1. Paint the Windows

For many shops, the front windows represent a very big flat space. Lots of shops have windows that look right out into the street. And while some shops like to display the wheels and tires that they sell, the lion’s share of small shops don’t. Which means the windows aren’t revealing any merchandise meant to lure people in. If your business were a jewelry store, I’d say don’t paint your windows. But it isn’t. So since what you sell doesn’t show off well in that front window—people aren’t really window-shopping for shocks and radiator hoses—paint it and invite people in based on something else. Offer a special, or just say something like “$10 off any service in the month of May!” Holidays offer great reasons to paint your windows too. So find a local window-painting service, or hire an artist that you know, and put all that window space to work. And remember, it doesn’t have to be fancy or detailed art; simply say what you mean in big bold color. Just make sure it looks professional.

2. Paint the Shop

People don’t want to do business with businesses that don’t look like they do much business. If the exterior of the shop is run down, with chipping paint and faded signs, well, that doesn’t look good. I mean, yes, obviously a run-down paint job on the outside of the shop doesn’t mean the service inside is no good, but to someone who has never been to your business before, well, how are they supposed to know that? All they know is that when they drive by, it doesn’t look like the shop is doing too well, given that it looks run down. They will probably assume either the business owner doesn’t care how the business looks (which means he or she might not care about other things), or they will assume the business can’t afford to get the painting done or the sign updated, etc. People do judge by appearances.

3. Paint the Showroom

This is an extension of the previous idea. If people come inside and the paint is old, chipping or water-stained, they’re going to wonder if the business is at the top of its game. Furthermore, things like water damage are, in a way, mechanical in nature. A leaky roof is something that handy people should be able to fix easily. People who go to automotive shops for service and repair go there because they are looking for handy people who are good at fixing and maintaining things. If they walk inside and see a showroom or bathroom that isn’t maintained, especially with something as easy as paint, they are going to make assumptions about quality of work. It may not be fair, but it is a distinct and problematic possibility for your bottom line.

4. Paint the Lifts

For many shops, the service bays are big, tall, yawning openings that look right out into the parking lot, making it easy for everyone to see inside. Often times the arrangement of cars and equipment and toolboxes can overwhelm the eye, and passersby may not think much about what they see. But the lifts are what “touch” the cars. Above-ground lifts are pretty prominent, so having them look good sends an important message to people looking in. And for many in-ground lifts, painting the arms can be as simple as a can of a brightly colored paint (yellow is great) and only a few minutes tops. You can keep them touched up easily throughout the year, and it really adds a nice touch of color to the shop as people are walking by.

5. Paint the Railings and Gates

Rails on outdoor steps or access ramps can add a nice touch of color and sharpness to the visual appeal of your shop in much the same way that the lifts do. The same goes for gates that might close onto your overflow parking, your dumpster, your waste fluids drum area or your junk tire space. Any of these represent opportunities to add to your shop’s overall professional appeal simply by making sure they look nice. You’d be surprised how little it takes to spruce up a whole shop attitude with little things like that.

6. Paint the Shop Truck

This might seem like an outlier at first because unless you are a paint and body shop, you won’t be able to do this one yourself. But the fact of the matter is, if your shop vehicle has been beaten up a little over time, you’re driving around in a moving billboard that doesn’t say a lot about your business. Your company truck really is part of your auto shop’s marketing and advertising program, so take a look at it with a critical eye, and if you think it needs a fresh look, don’t hesitate. You might even be able to take it out in trade with a local paint and body shop. And think about this as well:  if you have an older shop vehicle that is running great and looks fantastic despite being on the older side, imagine what that says about your ability to help keep other peoples’ vehicles on the road too. This stuff matters more than you might realize.

If your auto repair shop’s truck looks like this, consider a new paint job. Source: dieselplace.com

7. Paint the Parking Lot

I’ve already covered this one in another article, so I won’t beat that poor parking lot horse to death. Suffice to say, if your parking lot has lost the bright vibrancy of its painted lines, get to work sprucing it up. Those few bright white stripes can make a crisp and professional statement about your business the moment people pull in.

8. Hang Some Paintings Here and There

Okay, I’m probably cheating by adding this one here, but it’s true. If you’ve taken the time to paint your showroom or your shop bathrooms, why not take it one step further and add a painting or two? They don’t have to be expensive. They can be prints of paintings that you get very cheap. Frames can be had easily as well, whether a simple plastic poster frame or a nice frame you repurpose from a garage sale (you might even get the paintings at a garage sale). However you do it, having something on the wall besides that poster from last year’s shock and strut promotion is probably a fair addition to this list of auto shop marketing ideas. And a painting is technically paint, so this one is staying on the list.

We’re always writing new articles so you can learn more about getting customers into your shop. Read them each month in the CustomerLink Marketing Manual.

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People are put at ease by plants, and it’s a primal thing that goes beyond the fact that plants are pretty to look at and colorful and, almost as a side benefit, filter the air (especially the type of plant described in No. 4 below). Most people are aware of these things, if not consciously, at least on a subconscious level. And yet, there are lots and lots of shops out there that don’t have any plants in them at all. This is often because for many shop owners, it’s just too hard to keep plants alive.

It is a strange and nearly mystifying thing to discover that shop owners, often some of the most methodical and system-minded people on the entire planet, can’t keep plants alive. But it is very likely that a large part of that problem might be that these well-meaning people just aren’t trying the right kind of plants.

So here we are to help with another easy marketing idea for your automotive shop. Below is a list of six plant options for your business that can help you add some greenery to the scene. These plants can make your customers more comfortable, and make you more comfortable, and do so with an actual chance for continued success given that they might actually stay alive. So without further ado, here they are, six plants even you can’t kill:

Mother-in-Law’s Tongue

Mother in Law’s Tongue or Snake Plant

Mother-in-Law’s Tongue, which is also commonly called “Snake Plant,” is a great indoor plant. It’s cool looking, with long leaves that thrust up into the air like twisted sword blades. The leaves are typically sort of zebra-striped, with a dark green base color and either light green, yellow or silver bands striping them. They can grow as much as thirty-six inches tall, which gives them great visual appeal. The best part about them is that they can survive in shady places, and they don’t need much water. They are desert plants, so too much water is actually bad for them, and most experts recommend that you even let the soil dry out between watering. Now, let’s be honest, doesn’t that sound like something you were going to do anyway?

