Ralph Paglia has always been one of my favorite people in the automotive industry. His willingness to do what it takes for his dealers is a trait that’s often hard to find, particularly when it comes to making the hard choices.
At the upcoming Internet Sales 20 Group, we will be debating for the fifth time in six years. This tradition of going head to head on tough issues doesn’t necessarily stem from having completely opposing views. In private conversations, we’ve both acknowledged that we both could have debated for either side as automotive digital marketing is rarely a black and white issue.
The thing that makes the debates so much fun is that we’re both passionate about helping car dealers to take the right steps to improve their dealerships and increase sales. In debate formats, the topics are often less important than the discussions and winning or losing is less important than getting the right messages out to dealers.
In this next event, we will be having our first full-fledged “proper” debate with a set of rules to make it more formal. We did that a little bit at Driving Sales, but the timing was shortened and the topics were known ahead of time. This time, the topics will not be known. We are going in blind.
Below are a pair of videos with the two of us basically calling each other out. While we’ll always be friends, there’s nothing wrong with a little crap-talking every now and then.
One comment
Ralph Paglia
Posted on April 6, 2014 at 9:22 pmI wholeheartedly agree with JD about the debates and the value that these discussions deliver. In 2009 JD and I got into a debate while speaking at Sean Bradley’s “Synergy Sessions” in Atlanta which was prompted by our different opinions regarding account aggregation services such as Knowem.com… There were so many dealers that thanked us for showcasing different opinions that what started on an impromptu basis has now become a regular part of what we do to provide dealers with multiple perspectives. I am looking forward to debating JD Rucker because he is both a friend and a professional colleague that I highly respect… Those that attend the 3 day IS20Group event in Atlantic City will benefit from the massive amount of experience that JD and I have amassed… We both know what works versus what is essentially smoke and mirrors!