The Playbook.
Written for the sales floor.
Play 004 · September 2026
Selling cars is hard again
Doug Horner on why the video habit still works when the market gets harder. Featuring Dean Jarrell of Page Toyota, five years on CarFilm.
Doug Horner · Co-owner, CarFilm · GSM, Mercedes-Benz of North Olmsted
Doug recorded a video this week. This is the reason you already signed up for CarFilm. And if you have let the habit slip, this is your reminder to get going. Selling cars is hard again. The video is why it still works. Watch 2 minutes, then run the play.
Watch Doug set the frame · 2:10
Filmed on the way in · 2 minutes 10 seconds · The whole issue, in Doug's voice
Read the transcript
[0:00] If you were in the car business 3, 4, 5 years ago, it probably felt like fishing with dynamite. Everyone you talked to was a buyer; they paid all the money. It was as easy as it's ever been. Well, it ain't that way anymore. It is hard. The competition is fierce. People are taking their time to make decisions again.
[0:21] So you have to work harder than you probably ever had to work before. Certainly much harder than you had to work 3, 4, 5 years ago. But even if you've been in the business longer than that, the pre-COVID era was easier than it is today. You've got to be on your game, and the single biggest and easiest change that you can make is just start sending videos. That is the number one thing.
[0:47] I mean, everywhere you go, people's heads are just buried in their phones. They'll barely read a text; they certainly won't read an email. They're not listening to their voicemails, but they will watch videos all day long. That's just what people are doing now. So if you're not sending videos to people of the car that they want to see, answering their questions, introducing yourself, then you are so missing the boat, I can't even begin to tell you.
[1:13] And the number one thing that makes CarFilm the best is that it's so easy. It's so simple, it's so quick. It doesn't sacrifice quality. It doesn't live on your phone, so it doesn't take up space in your phone. It's just simple, and it looks like you're sending somebody an Instagram thumbnail, which they're going to click, and then it's going to notify you, and now you know you've got engagement. And that's how you sell cars in 2026.
[1:42] That's how you make what has become very challenging much easier again, much simpler. But I can promise you this: if you're trying to do what worked in COVID, if you're trying to do what worked even before COVID times, you're gonna get left behind. You're gonna have your lunch money taken. So get with it, get CarFilm. If you're a whole store, great, sign up your whole team. If your store won't do it, sign up as an individual. Download the app, start today.
This week's article
Remember when selling cars was easy? Not anymore.
Picture a buyer shopping six dealerships before deciding. They fill out six forms. They answer six phone calls. They read six identical follow-up emails. Then they pick the one salesperson whose name they can actually remember. That is the market you are selling into right now. Nobody handed anybody a memo when it changed, but it changed.
The salespeople who are winning did not get smarter. They got human on camera. When a buyer is drowning in six identical typed follow-ups from six different stores, the one salesperson who sends a 45-second video is the one they remember. Not because the video is polished. Because the video has a face. And the face is the one thing the other five dealerships forgot to send.
The dealer who taught us the frame Doug names in this week's video is not a giant chain. It is a store that decided the medium was the message. When shopping got harder, they got closer. When texts blurred, they showed up on camera. When emails got skipped, they sent something worth watching. And now their reps are the ones the buyer already trusts before they walk in.
The play this week is not to record a masterpiece. It is to send one video tomorrow morning, to the first lead in your queue, that names the shopping fatigue and offers to clear it up. Then do it the next day. Then the day after. That is the whole change. Doug walks through why in the video above. Watch it, then run it.
This week's play
Name the noise. Send the video. One lead a day, this week.
You do not need a new tool. You need one habit before Friday.
The play · run it this week
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Pick tomorrow's lead in advance. Before you close the laptop tonight, pick the first lead you will hit in the morning. Do not decide on the fly. Decide now so tomorrow you just execute.
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Name the shopping fatigue by name. Open the video with "I know you are probably talking to a few dealers right now. Here is what I can save you time on." That single line separates you from the five other salespeople who pretend the buyer only called them.
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Give one specific thing they did not have when they left. A price update. A similar unit that just landed. A direct answer to something they raised. Not "just checking in." One concrete piece of new information they can act on.
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Send it before 9 AM. Speed is the signal. A video at 8:47 AM Tuesday tells the buyer you were thinking about their deal before you had coffee. A video at 4 PM Thursday tells them you finally got around to it. Same content, different meaning.
Want Sam to film one for your store? Send us a car and we'll send you a CarFilm the way this play runs it.
Get a CarFilmFrom the floor · Doug
Recording it is easier than deciding to record it. Set your camera up in the same spot every morning. Same lighting, same angle, same 45 seconds. Do not think about production. Think about the buyer whose name is on the top of your list and what they need to hear from you before lunch. Everything else is negotiable.
Doug
CarFilmer of the Month · September
Dean Jarrell
Page Toyota · Sales
Dean Jarrell started using CarFilm at Page Toyota in August 2021. Five years and 27 days later, he has recorded 971 videos, sent 2,385 of them to buyers, and earned 5,262 views. His most recent video went out three days ago, on Thursday afternoon. This is not a rep who tried the tool and moved on. This is a rep whose entire follow-up motion is built on it.
This month's issue is about selling cars getting harder. Dean is the counterpoint. When his competition switched to text templates and hoped for the best, Dean kept sending video. Five years on the platform, when the market got tougher, the habit held. If you have been letting your CarFilm account go quiet, this is what the far end of the habit looks like.
Voices from the floor
"The buyers who close remember your face before they remember your name. That is what the video does. Everything else is the follow-up."
Co-owner, CarFilm · GSM, Mercedes-Benz of North Olmsted
First name. First video. First touch. The dealer who cuts through is the one whose salespeople send video while everyone else sends an email and text barrage. Do it TODAY.
Doug
RUN THE PLAY
— Doug