Cast Iron Plant

Cast Iron Plant

This plant did not get its name by accident, and what better name for an automotive repair facility’s plant than that? This plant seems to beg for a spot in your business. The Cast Iron plant is another excellent choice for the shop owner who can’t seem to keep plants alive. It’s got long, fairly wide leaves (they’ll grow up to twenty-four inches long) that are green with some streaks of yellow or light green. While not quite as colorful as the Mother-in-Law’s Tongue, they are still pretty, and the leaves bend and grow together more, giving the plant a nice full look that is pleasing to the eye.

 Lucky Bamboo

Lucky Bamboo

Lucky Bamboo is another easy plant to keep around, although it will want a little more light than some of the others here. Usually keeping it somewhere where it can get some indirect sunlight is best. This plant is popular with Feng Shui enthusiasts, and many believe it is lucky to have around. Who couldn’t use a little more luck in their auto repair business, eh? It’s also a compact plant, so it doesn’t need a lot of space, and yet it provides great visual impact because it’s got this really cool spiraling-stem effect that is just plain neat to watch as it grows.

Peace Lily

Peace Lily

This is the only flowering plant on the list (well, unless you count the plant listed at No. 6, which you might not). The Peace Lily is a decent-sized plant, usually growing around twenty-four to thirty-six inches high, and besides its pretty, broad green leaves, it sprouts long slender stems atop which grow gorgeous, sort of spoon-shaped flowers that form from one large petal that is somewhat pointed at the top. Despite being a flowering plant, it’s still very easy to take care of, though you do need to pay attention so that its soil does not dry completely out. One bit of warning though. Because a lot of shops keep pets around, and of course there are sometimes kids in the waiting room, it’s best not to set these where they might get chewed on, as they can be toxic if consumed. On the upside, however, this plant is reputedly good for filtering toxins out of the air, so perhaps that’s why it isn’t so good as salad, eh?

Chinese Evergreen

Chinese Evergreen

This is one tough plant. If you can kill this plant, then you definitely will find yourself wanting to pay attention to plant No. 6, because that’s the only thing that is going to survive you. The Chinese Evergreen will make it indoors pretty easily, and it’s actually a great plant to use if you have a big space you’d like to add color to, like a corner somewhere that needs a big splash of life. It can grow up to three feet tall, and it has wide welcoming leaves, often with lighter stripes that angle off from the centerline. This is a great plant for an automotive service center waiting room that feels especially bland and bare.

Silk Plants

If you manage to kill one of these silk plants, you are very skilled indeed.

Uh…okay…we’re cheating a little here.

As we mentioned in No. 5 above, it is possible to kill some of the plants on this list. While for the most part you should be able to make a go of at least one of these varieties, for some people, plants just seem to refuse to grow. But that doesn’t mean you can’t bring the beauty and relaxing effects of nature into your shop.

If your shop is just cave-like in its darkness, or if it just gets too darn cold in winter for anything to survive, then silk plants are your best floral friends. Silk plants don’t die, so you win automatically. The biggest upside of silk after that invincible part is that you can get pretty much any variety of plant, including flowers that will stay in bloom forever. You can’t do that with real plants. The downside of silk plants, however, is that they need to be kept clean. That is one of the neatest and sort of mysterious things about real plants. For whatever reason, they don’t seem to gather dust like silk plants do. But if you don’t mind dusting them every once in a while, or even just taking them outside and hosing them off, then a few silk plants might be perfect for you.

So there you have it, six plant varieties to liven up your shop. There are others too. Beyond this list, there are also many cactuses, ferns, ivies, and even some mosses that you can probably grow. Find some and try some if you haven’t before. If you want a really easy way to ramp up the happy-factor in your waiting room and around your office and showroom, consider working in some life, plant life. Go to the local nursery and tell them what your shop is like, tell them how much light you have, and be honest about how diligent you are about watering. They are professionals and they can really help you out.

And just to add options on top of options, there are actually companies you can hire to keep your houseplants alive. A quick search online will help you find local businesses that will provide you with the living ambience your shop needs. Have a look. Or just do it yourself. Seriously, the six options we’ve given you ought to make it pretty easy. If you can kill all of those varieties, including No. 6, well, then we give up. Maybe we’ll write about the benefits of green paint in a future article.

We regularly write new articles to provide you with great auto service marketing ideas—get them free every month with the CustomerLink Marketing Manual.

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The fact of the matter is people do judge things based on appearances. We’re actually pretty good at it. It’s a survival mechanism that dates back to our earliest ancestors. Running around in the primitive wild, people had to make judgments on what was dangerous and what wasn’t. What looked edible and what didn’t. The people who judged wrong didn’t make it: Ohhh, what a cute little animal. Look how long and slender it is, with those two pointy teeth. And what fun that rattle thingy at the tip of its tail must be!

We evolved the impulse to judge on appearance, and whether we admit it or not, we do trust our eyes, and our instincts, about what looks good or safe. And your customers will too. All the best auto shop marketing ideas put to use will not help you if their first impression of your business is that it’s not safe.

Know What Attracts Customers to Your Auto Repair Shop

A nasty old parking lot with weeds growing everywhere, with broken asphalt or concrete, with the painted lines all faded and gone, is a signal to potential new auto repair customers that the business to which that parking lot belongs is not safe. If that business were fruit, the messy parking lot would be the signal that what is inside might be poisonous.

Now there aren’t that many shops out there with trashed parking lots, as most shop owners understand that some degree of neatness is necessary. But there are degrees of neatness, and people driving by will notice them.

Think of how good a brand new parking lot looks:  you know, with fresh, richly black asphalt and crisply painted white lines. The edges of it are neat and true, the gardens around it, if there are any, have nice ground cover and neatly trimmed plants and are all weeded. That looks totally professional.

