subject: The Most Overlooked Steps In Auto Repair Marketing And How They Could Be Destroying Your Income [print this page] Auto repair marketing to existing customers is ten times to a hundred times more effective than auto repair marketing to a cold list and yet most shop owners spend most of the their auto repair marketing on attacking cold lists. This is crazy!
Instead, your auto repair marketing dollars should be focused on existing customers first, then old customers who have not been in lately and then finally on acquiring new customers. Eighty to ninety percent of your auto repair marketing resources should be spent on the first two categories.
Why is this? Simple, for better or worse your existing customers have some kind of relationship with you. At some point in time, because of your auto repair marketing, they decided that above all of the other choices they had you were the best choice to solve their problem. They may have changed their opinion, or they may have just drifted away, but at some point they were totally committed to you.
New cold customers on the other hand have never made that commitment. Because of this fact your auto repair marketing has to work much hard to convince these cold people to do business with you. It is much easier to deal with the warm clients.
Another huge auto repair marketing opportunity that almost always gets missed is the opportunity to make the customers next appointment while they are in your shop checking out from their current appointment.
How does this work? Well, did you ever notice when you went to the dentist how they automatically grab you on the way out and get you to commit to your next appointment? It is pretty slick, and you hardly even notice it, but you do keep the appointment. It should be the same way in your shop. The auto repair marketing tool you should use here on a regular basis is to make the customers next appointment as they are cashing out from this one.
All you have to do is say, based on today date and mileage you will be due for your next oil change on (a date 90 days from today). I have two openings that morning; one at 8AM and one at 8:30AM, which would be best for you. That is all there is to it. I make the customer watch me write their name in the appointment book as this does even more to confirm the appointment in their mind.
These two simple but often overlooked auto repair marketing steps could make a huge difference in your profitability this year. Take action and add these important steps to your auto repair marketing process.
