Was one of your business goals this year to increase your customer base?
Here are seven tried-and-true digital marketing strategies to help you attract more customers to your auto repair shop.
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Professional website
You would be surprised how many shop owners underestimate the power of a professional shop website. The competition in the auto industry is always growing and one of the best ways to share the quality of your work and attract new customers is to have a well-written and well-designed shop website.
While it doesn’t have to be fancy, the website should have a minimum of three pages and include essential information like your:
- Shop address
- Business map or directions
- Business phone numberÂ
- Hours of operation
You can also link to any social media platforms you are on.
If you start simple, you’ll eventually want to improve your website. Photos and images are an important element of marketing. Showcase your shop, equipment, tools, employees and customers with visuals when you mention services on your website.
You can also add engaging content. This could include videos and blogs on vehicle maintenance or customer testimonials.
Just make sure that your website works as well on a smartphone as it does on a computer. Most people nowadays use their smartphones to look up information and businesses.
Pro tip: Shops that make their websites self-service get more customers. A lot of people don’t like talking on the phone. You can offer an appointment scheduling feature on your website so that they don’t have to call you. This will also save you time as you won’t have to handle the requests yourself.
Search engine optimization
Search Engine Optimization (or SEO) is a highly relevant and impactful auto repair digital marketing strategy. Online search is the primary way customers find new businesses. 87% of smartphone owners use a search engine at least once per day.
If you want customers to find you on Google or Bing when they look up a repair shop in their area, you need to make sure that your website is optimized for search.
To get started, you can do some keyword research to find out what words people use to look up repair shops online and include those keywords in your website tags, titles and content.
SEO is a continually changing and technical process. It can be hard to figure out what to do yourself. Hire an expert or a professional agency to help your website rank higher on search engine results pages (or SERPs).
Pro tip: Don’t forget to focus on addressing any technical issues in the back end of your website. These can be issues that affect site speed, authority and performance. This can make a huge difference in your overall SEO results.
Online reviews
When you are on the lookout for a new weekend spot to watch the game, how do you find a good place? You ask someone who has been there. If you can’t find someone to ask, you will most likely turn to online reviews. And you won’t trust reviews older than 3 months!
That is how everyone these days decides if they want to try a new business. In fact, 72% of customers say they use reviews on Google to find businesses. That is why you need to be present on all the sites your potential customers use, such as Google My Business and Facebook, and collect reviews from your existing customers.
What’s more?
The way a business responds to reviews will always have an impact on your opinion of it. That is why you should read and respond to every review your shop receives, especially the negative ones.
Pro tip: Use a shop management software that can help you collect, manage and respond to reviews in one central location. This will help you save time and boost your ratings.
Search engine marketing
Search Engine Marketing (or SEM) is an effective strategy to grow your business. With SEM, you use paid advertisements on SERPs to get your business in front of prospective customers.
As an advertiser, you would bid on specific keywords that prospects might use to find your auto repair shop. This gives you the opportunity for your shop ads to appear alongside the local results on search engines such as Google or Bing. If you only have a repair shop in one area, target local searches and area keywords.
Use ad copy to promote the qualities that set you apart from other repair shops in the area. This could be satisfaction guarantees, new offers, unique services, quick turnaround times, etc.
Pro tip: Use negative keywords to ensure that your search ad isn’t matched to an irrelevant search query.
You can hire an SEM expert or an agency to help you get started with your search ads.
» Want more information on auto repair digital marketing strategies? Check out this free ebook.
Email marketing
You might be thinking that email marketing is the new alternative to direct mail. However, at its core, email marketing is about understanding your prospective customers, respecting their time and giving them something of value.
Most shops don’t have an existing email strategy in place. Those that do can see incredible returns on their efforts. All you need to do is to create personalized emails with a unique voice that give readers something that they want.
You could use email to inform your readers about services they didn’t know you offered. You could include a coupon of the month in a newsletter along with news about the shop. You could introduce a time sensitive deal. The possibilities are endless with email marketing.
Did you know that AutoLeap offers advanced marketing features that you can use to run email marketing campaigns for your shop?
Pro tip: Respect the inbox. Always put yourself in your customer’s shoes. Would they want to get an email from a repair shop every day? Probably not. Try to offer quality over quantity as you create an email marketing strategy.
Social media marketing
Many people nowadays turn to social media to look up a new business. This makes social media a powerful channel to drive new leads to your repair shop. You should use it to showcase your shop and expertise and share valuable information.
Social media is also an important platform for customers to voice their concerns. That is why it’s important to respond to all customer inquiries on social media. The most successful auto repair shops offer stellar social care.
You can also use social media to drive traffic to your website. Post quality blogs from your website to your social media pages. You can use lead magnets on your website to capture visitor information once people land on your website.
If you don’t have a large follower base on social media, you should also look at investing in social ads. You can use social ads to promote an offer.
Pro tip: Run a social media contest to get new followers and generate new leads for your shop. This could be a simple raffle in which you offer a free oil change to the lucky winner.
Referral program marketing
Want to build customer loyalty while attracting new customers? Include a referral program in your digital marketing tool kit. It’s highly likely you are already getting leads due to word-of-mouth. Why not reward your existing customers for referring new ones?
If you want to create a winning referral program, use incentives that benefit both the referrer and referee. This will help your shop see more success.
You could also offer an incremental reward system. This kind of referral program incentivizes your customers to refer more people so that they can get a better reward. More people will participate once they realize they can upgrade to a bigger benefit.
Pro tip: Reach out to your positive reviewers and tell them about your referral program. If someone likes your business enough to review it, it’s highly likely they would love to refer someone to your shop.
»Looking to transform your shop? Discover how our AutoLeap can help.
Concluding thoughts
A solid digital marketing strategy can help you market your auto repair business to prospective customers. And it shouldn’t be difficult or confusing! If you need help with your digital marketing, AutoLeap offers various marketing features, services and support!
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