Don’t let an ugly parking lot ruin your auto shop’s marketing. Image credit: ifixuglyparkinglots.com

 And What Might Drive Them Away

Now, take that same parking lot and age it several years, crack the asphalt and have a little row of weeds growing along the snaking line where it broke. Not tall weeds, just little clumps here and there. The pristine black surface is faded to dull gray, the bright white lines dulled to an egg-shell hue. The gardens also have weeds growing up around the base of the bushes and trees—not terrible, but they’re there—and the bushes are pretty raggedy, and no longer lush and well maintained. There might be a plastic grocery bag or fast food bag that blew into one of them that nobody got around to getting it out of there. To be honest, that’s pretty typical, based on my experience, which includes well over a decade as a sales rep calling on shops.

Now take that parking lot and age it some more. The surface is very cracked, there are potholes and tall weeds growing in some of the cracks, especially around the broken concrete stops in the parking stalls. The dull gray is now almost gravel-like in texture: light gray and rough-looking. The painted lines are nearly gone, they’re barely ghosts now, and the gardens are filled with the dead brambles of bushes and trees, like woody skeletons. There are definitely bits of paper and grocery bags that have blown into them, gotten stuck, and now flutter like the tattered remnants of their funeral shroud.

A Clean Shop Appearance is Simple Auto Repair Marketing That Works

The parking lot I just described is an auto service marketing nightmare because it practically screams: Stay away! It is a signal to everyone who comes in that the business does not pay attention to detail. And the sad part is that may not be true of the business at all. That business may pay attention to detail very well when it comes to working on automobiles. It may be great. But that’s not what it looks like to prospective customers who have nothing to go on but their instincts, no choice but to trust their guts.

As they drive by, most people have no way to decide what might be going on inside a business beyond what they can assess visually. The first thing they see is the front of your building, your signs and your parking lot. Any one of those three, if left to fade out in the elements, sends a message to passersby that’s not the welcoming message the business owner hopes they’ll get. Instead it’s a warning—the sight of that plastic bag blowing in the wind, the sound of it flapping there, working like the rattle on a snake’s tail to scare them away.

So, as the weather begins to clear in the coming weeks, depending on where you are located, all the moisture left behind is going to start the grass and weeds growing. It won’t be long before your parking lot will be subject to the test of nature once again. Make sure that with fresh new spring growth, you look at it with a fresh and critical eye. After all, wouldn’t it be a shame to send out some great spring automotive service reminders only to scare people off as they drive in?

Did you like this tip? There are more where this one came from—get them free each month with the CustomerLink Marketing Manual.

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As marketers, I think we can all relate to his desire. Getting more email addresses in your database means you have more customers you can quickly and cheaply contact via email. Don’t we all want that? But as consumers, I think we can also all relate to a customer’s reluctance to hand out their email address to everyone who asks. So how do you overcome that reluctance? First, you start by having a healthy relationship with your customers. No, they don’t have to be in love with you, but they do have to have to like you first. (Yes I said “like you” not “trust you”. More on that in another article.) Assuming your customers already like you to some extent, and they must since your business is working as well as it is, all you’ve got to do is learn what questions and objections are popping in to your customer’s minds when you ask for their email address, and learn how to pre-empt those. Then you’ll be well on your way to getting more email subscribers for your email list.

What’s in it for them?

How many unread emails are in your inbox right now? Most people have hundreds of them. (I did a really unscientific survey of some fellow CustomerLink people and I was pleasantly surprised to see my inbox in relatively good shape with just 55 unread emails. The average was more than 100 unread (the worst case I saw was more than 11,000 unread emails- ouch). Think about that for a second. With most people checking their email multiple times per day, if not multiple times per hour, they still don’t manage to get to all of them. Why not? There are simply too many emails coming in to deal with them all. Especially with the growing number of smartphone users having 24/7 access to email within arm’s reach. Giving yet another business the ability to interrupt them any time they choose, and pile still more stuff into their inbox that they have to wade through… the thought alone is enough to make many people recoil in horror.

Don’t be a desperate email marketer! Offer customers something valuable in exchange for their email address.

How do you get past this? You start by making sure every email you send provides value for your customers. Whether it’s information that educates, entertains or otherwise helps them, saves them time or money, the emails you send have to be valuable to your customers. Or they’ll simply never get read.

Once you’ve got your emails jam packed full of value for your customers, all that’s left is to tell people what’s in it for them when they sign up for your emails. When they see you’re focused on giving them something, and not simply on trying to make a buck from them, they’ll gladly hand you their email address and read every single email you send.

How often are you going to email me?

This one may seem obvious, but companies often fail to answer this basic but essential question. Are you sending a monthly or weekly newsletter? Quarterly promotions? Daily informative tips? Whatever the frequency is, make it very clear what customers are signing up to receive, and how often they should expect it. They’ll be more likely to sign up if they know you’re going to be consistent and predictable about it, and not going to email them multiple times per day. It goes without saying, but once you set this expectation, make sure you stick to it. If you tell them it’s a monthly newsletter and then you switch it to be more or less frequent than that, your customers will recognize that you’re not keeping your end of the bargain. They may simply unsubscribe from your emails, or worse they may lose confidence in your business if you don’t meet the expectations you set. In summary, tell them how often you’re going to email them and keep your word.

What about Spam? Or selling my info to others?

My Uncle Forrest loves Spam. He could go to that Monty Python restaurant and order everything on the menu:

• Egg and Spam
• Spam Egg Sausage and Spam
• Egg, Bacon and Spam
• Egg, Bacon, sausage and Spam
• Spam, Bacon, sausage and Spam
• Spam, Egg, Spam, Spam, Bacon and Spam
• Spam, Spam, Spam, Egg and Spam
• Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, baked beans, Spam, Spam, Spam and Spam

He would love it all. But there’s one kind of Spam that nobody likes. Not even my Spam-loving uncle. Spam email.

I get dozens of unwanted email addresses every day… from companies I never requested email from and never gave permission to email me… Is your business going to do that to me too? Or give my email address to another company who will send me unwanted junk that fills up my inbox?

Of course you’re not, right? You know that’s bad for business in the long term. So tell them. One of the cleverest ways I’ve seen this written is was on a website for photographers, “I’m anti-spam. Your email address is like a blueberry muffin to me. I’m going to savor it and not share with anyone.”

