We’re kicking off another great customer spotlight with the team at Weston Kia. Weston Kia stands out as a top TradePending Video user, showing how strong video content leads to better conversations and more sales. We met with Andrew Roberge, Director of Customer Relations and Vehicle Acquisition, along with Client Relations Specialists Violet Stancer and Kenia Cisneros, to hear how their team is making it all happen.
Tell us a little about Weston Kia and Weston Buick GMC, and what makes your dealerships stand out.
Andrew: “Weston Dealership has been here for 50 years now in the Gresham community. We started as a Pontiac and GMC Dealer and took on Kia. We’ve always been here. We’re locally owned, and the Westons actually work right here on site. We proudly serve our community. We don’t have any satellite dealerships, it’s just this one location, and we thrive because our community is here to support us.”
Kenia: “I mean, they’re really here for the community. They’re very involved, like everywhere. Everywhere I go, when I meet people at the store or out and about, and I mention I work at Weston, they’re like, ‘Oh, I know so-and-so!’ I know them from church or other service events they’ve done. It’s really awesome, they’re just so involved locally.”
Violet: “There’s just such a pride in working here. I think everyone really enjoys what they do, and like I said, the community is a big part of it. People hold that Weston badge in high regard, even when they’re not shopping for a vehicle. It’s all about making connections and making sure people feel heard. It really does feel like a family here.”
How did you personally get started in the automotive business?
Violet: “I started in the corporate automotive industry working with Mercedes, but I didn’t feel like I was really being heard as an employee. It felt like the clients weren’t really valued either. When I switched over to working at Weston, I found that everyone genuinely enjoys what they do. There’s a real sense of pride here, and people wear that badge in high regard when they’re out in the community. I love working with the people here and being part of something that feels like family.”
Kenia: “I was studying in the business department at Oregon State and decided to give Kia a chance. It was completely new to me. I didn’t have any prior sales experience, just some management experience from Walgreens. But when I came here, everyone was so kind and supportive. They gave me advice and helped me grow into the role. I enjoyed it so much that even after I had to leave for health reasons, I came back because the support from Weston’s management and the relationships I’d built were that strong.”
Andrew: “My background was actually in the restaurant industry. I was operating a couple of franchise steak houses in town. The Westons had used me to cater events, and I saw how well they treated their employees. Over time, we built a strong working relationship, and Mr. Weston asked me a few times to come work for him. At first, I joked, ‘What am I going to do? Cook potatoes?’ But eventually, I sold my vested interest in the steakhouse company and gave it a shot. I ended up loving the culture here. I guess you could say I was recruited.”
What are some things your dealership is doing really well right now?
Andrew: “Taking care of our customers. It’s very client-first, very customer-first, and that comes from the top down. The motto here is always the same: to genuinely serve our customers, communities, and employees with the highest degree of honesty, integrity, loyalty, quality, and respect. The idea is that if you put the customer first, everything else will fall right into place. And I really think we excel at that.”
Before using video at Weston Kia, what were you using?
Andrew: “When I started off, I was just dabbling in anything other than email, phone, and text. In the early stages, I had a YouTube account. I’d use my cell phone to record a walkaround, post it to YouTube, and then send the link to a customer. But it was convoluted. It took a lot of work to get something from your phone, load it onto a computer, upload it online, get the link, and then make sure the customer knew it was really for them. We weren’t really using anything else to substitute it. So when TradePending came out with an interface that made it easy to send videos to customers, I knew it was going to be the new number four, right alongside phone, text, and email. Video is just as important as those other methods now. You’ve tapped into an area of communication that was totally underutilized.”
Violet: “I do a lot with social media and everything, and I think engaging video is so important now. People have short attention spans, they don’t want to listen to voicemails or read long texts. But when they can see someone’s face and hear what they need to know in just a few seconds, that makes a big difference.”
How has video helped your team or dealership so far?
Kenia: We have a lot of people who don’t actually reply to our CRM system sometimes. But when we send a video and they see it’s an actual person, they’re more inclined to respond. I’ve seen a lot more engagement that way. More customers are replying and interacting with us.”
How do you measure success when it comes to using video?
Andrew: “Your group has been kind enough to have quarterly meetings with us where we review industry averages, things like watch rate, and other key metrics. So we use those as benchmarks. Then, internally, we sit down as a team every week to analyze where we are both as a group and individually. We ask questions like, ‘How is Kenia getting the highest watch rate by about 6%?’ Then we dig into things like video titles, thumbnails, and delivery, and we try to borrow each other’s best practices. And whenever we get a video from someone outside our team that stands out, we try to learn from that too.
What excites you most about the future for your dealership?
Andrew: “I think we’re seeing a drop-off in how email is used, kind of like how USPS mail isn’t really sustainable anymore. Over the next year, I see us and likely other dealerships leaning into video as a main channel for contacting clients before, during, and after the sale. I’d love to see us get those videos even shorter, maybe under 10 seconds, and push them out through platforms like social media. Ultimately, I’d like to see short, high-impact videos permeate every aspect of how we do business here.”
Violet: “I think that’s great. I hope video continues to grow into every area of the dealership so that people kind of expect that standard of us being in front of the camera, introducing ourselves, and making sure people are heard. That kind of communication just feels more real and personal. No one likes talking to robots. I just hope video keeps flourishing across all departments and that everyone feels more and more comfortable using it. It really helps us stay connected with our clients in a meaningful way.”
Thank you again to Andrew, Kenia, Violet, and the entire Weston team. Keep up the great work!