Kevin Pitts on Building AI Tools for His Dealership

Artificial intelligence is rapidly reshaping dealership operations, and some retailers are choosing to build their own tools instead of relying entirely on outside vendors. On this episode of Inside Automotive, Kevin Pitts, General Manager of BMW of Reading, explains how he developed in-house AI solutions to streamline workflows, improve marketing, and enhance customer engagement.

Pitts shares how his dealership automated social media content creation, simplified internal processes, and integrated AI-powered research and communication tools without requiring extensive coding experience. He also discusses how customers are increasingly using AI during the car-buying process and why transparency is becoming even more important in today’s retail environment.

Key discussion points include:

•  Why dealerships are building AI tools internally 
•  Automating social media and marketing workflows 
•  AI-powered customer communication and content creation 
•  Managing employee concerns around AI adoption 
•  How AI is changing customer research and buying behavior 
•  The growing importance of AI visibility and search relevance 
•  Practical advice for dealers starting with AI 

Pitts also explains why dealers should view AI as a tool for efficiency and customer service, rather than a replacement for human interaction.

Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick is powered by CBT News, your go-to source for the latest news, trends, and insights in retail automotive. Subscribe for more interviews with top industry leaders, dealership innovators, and experts shaping the future of automotive.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Welcome to Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick.

Jim Fitzpatrick 0:13

For many dealers, the challenge with AI isn't understanding the hype, it's figuring out how to actually use it inside the store. Kevin Pitts, general manager of BMW of Reading, has taken a different approach, building his own internal tools to streamline workflows. Thank you so much, uh Kevin, for joining us on the show today.

SPEAKER_02 0:30

Yes, thank you, Jim. Appreciate it.

Jim Fitzpatrick 0:32

Sure. So talk to me about this. What made you decide to actually build your own tools instead of relying solely on the vendors out there?

SPEAKER_02 0:39

So, as we all know, the industry is very good with vendor balloon, as they like to call it, where there's a vendor for everything and you can find an agent that'll uh give you anything. So in an in an attempt to try to control expenses, um, and then also be able to provide a service that's cutting edge, um what I decided with some other dealer friends of mine was to be able to um see if we can dive into some of these tools that are out there. And as they've as they've developed over the past probably six months, it's really gotten interesting and fun being able to create workflows and being able to create agents that you can get them to do whatever you want, and you really don't have to have a lot of coding experience.

Jim Fitzpatrick 1:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

Um, so the operational background that I have uh just started picking apart things that would take a dealership a long time to do at times. Um, some things as a little as getting a Facebook post up from fresh inventory. Typically, you have to send someone out to the lot, uh, get pictures, get videos, and then you come back, someone writes a prompt. So that was one of my first endeavors was taking that process with the images that we had we take uh during our reconditioning process uh on day one. We decided to pull inventory feed, AI, plug in numerous AI pieces, and be able to automatically with an API post those to Facebook, Instagram, and any other uh channels that we wanted to do. Um that was the one that kind of got it, got the ball rolling and got the juices flowing. And we've taken it take uh to internal processes, to marketing efforts, um, anything that we feel like could benefit from um just some increased workflow.

Team Adoption And Job Fears

Jim Fitzpatrick 2:25

Um that's great. That's fantastic. How has your team responded to these to these tools? Any resistance or has adoption been fairly neutral?

SPEAKER_02 2:34

Uh for the most part, it's pretty neutral. Um, obviously that it takes some conversations of look, it's not we're not trying to eliminate jobs, we're just trying to uh create efficiencies with workflows instead of sitting behind a desk doing the things that we don't want to do. Yeah, um we get to be out, be in front of customers, be customer-facing. That's the the personalities we have in the showroom, anyways, or even in uh service as well. So, how do we get you out from behind that desk and doing processes that really don't add a lot of value when you can get an AI agent built to do them?

Jim Fitzpatrick 3:07

Sure. From your experience, where do you think dealers are overcomplicating AI or misunderstanding its value?

SPEAKER_02 3:15

Um, I would say probably the complicating part of it is you got to find a vendor, you got to find somebody that has it all figured out. Um, start with a small process um that you think might be uh something that AI could do and go find an AI tool, find whichever one. There's a bunch of them out there. I'm partial to Claude. Uh it seems to be the most front-running right now. Okay and just ask it questions. Do a little educating. Do a little, there's all kinds of free training that you can do. Sure. Um jump on the free training, educate yourself a little bit on it, and just try it. You can't harm anything.