Here are a couple of other ideas:

• Our relationship with you is important. We would never put that at risk by sending you junk.
• Spam is for eating. Not for sending to loved ones. Get the good stuff in our email newsletter with no Spam guaranteed.
• 100% No Spam Guarantee.
• You are entering a Spam-free zone. We’ll keep your email address private and only send you valuable content, no filler.
• We hate Spam as much as you do. Your email address is safe with us.

However you say it, assure customers you won’t Spam them or share their email address (and obviously keep your promise on this!). When you do, you’ll definitely start getting more emails and subscribers for your list.

So this is the part where I practice what I preach. If you found this article helpful, there’s lots more where this came from. I know your time is precious so I’ll never waste it by sending you junk. You’ll get only the best marketing and advertising ideas, tips and tricks, automatically once a month with the CustomerLink Marketing Manual. Check it out.

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He that lieth down with dogs shall rise up with fleas.

This is so true it almost hurts. And it applies in more than one way. For one, I think Mr. Franklin was telling us that if we allow ourselves to be surrounded by people who bring us down, well, we shouldn’t be surprised if we are down. If we tolerate crankiness, gruffness, grubbiness, laziness or any number of other nesses, we might end up with that ness ourselves. If you’ve got a surly service manager or a tech with an attitude, but he or she is decent enough that you don’t want to be bothered with dealing with the problem, or you are intimidated by the prospect of confrontation so you let it go, well, guess what? You wake up every day with fleas. And like fleas sucking blood out of the host, those kinds of things suck you dry, they drain your energy. So, handle it.

Another possible interpretation of this great Franklin quote applies to customers too. If you find yourself trapped in the endless coupon cycle, always having to give away oil changes to get any business, maybe you aren’t going after the right customers. Maybe you are chasing fleas instead of butterflies. This is sort of the whole point of having a smrt marketing program, and very pointedly, a marketing program to get new customers into your auto repair shop where you can go only after butterflies and leave the fleas to someone else.

Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.

This one speaks very closely to your crew. It is so easy to get into the habit of explaining stuff to people. We all do it. It’s just how we are, and we do it often because it’s easy and, a lot of the time, it works. But sometimes it doesn’t. Or if it does, it takes a long time and a lot of repetition. So the message here from good old Ben is to remember that there is more to teaching than telling someone, or even having a meeting and showing it in detail. Bring them into the process. Do it with them. Or involve them in establishing a new policy or a new procedure, in implementing it from the start. Give them ownership of it. Have them be responsible for training everyone, if it’s something everyone is supposed to know or do. Or if you’re learning it together, if it’s totally new for the shop, but eventually everyone or more than a few of you will need to know it, take on the learning together. Each person can take different parts of a big learning project and master them and then cross-train everyone else on their respective pieces. Be creative, but bring them into the process. They’ll feel appreciated and valuable, and they’ll actually do it the way you want them to when it’s all said and done.

Drive thy business, let it not drive thee.

This one is particularly on target for an automotive service facility. It speaks to the obvious yet often neglected reality of falling into the trap of reacting to events. It speaks to the value of having a plan, which is important, and on point here in the early part of the year. Set goals, map out a plan, set target dates for things, implement the plan, track the results daily, and adjust as needed to make sure you are achieving the goals you set. If too much time is spent running around putting out fires, one must wonder why so many fires are popping up. And I think the answer to that lies in this great Franklin quote.

It certainly speaks to auto repair marketing principles. If people wait until there are no customers in the bays to start a marketing program, and then they rush to get out a coupon or advertising campaign, they are not driving their business, their business is driving them. And while it’s certainly better to do something if that problem comes up suddenly, such as sending out a quick email campaign to increase car count on a particular day, it is far more in keeping with Franklin’s advice to be working to have a steady flow of traffic all along.

I wake up every morning at nine and grab for the morning paper. Then I look at the obituary page. If my name is not on it, I get up.

In the first installment of this Benjamin Franklin series, I ended with a comment about how money has never made a man happy. It wasn’t my comment, of course, it was Franklin’s, but my point was that it’s important to be grateful for what we have. I saw this quote and, besides just being characteristically funny of the great man, it made me want to hit that idea once more. I won’t belabor it this time, but be happy. Life is short. Enjoy the freedom you have, the people around you. Watch the news tonight and realize how lucky you are to have this business and this life. It truly is awesome, even if there are bumps and headaches from time to time.

Get more ideas and inspiration for your shop free every month with the CustomerLink Marketing Manual.

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Never confuse motion with action.

This is a pretty big one because we’re all subject to it. Our days fill up with so many tasks that have to be done. It’s pretty easy to do the sunup to sundown routine over and over and over again, staying busy all the time. But every so often, it’s important that we stop and make sure that what we’re doing is both an effective use of our time and actually moves us towards the goals that matter most.

A perfect and very close-to-home example we often see is shop owners trying to work their social media. Everyone knows social media is a huge component in an auto repair online marketing strategy. And so, diligent to the last, many shop owners set themselves to the task of learning it and trying to stay on top of it. But how much time is a good idea? Is a shop owner’s time spent on Facebook marketing as valuable as his time spent in the shop directing the crew or monitoring inventory or, maybe this is crazy-talk here, spending time with customers? Seems unlikely. But there are many other busy things besides social media marketing that can gobble up time that would be better spent on something more important. So, every so often, we should all take inventory of what we’re doing versus what we’re accomplishing, especially if there are things going on that we wish were different.

Honesty is the best policy.

I suppose this one isn’t much of a surprise, but since it’s such a famous quote, it pretty much has to be on the list. Besides, it never hurts to think about it. It’s not just about selling with integrity or admitting to mistakes; those are already assumed. But it can also mean being honest with ourselves.

…A frequent recurrence to fundamental principles…is absolutely necessary to preserve the blessings of liberty and keep a government free.

