The Retention Gap

The Retention Gap

Written by Autoflows | Jan 15, 2026 3:57:05 PM

Most dealers don’t lose customers because they don’t care.

They lose them because aftersales execution quietly breaks down.

Messages end up in spreadsheets and inboxes. Handovers rely on memory. Follow-up happens without visibility.

Over time, this creates a Retention Gap - where good intentions don’t turn into consistent results.

In this 45-minute session, we show why customer retention is an execution problem, not a messaging problem - and what changes when aftersales communication is integrated into one reliable flow.

 

Why this conversation matters

Customer retention is the dealer’s license to operate.

Margins are tightening, capacity is fixed, and teams are already stretched. Yet many new tools add more tasks instead of fixing execution.

The real question isn’t “Should we use AI?”
It’s “Will this actually make everyday life easier for the dealership?”

 

What to expect in your session

In this session, you’ll learn about:

  • Where retention is really lost in aftersales
  • Why spreadsheets, inboxes, and handovers fail
  • How integrated aftersales communication closes the Retention Gap
  • How automation and AI should work quietly in the background


What Dealers Are Saying

“Before, it was very difficult. It was just a data pot managed on Excel… a bit of a blind hope that we were contacting the right customers at the right time.”

Katherine McLoughlin

Head of Aftersales, LSH Auto UK