Jim Fitzpatrick 3:53

Yeah, that's so true. And and yet you still have dealers that are standing on the sidelines going, I'm not so sure about AI. I don't think I need it. I've sold cars this long without it. But but let me ask you this question. When what you know about AI, and obviously you're using it, you're building tools on it. You know, the big question is, is this going to reduce, is this going to replace people, reduce headcount? Uh, I happen to think it will. Uh, many others in the industry say no, it's just a tool that will help your teams do a better job and be more efficient. Where do you stand on that?

SPEAKER_02 4:23

Well, I think we're seeing it everywhere that uh other companies are reducing headcount, good or bad. We just had uh announced earlier this week one that reduced significantly. Um, not the intentions of it. Um, if you have a slim headcount to begin with, I think you're just making people more efficient at doing their jobs. Um and like I say, getting them out from behind the desk a lot of times. There will be admin jobs um that I think that could get eliminated by it, but it there's other things that can always be done. There's enough work for everybody, is my theory on it. They're bigger, larger corporations. We're not a large corporation, but we only have about 200 people within all four dealerships. So we run a tight ship to begin with. Um, but this will allow us to dig in even more. The analytics that it can provide you just allows you to make smarter business decisions and dig in, and you have the right staff here, you employ the right people, you can just dig in and do even more and provide even even a better service to your clients.

Jim Fitzpatrick 5:29

Yeah, oh, no question about it. So many people are now using it as as really a a full uh assistant, you know, if you will, to uh to do all sorts of things. I mean, book airline reservations, set up hotels. I mean, it just it really just is incredible as to the capability of this, of this new, this new technology, right?

SPEAKER_02 5:49

Yep. Yeah, and it's one of the things I was working on this morning was uh getting it to scrape the internet for uh industry or dealership specific articles out there and send me an email every morning. Send me an email of what's happening out there that I can then use that content to create a blog post.

Jim Fitzpatrick 6:09

And it sends you an email, it sends you an email.

SPEAKER_02 6:11

Yeah, and it sends me an email and then I can respond back to that email and say, take articles one, two, and five and create me a blog post, and then it'll email me the blog post. So there's whatever you can think of, there's an option out there to be able to just provide that's and that's when I say provide a better service to our customers, right? My website's gonna have so much more content that then allows me to be made more AI or AEO or GEO relevant.

Jim Fitzpatrick 6:37

Sure.

SPEAKER_02 6:38

Because I'm using the tool to make sure that I'm more educated. And we have people in the showroom that are more educated.

Jim Fitzpatrick 6:43

Sure. I I was just using it prior to coming on this interview today with you. Uh and um we're in the process of selling our home, and I'm looking into the market in our, you know, in our uh about the homes in our market, I should say. And uh I was asking it, you know, as of today, what are the home sales? How's how's long is the average home on on the market? And what is, you know, what's the price and what have you, the average price. And at the end of it, it said, Would you like me to drill down even further to give you a specific about your particular home, you know, in the marketplace and where it stands, competing with the and I went, yeah, give me that down. And it just gave me a whole nother slew of information. And then at the end of that, it said, Do you want me to give you your competitor, your top competitor? I mean, it just never ends, it just keeps going to go even deeper and deeper and deeper. Really amazing.

Winning GEO With Unique Content

SPEAKER_02 7:29

Yes, it is. It is very amazing, and it's fun to be watching it and participating in it as it's growing itself. Like it's it's really fun.

Jim Fitzpatrick 7:38

Now, I would imagine that you're also looking at this as to think, well, obviously, if you're using it, the consumers in your market are using it for BMWs and the kind of cars that your group sells. That being said, how do you ensure the fact that you come up when somebody says, Where is the best place in my market to buy a BMW? Or, you know, who should I, where should I have my vehicle serviced, or what have you? How do you then come up in that find on chat?