Yes, this quote is pointed more at liberty and government, but the message remains right on point for auto repair too. Whenever things seem to be out of control, or even just some element of the business isn’t working right, don’t forget the basics. Sometimes—a lot of times—problems arise when we forget to do those right. We get in habits, go with assumptions or trends, or just let the basics slip by. Ever seen anyone spend time diagnosing a vehicle that was towed in for no-start problems only to discover that it was out of gas? How many other things got checked first? Yeah, like that. It happens.

So, if there’s something going on that you can’t figure out, you need a “recurrence to fundamental principles,” to use Franklin’s words. Step back and start from the super fundamentals involved. Check the stuff that falls into the category of, “Duh, of course we’re doing THAT right.” Sometimes you aren’t. Maybe you were at one time, but not any more. Who knows why the shift happened, but it did. Big problems can be caused by things as simple as floor mats or seat covers, fluid checks, air pressure, dirty bathrooms, techs swearing or smoking near customers, etc. You know this stuff better than we do. So, when in doubt, pull back to the “fundamental principles” and check one item at a time.

An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

Doesn’t it seem like everything Franklin said is such a no-brainer? Genius is weird that way. And this is another one that is spot-on.

No matter what any of us does for a living, we never know all of it. I read once that Socrates was the last person on Earth to know everything that was known by man. I have no way of knowing if that’s true or not—and I have a couple of teenagers who are pretty convinced they know everything, which I do know is not true but they are pretty convinced right now—but besides my kids and Socrates, for the rest of us there’s always so much more to learn. And Franklin’s purpose, I believe, is that we should always push for more. You can learn more about running your auto repair business, and you can help your crew keep learning too. If learning pays interest, imagine if everyone in your shop is learning. That’s a lot of interest coming back to you in the long term.

Watch the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves.

I realize this is one you live every day, so I’m going to dovetail this with the last one. One of the things about learning is that often we don’t learn all of what we could have out of any given class or book or seminar. So, here’s a little tip for getting the most interest back on an investment in knowledge that you have already made.

Ever go to seminars or take classes somewhere, either online or at a campus, and come back with lots of books and DVDs (VHS tapes?) and maybe access codes to specific learning websites? Remember how excited you were when you got back and were ready to bust all those new auto shop marketing ideas out? Well, odds are, not much has changed between when you went to that training and now. Sure some things might be different, but I bet the business principles are the same. Blow the dust off those old resources and tap back into an investment you’ve already made.

Money has never made man happy, nor will it; there is nothing in its nature to produce happiness. The more of it one has the more one wants.

Now, since we hit the frugal penny-watching Franklin quote, I felt this would be a good one to end on. I don’t want to turn this into some sort of touchy-feely essay or anything, so I’ll keep it brief and just say:  don’t forget to have fun. Enjoy what you do. Don’t forget that you are living the American dream. You have your own business. Whether it’s been a raging success from the beginning or it’s been a struggle all along, here you are. You are eating, you have a dry place to sleep, you have people around you who respect what you do. No matter what might be wrong, don’t forget to take a look at what’s right, at least for a little while. Chasing money is part of business, and obviously it needs to be done effectively. But you already know that. Remember to look around and allow yourself to smile and be proud of what you’ve achieved, regardless of what the books look like.

I could go on forever with quotes from this brilliant man, so I’ll leave it on that hopefully uplifting note. Maybe I’ll write a follow-up to this for another day. In fact, I will. It is fun to think about, and the man was so brilliant we can all learn from spending a few moments considering his words, words so powerful we still read about them two centuries after he passed. Must be something to them, eh?

Get more ideas and tips for your shop, free every month with the CustomerLink Marketing Manual.

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Now I know you don’t need some kids’ movie-style motivational speech about learning from your mistakes, so that’s not what’s coming. But what is coming is a reminder about the underlying point of all those sweet-but-goofy productions: by examining what went wrong, you can figure out what you need to do to make it go right.

Think about it: that’s actually what your auto repair shop is all about, or at least, it’s a large part of it. Something breaks, or is breaking, or is about to break on someone’s vehicle, and yet that doesn’t bother you, right? You approach that grinding sound in your customer’s car methodically, un-emotionally, logically. You have a system in place for working through possible causes of the problem, and you have tools to help you figure it out. Then, once you find the issue, you apply a solution, or at least you recommend that your customer applies a solution. When they do, their problem goes away. And if it doesn’t, or if it goes only partly away, you keep diagnosing until it works. That’s a big part of how the business operates. And it makes sense.

So, if you have some regret from last year, some goal you didn’t achieve, whether it’s a sales goal, a goal of increasing your shop’s profits, personnel goal or any other kind of goal, don’t let it drag you down. Try to push aside the emotion and approach that problem like it’s a grinding sound in someone’s automobile. And most of all, don’t wait; start fixing the problem today.

Increase Auto Repair Profits by Diagnosing and Fixing Problems In Your Shop

Diagnose the Problem

If it’s a profit issue, look at your pricing. Are your margins right? Are you getting what you should for labor, or holding on to an old rate because you’re afraid people will think your prices are too high? Do you not have the right mix of repair and maintenance? If not, ask yourself why. “Sure,” you’re thinking, “if I knew why, if I could just ask myself and get the answer, then I wouldn’t have missed my goal!”

True, but if you go meticulously through what you know, you can start to break it down. If you aren’t sure what your prices should be, or if you think you’re sure, but you’re willing to admit you might have possibly forgotten how that should really work, then find out. Go back through that old franchise handbook you have, or that old binder from the seminar or other training you got that talks about margins and make sure you’re doing it right.

If you don’t have that, go online and look. Ask a trusted vendor to help you. They know this stuff, and they work with a lot of other shops. They can help. The bottom line on the bottom line is that if you aren’t sure what your prices should be when you start to try to evaluate why your profit goal failed last year, then you’ve just discovered the first real symptom and have a place to start: getting the right information. Maybe that’s all the problem is, and it’s a simple fix once it’s been diagnosed.

