperation makes you click things.
The app opened like a sniper's scope. Camera activated before I blinked. Suddenly I'm crouching in driver's seat filming walnut trim while explaining adaptive suspension. My reflection glared back from the infotainment screen - tie crooked, forehead shiny. I almost deleted it. But that CRM auto-fill witchcraft had already embedded the client's name in the video title. "For Thomas" pulsed on screen like a heartbeat.
Magic happened at 1:37 AM. Thomas replied: "You pointed out the massage seats exactly where my back hurts." Came dawn with espresso jitters watching him sign papers. His handshake crushed mine - real flesh, not pixels. Later I'd learn about the compression algorithms making 4K videos sendable even from our signal-dead basement. But in that moment? I just smelled new leather and human connection.
Not all fairy tales. Remember Mrs. Abernathy's Mercedes trade-in? Recorded pristine paint under showroom lights. She arrived screaming about "invisible scratches" my video "deliberately hid." The app's lack of directional lighting markers cost me that commission. And heaven help you when IT "upgrades" servers mid-month - lost three videos during bandwidth-hogging uploads that Tuesday. Wanted to spike my phone on the service bay concrete.
Last Thursday sealed it though. Teenager inquiring about his dream WRX STI. Pulled the car into thunderstorm downpour deliberately. Soaked through my shirt filming raindrops sluicing over the spoiler. "See how water beads off?" I yelled over thunder. He bought it sight-unseen. His text still burns my eyes: "Nobody ever showed me anything real before."
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