It’s a New Year! I hope you enjoyed your Holidays and are ready to get a jump start this year. If you are like most auto repair shops, you have plans of making more sales and profits this year than you did you last year. Your auto repair shop can either raise your R.O. count or R.O dollar average to hit those goals (or both). Those goals can further be broken down into either productivity, new customer, or existing customer goals. Deciding which goals are right for your auto repair shop is important. If you try them all at once, you might not have enough focus and miss your goals. So, read on to determine which is the best for you to start with.
Productivity goals
Productivity is more than how many vehicles you can repair each day. Productivity is everything your auto repair shop has to do daily to repair vehicles. Productivity includes phone calls, responding to customers, building quotes/estimates, customer follow up, ordering parts and more. Auto repair shops looking to increase their productivity should stop and review their current process. If you have not reviewed your process and documented your actions, you are losing profits. This is unfortunate because you work so hard for every dollar.
Walk through the entire process from initial customer phone call, to finalizing the invoice, and all the way to customer follow up. As you walk through the process, imagine you are a customer at your shop. You could even pretend to be a customer and see what it is like to get a vehicle repaired at your auto repair shop. Note down all the areas where you see your team repeating or going back for information. Note down all the times the process felt clunky, slow, or just confusing. These are areas you will want to work on.
Training, digital inspections, and texting are some of the best ways to improve your productivity. Learning how to use your existing software better will help fill in the gaps. Adding digital inspections and texting will gain you valuable time per each customer you interact with. Any of these 3 will lead to faster repairs, which leads to more repairs performed daily. Reach out to your local Mitchell1 Rep and find out more.
New Customer Goals
Auto repair shops looking to bring in new customers need to figure out how to get their auto repair shop in front of the eyes of those who are looking for a new auto repair shop. While there are sites that claim to get your name all over the internet, Google is the top place customers search.
To find out how well your auto repair shop perform on the internet, look up your shop from your phone by doing a general search. Do not add your shop name to the search. You might need to use a device that has not been in your shop before or use an incognito tab. Search for a the categories you want more of in your shop. For example, brakes, diagnostic, oil changes (everyone wants oil changes), air conditioning and more. Note how your shop performs in those searches.
If you do not have a website, then you need to get one set up ASAP. A website is where customers find the information about your auto repair shop they need to make a decision. If you think just having a Google page is enough, you are losing out on new customers. Unless the new customer was referred by someone, they will likely want to do some research on your auto repair shop. This is why a quality website is important. A website paired with Google Ads will bring in new customers.
Mitchell1’s Google Ads is a great way to have your shop jump to the top spots! Instead of you spending valuable time learning how to build quality ads on Google, you should run your shop and make sales and profits. Let your Google Ads agent build your Google Ads focused on the categories you want more of in your shop. Reach out to your local Mitchell1 Rep and find out more.
Existing Customer Goals
Every shop that has been open for a while has huge potential sitting in their shop management system. Since oil changes are typically needed every 90 days or such, your current customer base should be visiting your auto repair shop 2 – 3 times a year. Your auto repair shop will get a boost by bringing back your existing customers more often.
To bring back an existing customer to your auto repair shop requires more than a random email blast or text message. It requires timely communication with a purpose. Simply blasting your customers with an email or text will get you some sales, however, developing a process of communicating with your customers that is timely and has a purpose will deliver consistent long-term results.
If you can take the time to track each customer and their vehicles needs, then shoot them an email or phone call when their vehicle needs any of the following.
-Maintenance
-Oil change
-Timing belt
-Recommended service from a previous visit
-Customer service follow up (review)
If not, then you will want to consider Mitchell1’s Social CRM a great way to communicate timely and with purpose to each of your customers. This is an automatic system which will email your customer when their vehicle requires any of the above services. In addition, it will automatically send a text message reminder when your customer has an upcoming appointment. Reach out to your local Mitchell1 Rep and find out more.