But it could be anything. If you need higher sales, ask yourself what you did to increase car count last year. If you don’t know, that’s probably the problem. Are you doing any automotive service marketing? What kind? How consistently? Whether it’s auto repair direct mail, social media marketing, new customer marketing, etc., how good is the reporting on that marketing? How often are you consulting the reporting and using it to make changes? Are you targeting the right customer types? Were you using target marketing at all, or just tossing it out there, hoping? If you aren’t sure how to answer those questions, again, spend some time looking into how to diagnose that problem, rather than being frustrated. Take action on that problem. And, again, get with your vendors, get with us and ask us to help you figure it out. It’s what we’re here for.

Apply the Solution

Needless to say, there are lots of possible problems you might have had, and all of them can’t be addressed here, even as lightly as I’ve just done. The main point, however, is that rather than feeling bad about a problem, find one and fix it. Just one, to start with; it’s easier. Think about it, how often does a diagnostic tech run diagnostics on multiple cars at the exact same time? Yeah, that’s the point. So pick the one that you think you can fix—either the one that can be fixed the most easily and therefore put to rest, or the one that can change your outcome this year for the best—and then set to work breaking down the problem in a logical, methodical way.

If you don’t know how to break the problem down, find help. You aren’t alone. Your vendors are your allies; let them help you. Remember, the better you do, the better they do. They know that. Plus, the odds are, they are really nice people who truly do care. If they can’t help you, maybe they can help you find someone who can. You’re all in the same industry, after all. So get help if you need it. There’s no shame in it, and wow, does it feel good to fix a problem once and for all.

Do you need help diagnosing your business and looking for ways to improve your results? Get your free Shop Diagnostic, and we’ll help you uncover real solutions to your shop’s unique challenges.

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Procrastination is a common problem that affects the performance of the human machine. We all do it, whether we admit it or not. And procrastination is one of the nastiest things out there when it comes to keeping us from achieving goals. You could have the very best auto repair shop marketing campaigns in play, never having any problem with getting customers in the door.  But you’ll have trouble turning those new customer marketing results into profits if you have a procrastination problem in your shop.

Sometimes it’s hard to tell (or hard to admit) if we are procrastinating on something we need to achieve or if we are just too busy to get it done. That is essentially a performance problem that needs to be diagnosed. So, since there are no hand-held devices you can plug into your brain or the brain of someone you work with to determine if procrastination is the problem behind an unrealized goal, what you need instead is an understanding of the three components that make procrastination work. Here they are in order of complexity, from least to most:

1.      “I Don’t Like to Do This”

This is the simplest of the three things that cause procrastination. Easy-to-see examples of things that fall into this category are tasks like cleaning bathrooms, painting the shop or doing paperwork. Any of these things, and a whole lot more just like them, represent unpleasant tasks. Not everyone feels the same way about these—you might actually like doing paperwork for example—but the point is, there are lots of things out there that don’t get done because people simply hate doing them. This is easy to recognize if you know that you are looking for it, and easy to fix, especially if you are the boss. Just make your employees do it: crack the whip and do some disciplining if you have to (which also may be an unpleasant task that you avoid!). And if you’re the one who’s procrastinating, well, now you know what the problem is, so quit messing around and just get to it already. Make a plan; break it up into smaller parts if it’s a big unpleasant task. But deal with it because it’s important to your business: simple things like a clean and well-organized shop are nothing less than instant, in-your-face, auto shop advertisements.

2.      “I Don’t Know How to Do This”

Another huge reason people don’t do things that need to get done is because they just don’t know how. This one seems obvious on the surface, but it’s actually a little more complicated than that. Maybe they know how to do part of it, maybe they knew at one point and forgot, or maybe they were just never trained on it before. Maybe everyone else thinks they know how, and they don’t want to admit to anyone, or even to themselves, that they really don’t. Regardless of how it came about, however it happened, this is a problem. People who don’t know how to do something tend not to want to do it. This is hardly Harvard School of Psychology stuff here. Sure, there are some instances where not knowing how to do a thing doesn’t prevent someone from trying anyway, but that’s kind of scary in professional automotive repair. (I can think of eager young car enthusiasts who are more than happy to jump in and try to rebuild that engine even though they aren’t qualified—that sort of thing—but remember, we are talking about things that aren’t getting done that need to get done, not things that ARE getting done but getting horribly done because they are being butchered by inexperience; that’s a different article.)

Like number 1 above, this isn’t a complicated thing to understand, but it is important as a manager of people to understand that when there are goals to be met that aren’t being met, understanding the nature of the problem is half the battle of fixing it. So, if something isn’t happening at your shop that seems like it should be happening, maybe investigating whether or not whoever is assigned that task is really as knowledgeable as you or everyone else assumes they are is a good place to start diagnosing the problem. Again, once you find this out, deal with it as soon as possible. After all, you are marketing your automotive repair service as a knowledgeable and reputable business, so you need to be sure you’re backing those claims up.

3.      “I Don’t Know If This Will Work”

This is the most complicated of the three because this one is almost purely emotional, and it can be harder to pin down. It is often the product of numbers 1 and 2 above. But not always. Sometimes, it is its own unique situation.

When people don’t know if their efforts are going to pay off, they will procrastinate. It’s sort of an “uncharted waters” type of problem, like who wants to sail off the edge of the map? The guys who were willing to try either died or you know their names now.  Back in the early days of navigation on the open seas, a competent person may have enjoyed sailing on wooden ships, and they may have known how to do that task perfectly well, but because nobody knew if the world was flat, or if there be dragons out there, well, lots of competent sailors never bothered to try those uncharted waters. That’s why we have Columbus Day and not Joe Espinoza or Marquez De Gorfinblatt Day. The same goes for less glorious tasks. Whenever a particular operation or goal has an uncertain outcome, people will procrastinate. It’s in our nature.

Here’s a concrete example: You knew how to work on vehicles, or at least you knew how to hire people who do. You knew how to talk to people. You knew how to do mathematics well enough to run a business. You knew how to research options and find leases. You knew how to fill out forms and applications. Maybe you even knew how to market an auto repair shop. In short, you knew how to do all the individual parts of what it took to start a business. However, knowing how to do each of those individual things, and being willing to do them all, did not mean that starting your business would be a success. You had the skills you needed, but you could not be sure of the outcome. You didn’t know if starting a business would work. You could have procrastinated starting it. Maybe you did procrastinate for a while. And yet, eventually, you did it.

So in the end you did not procrastinate, or at least not forever, when it came to starting a business. I’ll bet you can think of a few people who are procrastinating on that very thing right now. So, for one thing, congratulations on taking the leap. Aren’t you glad you did? And for another thing, hopefully now you see how this third form of procrastination works.

That’s the point. To help you recognize this insidious component of procrastination. In a way, this is the worst of them because it’s the hardest to admit. Nobody wants to admit they aren’t doing what they should be doing because…well, let’s be frank…because they aren’t confident. Because that’s what number 3 really means. It’s a lack of confidence in the outcome. Nobody wants to put in a lot of time and energy on something that might not work. So they put it off. A.K.A. procrastinate. But now you know. You can encourage them, or encourage yourself to get on with it, to have faith in yourself and just jump in. That’s a big part of what life is all about.

Conclusion

So there you have them, the three legs of the stool upon which procrastination stands. Now, just like having an understanding of how the water pump, radiator and electrical system all work to cool an engine, you have the same sort of understanding of why things get put off.

When figuring out how to analyze a problem in your shop—something that isn’t happening even though it should—ask yourself why it’s not getting done. Is it not happening because it sucks and nobody wants to do it? If so, then find a way to make it happen. Add an incentive. Add a management follow-up that forces someone to check that the task is completed on time, holding whoever is supposed to be doing it responsible. Delegate the task to someone who doesn’t hate it. Do something with the recognition of what the problem is.

If the problem is because of number 2, not knowing how to do it, then fix it. If it’s something you should do but can’t because you don’t really know how, then fix it. Go read up on it, or take the training, or get a vendor to show you, or hire someone who does know how to do it. Just do something to get the information that you need. By diagnosing that this is the particular element of procrastination that’s preventing you from accomplishing that goal, you can fix it.

And if the problem is a matter of confidence, a matter of reluctance to jump into a task because the outcome is unknown, then just do it anyway. “Man up,” as my father used to say when I was a kid. Just do it. If you think you need to learn a few more things before you start, fine, learn them, but don’t let training…and training…and training be an excuse to avoid taking on that thing. You can actually use training as a way to procrastinate from actually doing too. Many people do that all the time. So, at some point, look in the mirror and ask if you’re just putting it off because you don’t know how it will turn out. If so, ask how much having that goal achieved would matter if it did work out all right? If it’s a really good thing that you really do wish was done, then do it. And remember, you just have to start. You don’t have to be perfect. You can keep tweaking until you get it right. Unless it’s brain surgery or something, you don’t have to nail it the first time. And you have people to help you. Your crew, your family, your vendors. You aren’t alone. So just do it already.

We regularly post articles with new auto shop marketing ideas. Get yours free with our CustomerLink Marketing Manual, and let us know how you like it!

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At some point after we buy, however, we see an ad that points out a much better offer from the “other guys,” the company we didn’t buy from. It’s frustrating. It’s not even that we don’t like what we bought, it’s just that there it is, some great offer that we didn’t get from the company we bought from. Did we make a bad choice? Did we get ripped off? Maybe we should go back in and say something, see if we can price match or something. Maybe we do, maybe we don’t, but either way, nobody wants to feel that way.

This is not what you want from your auto repair ads and coupons…

But that’s not the worst of it. The worst is not realizing some other company seems to have a better deal, but realizing the company we do business with is offering better deals. Especially if we have a long-term relationship with the company. That is brutal. Here we are, paying customers of that company, and there they are, offering everyone in the world a better price than we paid or that we continue to pay. It feels like an insult. Why didn’t they call us first? Or better yet, just lower our bill automatically? You always hear people talking about building brand loyalty, so doesn’t it seem like if these cable and phone and whatever-else companies wanted us to be loyal to them, they wouldn’t offer better pricing to literally everyone besides us, their current customers every time they ran an ad?

And yeah, it would be great if they offered us their discount pricing all the time. But they don’t, because if they charged all their customers their lowball introductory rates every single time, they’d go broke. And on top of that, most of the time the hot deal is only for new customers who sign up for a new contract and that comes with lots of fine print that usually locks them down for years, or includes some secret equipment rental fees or some minuscule allotment of minutes.  We can hardly fault any business for trying to find ways to entice new customers to try them out. That’s a fact of business. But it does create a sticky situation for the business as you can see. They need to make a profit, but they also need to manage appearances when it comes to their marketing.

It’s a fact of your business too. You have customers you’ve been seeing for years, and while you don’t mind if they see a coupon here or there, and you even often offer them those prices if there’s some ad you have running automatically somewhere, the reality is, there are some offers you’d like to be able to make to help you get new customers too. Super good, first-time-in, “give away the farm” kinds of offers. And while it would be nice to give a free oil change or a $50 discount to every single customer in your database, the reality is, that would cost you a ton in profit.

But you do want to make great offers to new customers. It is, as we said above, a fact of doing business. It’s an important and effective part of your auto shop marketing strategy. But how do you advertise your auto repair business without announcing to the entire world that you are offering free oil changes only to people you’ve never seen before? That’s the sticky thing.

You can get better new auto repair customers. The secret is choosing them carefully.

Hand-picking who you send the discount to is the secret. Rather than broadcasting that you are making that great offer, whisper it right into the ears of the people who need to know. That way, you don’t hurt any feelings, but you also don’t have to give away all your profit. There’s nothing wrong with doing a strong auto service reminder campaign. And there is also nothing wrong with wanting to maintain a profit margin that supports your business. So, by targeting your prospects carefully, you can control, to the largest extent possible, how much “word” gets out, making sure that word gets out where you want, not where you don’t.

A CustomerLink New Customer Finder campaign is a great way to do that. You can carefully select what types of customers you’d like to see more of in your shop, and then specifically target them with your really amazing offer. Doing it that way is sort of like whispering. Rather than a newspaper, radio or even Groupon type of auto repair ad that anyone can see, by discretely selecting who gets your special deals, you can control not only who sees them, but how many offers go out at all. You are in control, and that is always a good thing when it comes to marketing your auto repair shop.

We regularly write new articles to provide you with great auto service marketing ideas—get them free every month with the CustomerLink Marketing Manual.

