Growing your auto repair business can be tricky, especially with the mounting competition. With so many auto repair shops springing up in every vicinity, it can become challenging for you to make your mark.
But the real question is, how can you grow your auto repair business, attract new customers, and ward off the competition? Well, the strategies are endless but they are only a few tactics that will yield a mighty Return on Investment (ROI).
So without further ado, this guide is going to teach you how to grow auto repair business without breaking the bank! Buckle up and let’s get into it.
Top 8 Strategies To Grow Your Auto Repair Business
The following strategies are going to help you retain existing customers and attract more customers to your auto repair shop.
Set up an online presence for your business
If you don’t already have a company website, you should get one right now! The majority of owners of auto repair shops nowadays are under the age of 40, and they only do business with companies they can discover online. Nowadays, becoming popular is all about having a business presence online. A good place to start is by looking at the best designs for auto repair websites.
Here is a quick list of a few best practices you should follow for your website:
- Add a list of the auto repair services that you provide
- Contact information is prominently provided (include your location PIN for customers viewing your website on their mobiles)
- Quick load times
- Designs that are mobile-friendly
- Content that is relevant (think blogs and tips)
- Customer feedback (pro tip: you can import Google Reviews to your website)
- Invest in local Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
If you want to stand out from other local businesses, especially in terms of your online presence, you need to invest in auto repair SEO. It will definitely bring in more customers to your auto repair shop and offer you a great return on the marketing dollars that you invest.
Let me explain how this works.
Think about this. How likely are you to browse down and click on the second, much alone third, page of Google results to locate what you’re searching for?
When a potential consumer searches for “strange exhaust sound” or “auto shops near me,” you want your website to be at the top of the results. This is where local Search Engine Optimization (SEO) comes in. It helps in landing your business on the top of the first few pages on the search engine.
if this seems too complicated, don’t worry—there are plenty of SEO specialists available to assist. Just hire the right one and you can reap the benefits of SEO.
According to Google, better-ranking websites are likely to receive 70% more hits, which directly influences the volume of traffic (possible customers) you receive on the site and leads to greater conversion rates (a prospect who clicks on the site, interacts with it and eventually becomes a customer).
- Offer Top Tier Customer Service At Your Auto Repair Shop
Did you know that the typical American would spend up to 17% more on service with a company if they are satisfied with their service? On the flip side, 33% of Americans say they will never do business with a firm that provides terrible customer service again. And as per American Express, because of bad service, half of all Americans have cancelled a scheduled purchase!
That means that customers demand high-quality customer service, thus auto repair shops must now go above and beyond for each and every consumer that walks through the service door.
In the auto repair industry, it also helps a lot to have past customers who are loyal to your car repair business. 61% of brand-loyal customers will go out of their way to purchase from a certain company! It’s no secret that loyal customers also help in attracting new customers to your auto repair shop through word of mouth and testimonials.
For these reasons, your auto repair shop must have a client retention plan in order to attract real, brand-loyal consumers and become their preferred auto repair shop.
Otherwise, it can become difficult for you to run a successful auto repair shop.
- Have A Robust Customer Retention Strategy
It’s also vital to keep your previous customers engaged. The 80/20 rule applies here. This idea states that 80% of a company’s sales originate from 20% of its clients. This 20% of consumers are your brand’s loyal clients, for whom all businesses compete.
Along with providing excellent customer service, there is another technique to turn more, new customers into brand loyalists. Thanking your consumers for their patronage is an easy method to do this. A simple thank you goes a long way toward ensuring that clients remember you. It also shows your consumer how much you appreciate their business.
You can also launch customer loyalty programs and give favorable discounts for repeat services.
- Use Social Media Marketing
Many customers check in on a company’s social media pages before going to the store. Take pictures with pleased customers, upload pictures of the amazing automobiles you work on, or post pictures of what it’s like at work on any given day. “Stories” is a fantastic new tool that is gaining popularity by the day and you can use it to showcase live auto repairs.
Whether on Facebook, Instagram, or Snapchat, it’s a terrific way to keep your followers up to date on what’s going on in your life or to communicate any news in a few seconds or less. It’s a great approach to humanize your business while also providing customers with an inside view into your shop’s day.
Social media is also an excellent method for responding to client problems, comments, and inquiries about your services. Engaging with customers where they are online helps to increase brand exposure and recognition. You may follow certain hashtags on multiple social sites and comment on other people’s posts on popular issues, demonstrating your industry experience.
Many stores even run social media contests for their clients. You might run a successful social promotion by uploading an image of your business and asking consumers to like, share, and tag a friend in the post to be included in a drawing. It should be noted that the award does not have to be something extravagant; it may be as simple as a $50 gift card to your shop.
Because you can tag a company on social media, it’s a terrific method for stores to obtain free client awareness. They may snap images of their vehicle at your store and tag them on Facebook or any other social media platform, letting others know that actual people believe in your company. You’re missing out on free exposure if you don’t have a social presence!
- Create Helpful Content
Another strategy to keep your consumers engaged is to provide them with genuine value at no cost. You may accomplish this by launching a monthly email newsletter! Nobody likes dull marketing emails crammed with “THE LATEST, GREATEST SPECIAL OFFER”.
Use your imagination! Fill it with auto-care advice, blogs, videos, and so on. For example, you might add a blog post about “how to plan the perfect summer road trip” in your email. Creating content and providing it to your client list for free establishes your store as a thought leader. When you become a thought leader, you become a go-to source for industry information.
Keeping your previous customers connected with you via email newsletter is also a terrific method to maintain your business at the forefront of their minds. When you stay top of mind and provide clients with unique industry information and value to their daily lives that they genuinely get value from reading, your store will receive more referrals and appointment requests.
- Aim To Generate Positive Word of Mouth Marketing
The majority of individuals learn about their favorite car repair company through word of mouth. Because it is the most successful kind of advertising, it is critical for businesses to have a solid strategy in place. We discovered that 75% of brand-loyal consumers, without being asked, refer their favorite firms to their friends and family (-InMoment).
It’s a fascinating look at how individuals communicate their experiences. People like assisting others they care about in locating high-quality services. These suggestions are also quite effective. According to Hubspot, more than 81% of consumers trust a reference from a friend or family member (-Hubspot research).
If you provide excellent value to your customers, you can practically expect them to promote your business for you. Nothing beats free stuff in life, right? But if you serve your customers well, they will promote for you for FREE.
People like sharing stuff with other people about positive events in their lives, but they may not bother to submit an internet review. On the other side, if someone had a negative experience at your store, you can almost certainly expect a negative internet review.
One fantastic approach to accomplish this is to offer clients who post a nice review online a discount on their next oil change. You don’t have to go overboard; a 15% discount coupon that covers the tax is plenty. We also urge businesses to establish referral schemes. Customers may help you advertise your brand by giving them a $10 shop gift card for each referral they send your way.
- Use Technology
With digital vehicle inspections (DV), you can improve the client experience at your shop.
DVI gives car specialists the ability to use multimedia (pictures and movies) to pinpoint exactly what needs to be addressed. It will provide your customers with better knowledge, and allow them to make an educated decision regarding the vehicle repairs advised by your car repair company.
With this latest automotive equipment, such as DVI, tech-savvy shop managers can also improve their average ticket size by 30% or more.
Digital vehicle inspections are a must-have for all auto repair firms looking to enhance client trust and average repair order size.
