SAN RAMON – MediaTrac, a provider of customer loyalty and retention programs for dealerships, said that San Antonio-based Ancira Nissan is achieving strong retention results by augmenting its Nissan One to One loyalty program with MediaTrac’s UltraCare retention program.

Nissan One to One is an incentive program the OEM offers to encourage its dealers to build retention and customer loyalty. UltraCare is a prepaid preventive maintenance program redeemable only at the issuing dealership. Ancira Nissan uses both of these programs to provide more thorough retention coverage across its customer base, reported F&I and Showroom.

Ancira Nissan is one of a number of dealerships whose OEM now offers programs to help build loyalty and retention. Likewise, many dealers, including Ancira Nissan are augmenting these factory programs with internal or third-party retention programs like UltraCare to help promote even healthier retention.

Nissan, like many manufacturers, recognizes the need for its dealers to attract and retain more business, especially profitable service labor and parts business. Nissan calculates that 85 percent of customers who visit their Nissan dealer’s service department 11 times and have positive experiences will buy their next vehicle from that dealership.

Ancira Nissan is noted for customer retention. It ranks third in three-year retention and second in seven-year retention in its region among 183 Nissan dealerships, notes General Manager Ronda French.

The dealership implemented both the Nissan One to One and MediaTrac UltraCare programs about a year ago. At the time, retention was 64 percent. It is now 69 percent — well above Nissan’s first-year program retention goal of 55 percent.

French says the UltraCare program has been a big part of Ancira Nissan’s overall retention growth. She attributes this to the fact that the program’s benefits are redeemable only at Ancira Nissan for future services. This strategy keeps her customers “locked” to her service department.

Ancira Nissan Service Manager Steve Quiroga notes that the dealership’s UltraCare customers return for service three to four times a year – three times as often as customers who do not purchase the program through F&I or service.

“We’re inspecting more vehicles more frequently now and we’re finding parts and components near failure,” says Quiroga. “This is business the customer probably took elsewhere before we put UltraCare in place.”

Ancira Nissan sells about 2,400 new and 1,000 used units a year — considerable units in operation to retain.

“We pride ourselves on customer satisfaction,” says French. “We were one of just 32 Nissan Circle of Excellence Award winners in the nation in 2010 and the only one in San Antonio. We pride ourselves on retention and referrals, which a dealer won’t capture and sustain unless customer satisfaction is high.”

Certainly, OEM loyalty programs can help their dealers improve retention. Many dealerships, like Ancira Nissan, however, are augmenting these factory programs with non-transportable third-party or internal retention programs.

“What I like about this UltraCare program is that it ties the customers to my store. The plan’s services can be redeemed only here,” notes French. “I believe we’ll see more dealers opting for programs like this because it helps retain more customers, resulting in more parts and labor dollars for the dealership.”