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1.      Seeing Is Believing

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Well, in the age of Photoshopping everything, if that’s still true, then reality is worth a million words at least. Once you have inspected your customers’ vehicles, and found issues that need attention, why not show them what’s wrong instead of just telling them? Yes, if they came in for brake noise, you probably could just tell them that the pads have gone metal-to-metal and they would believe you and buy, but what if the rotors are toast too? You know telling them alone is going to cause “sticker shock.” They probably had a price in mind for a brake job, and it didn’t include rotors. They might not believe they need that much work because the price, in their minds, seems too high for what they were expecting. But if you show them the good rotor on the other side, or a good one from inventory, or on another car, and then compare that with the deep gouges ripping round their rotor, they’re going to be more willing to believe the price is reasonable, or at least understand why it is more than they had hoped.

This works for other inspection-related service work as well. If a customer is in for just an oil change or a tire rotation, by offering them an inspection and then bringing them out to have a look, you have a better chance of getting a sale. It’s one thing to say, your tires are worn into the secondary rubber; it’s another thing to show them the tread diving off and the open sores on the shoulder where the fibers are coming through. The same goes for worn and fraying belts, bulging hoses, lights that are out, leaks, etc. They don’t have to be automotive experts to know that there shouldn’t be strings or bits of wire sticking out of their tires or that the lights should be on all the way around or that whatever that fluid is, it shouldn’t be puking out and coating everything. Seeing the problem puts an immediacy on your recommendation that can help you increase sales.

2.      It’s Still on the Rack

Another advantage of showing them the issues that need attention on their vehicle comes from the simple fact that it is still on the rack. Many customers are in a hurry. They come in and hope that whatever they need will get done fast. This is particularly true of oil change and tire rotation customers. So it is not uncommon to run into an unwillingness in those customers to have other things done because it’s going to prolong their wait. But this is where the benefit of having them come out to the vehicle kicks in again: It’s already up there.

Your customers don’t often get to see their giant, expensive machines hoisted in the air. It seems pretty unimpressive to you because you see it every day, but to people outside the industry, it is impressive, at least in a certain way. It’s powerful, even if it’s not exciting. Lifting it up like that is a show of technology and particular expertise that you have and that they don’t, and when the car is up in the air, they have access to that underlying recognition on the part of your customer. Their car is at the center of your expertise and it has the “attention” of your lift, your bays, your technician and you. This feeds the next part: convenience, even in the state of inconvenience.

With customer’s cars on the rack, you’re in a great place to sell automotive service and repair.

When you bring them out and show them that there is extra work that could be done, this is the moment in time, the place in time too, where customers can be made to understand that, “Hey, right now, we have your car in the shop. You found the time to get it here, it is here, and here we are working on it right now.” Your customer had to do some rearranging of their schedule to get the vehicle in, and the reality is they don’t really want to do it again some other day. They probably don’t really want to do it at all, but they definitely won’t want to do it more later, because later means they have to rearrange their schedules and do all that other stuff they did already for today…again. (How many “I’ll bring it back for that later” types do you actually get back?) So, while it’s up in the air, point out to them that it is here, and that, while they might not have expected leaving it for additional repairs, “It is here right now, and we’d be happy to help you find a ride.” That’s a pretty good place to be selling from, all things considered. But only if you use it.

3.      Put a Face on Your Tech

Bringing the customer out to the vehicle allows them to meet your tech, who is otherwise a nameless, faceless entity known only as “our technician” or whatever other term you use for them. Bring the customer out and introduce them. By doing this, you formalize the relationship and make your customer feel like they are getting access to more parts of your business than just the front counter, which, if you think about it, represents a barrier that separates the two of you. Taking them back into the shop involves them in a more human way. It also puts a face on the person making the recommendations. It’s not just some stranger they never see writing down these abstract part names that need replacing; it’s this real human being standing with you as you discuss the repair, or at least who stands there long enough to say hello to them before getting on with other work. That’s two experts instead of one! They will appreciate knowing who is actually spending time on their vehicle, the thing they paid a fortune for and in which their family spends so much time, and it will add humanity to how they understand your shop emotionally.

4.      The Advantage of Private Conversations

Ever had one of those super busy days where you have a full waiting room, lines at the counter and people chatting on the phone arranging to get rides to come pick them up, and then, there’s that person who asks, real loud, “Can you guys give me a ride to work?” Sure you will if you have to, if you have the manpower for it, but what happens if you say you will out loud with all those other people waiting and calling? They’re going to want a ride too. Which is fine. I mean, sure, you want to make them all happy. But, um, they could have arranged for a ride. Some of them anyway. And you were doing fine until that one customer made it awkward. It’s not like you don’t want to give people rides, it’s just that it’s more profitable if you don’t have to be a taxi service AND an auto repair company.

So, by having the customer outside with their vehicle when you are selling services, or even just when you are writing them, if it then turns out they don’t have anyone who can pick them up, this is your opportunity to offer them a ride without an audience. Not only is this a convenience for you, it’s an extreme convenience for that customer. And everyone else could probably get a ride anyway.

5.      A Chance to Show Off Your Shop… and Win

You have a lot of really cool, high-tech equipment in your shop. When your customers visit, odds are they will have no idea what any of it is. But it’s all impressive. It’s rather like that Monty Python skit about the hospital and the machine that goes PING! There is an impressiveness to technology, and you can use that wow factor working in the back of their minds not only to help them feel more confident about your recommendations, but to help them formulate their overall impression of your shop. That’s effective auto service marketing that works for you long term.

While there are other advantages to bringing customers out to their vehicle when selling, these are the five big ones, or at least these are five really good arguments for why doing so is a great idea. What do you think? Are there other benefits to doing this? Disadvantages? There are a few owners out there who can make a case for safety and liability probably. What are your opinions on the subject, because it is an interesting and important one? Feel free to leave a comment below, or email us and maybe we can use your suggestions for another post discussing the other side of the question. We’d love to hear from you.

We regularly post new tips and tricks to help you with your auto service marketing—get them free every month with the CustomerLink Marketing Manual.

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