Web Marketing for Auto Body Shops: Three tips
Auto body shop owners always agree that their most profitable work is inevitably non-DRP– walk-in customers, repeat customers, and customer referrals. Owners and managers of collision repair centers never have enough of these, and unlike regular DRP work, it requires effective marketing to get individual customers in for work estimation.
Most auto body shops still stick to marketing strategies like buying Incident Report lists from local law enforcement and mailing the vehicle owners with offers, with increasingly disappointing results.
Often, by the time you can get to the owner of a damaged vehicle it would have either been converted to a DRP category work, or it would have gone to a competitor.
What went wrong, and how can you set things right?
The Loaner Car Offer-How Web Marketing Works
Imagine, you just ran over the curb and your car has serious dents. You are tired, shaken, and feeling vulnerable without a ride. Thankfully your cellphone is intact, and you Google for a collision repair facility.
In a spit second, you find one in your local search results, with an added loaner car offer. Are you likely to call them, or will you rather wait for days, so that someone will inevitably find out and drop you a mail?
The Three Web Marketing Basics
Remember the first rule of local marketing – if it is web vs. anything else, the web is likely to win hands down.
The one simple reason that collision lists are not working as well as they used to, is web marketing. And it’s never too late to get your own web marketing up and running.
Tip 1: Get a mobile-friendly Auto Body Shop Website
If you are in the auto body shop business for some time, chances are you already have a website. But is it an earlier generation website that works more like an online business card? Then the first thing on your to-do list should be a new, mobile-friendly auto body shop website.
Since about 90% of your online visitors will use a mobile phone, a new generation website that comes with mobile-friendly responsive technology is a top priority.
It should be easy for you to add stuff to the website yourself, since you need to frequently update your website with new offers and every single customer testimonial you can get.
Make sure that your website provider understands SEO well. Your website needs to be 100% optimized for Google local search.
Tip 2: Get your Auto Body Shop Listed
Next, list your Auto Body Shop on every single business listing available, together with your location, hours, telephone, email, and website URL. Start with Google MyBusiness, and work your way up Yelp and other business listings.
The more search results your business throws up, the more you can drive your competition further down Google search results.
Tip 3: Go Social with the Goodies
You have your website and business listings fixed and is now the reigning champ in local search results for auto body shops and collision repair shops. Now is the time to go and reach out to the local community, and create some anticipatory recall with clever marketing.
If you have regular slack hours every month, fill them in with aggressive offers. Try free estimates, towing, loaner car, discounted billing for out-of-pocket expenses, and more.
Publish them on your website first. Then go social. Add it to your Facebook page and tweet it as well. Aggressively network with your local community on Facebook and befriend them at every possible occasion.
Need help with your digital marketing? Just drop us a line at sales@izmoweb.com.