SPEAKER_02 8:03

Yeah, it that is probably the most challenging part of it right now because it is ever growing and the rules aren't really defined because they'll change as the new uh versions come out. So it's challenging um making sure that you're GEO relevant using a tool like an SEM rush that can tell you where you're not, creating content pages, putting blog posts, making sure having someone even on Reddit putting posts, because Reddit, for whatever reason, all of these bots have uh really grown to Reddit. So adapting to that. That's right. Um it's really about content, and and there's an unlimited amount of content that you can create now. The trick being making sure that it is unique to you, yeah. Um, and it is not just blasted content that uh everybody else is putting out to make yourself uh individually relevant is a trick. Um, but it's yeah, it's about content. Uh that's how you're gonna remain relevant um with these AI tools. Uh, one of the things I advise all of my salespeople is to go out and act like act like you're a consumer and engage with these different bots and ask them what you would do to buy a car today. And it'll guide you. It's amazing how well they follow the sales process and guide a customer through the whole thing. I sit with my sales team at BMW once a week and we just go over just different things, fun things to talk about for 30 minutes on a Friday, and one of them we do on a regular is we bring up on the screen an AI tool, uh, Perplexity, Chat, Gemini, one of them, and just act as if we're a consumer just to stay relevant with what consumers are getting back. And they're building it into their initial uh sales process of capturing that data when they're talking to a customer. What do you know already? What tools are you using at home that are helping you so that we know how to talk to that customer?

Jim Fitzpatrick 9:55

Yeah, that's that's exactly right. And you know, there people are putting uh the information in to say, where do I get the best deal on a on it, even right down to a specific model car, right? Um, in your marketplace. And uh you it you got to keep an eye on you know what uh what AI is popping back up to these consumers, right? Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:15

Uh taking a picture of a buyer's order and putting it out and saying, is this a good deal? And it'll tell you if you have uh addendum items or you have uh items on there that you maybe shouldn't have, it's telling the consumer you know, this is necessary, this is not, this is negotiable, this is not. Sure. So it's out there. Uh it's with FTC ruling a couple weeks ago. Um, it's even more prevalent with AI uh educating your customers.

Phone AI Inbounds Legal Limits

Jim Fitzpatrick 10:43

That's right. That's right. Yeah. The uh no doubt about it. I'm sure you're using it already uh in your BDC or do you have do you does it make outgoing calls to set service appointments or for warranty work or for recalls or any of that?

SPEAKER_02 10:58

We do use a vendor. Uh uh the we use a vendor to make the outbound calls on recalls. Okay. Um we don't have just an AI agent for outbounds. I'm skeptical on the legality of that at times.

Jim Fitzpatrick 11:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 11:14

Uh uh having robotic calls go out. Um so we haven't done that piece of it. I do have it for inbounds. We have an AI receptionist on the phone um that helps guide customers through the call trees. Um we still have a manual BDC when it comes to um answering the phones.

Jim Fitzpatrick 11:33

Yeah, yeah, gotcha. Gotcha.

SPEAKER_02 11:35

I'm still a little old school with that where customers, if they're calling in, there's usually something they're calling for at a dealership and they want to reach somebody. Um, we're in an area that isn't necessarily the most cutting edge. So we still have a big customer base that is very loyal to us. We tried it um a couple years ago and did not get good reviews from customers. So kind of backed off, and we'll we'll keep trying uh different um ways to interact with it in that manner.

Sales Outlook And Wrap Up

Jim Fitzpatrick 12:06

Sure, sure, absolutely. Well, I'd be remiss if I didn't ask you while I've got you. Uh how is business today at uh BMW Ready?

SPEAKER_02 12:14

Business is good. Uh January, February. We're fun, just like every January, February, um, especially up here in the Northeast. Yes. Uh but March, April um have been good so far. Uh we're up year over year in March, and we're pacing with a very good number in April so far. Oh, that's cool. So used, used and new. Um very healthy right now.

Jim Fitzpatrick 12:33

That that's fantastic. Uh it's good to be a BMW dealer, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 12:38

Yes, it is.

Jim Fitzpatrick 12:39

Yes. That's awesome. So uh any challenges, I mean, any uh that you see down the road? I mean, obviously, here we are with a war in Iran right now that's driving gas prices and got a lot of uh uncertainty out there in the marketplace. Does any of that concern you?

SPEAKER_02 12:56

No, we've been through this enough uh with the wars that pop up on occasion that it'll be a blip. Uh, very confident with BMW. Um they always tend to handle these very well. Sure. Uh very good with their dealers, um, and always make sure that we have what we need.

Jim Fitzpatrick 13:14

Yeah, that's fantastic. That's great. Kevin Pitts, General Manager of BMW of Ready. Thank you so much, sir, for coming by CBT News and sharing your thoughts on AI. Congrats on building your own uh tools out there. I commend you for that. That's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_02 13:28

All right, thank you. Appreciate it.

Jim Fitzpatrick 13:30

Yep, absolutely. Thanks so much. Love to do a follow up with you to see how things are working.

SPEAKER_02 13:33

Yes, definitely.

Jim Fitzpatrick 13:34

All right, thanks. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 13:39

Thanks for watching Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick.