What happens when you have an intake dialogue with a customer, send the work order to the shop, they complete what was on the work order, you call the customer to say the car is done and they ask: “What did you find out about the noise I was hearing?” You can now hear a…
Are you going to be sobbing over your Thanksgiving turkey as you think about December? Many auto repair shop owners tell me that the holiday season, while busy for many retailers, is their slowest time of the year. They see the car count drop off each week so repair orders are at their lowest and…
There’s a familiar story that is told of a new insurance agent named “Jack” who was struggling to make sales. He would contact ten leads and come away with ten rejections. He believed that business was slow due to the bad economy in his area and the fact that many of his customers were focused…
The most common complaint I hear from auto repair shop owners is “I need more cars to hit my sales goal” – and most of the time that is not the problem. They have plenty of repair orders billing out every week, but when your average repair order is low, it takes a lot of…
Imagine dining out at Ruth Chris Steakhouse. Your waiter comes out and takes the order for your family of four without writing anything down. It takes forty-five minutes for the food to arrive, and when it does, the order is completely messed up. You asked for the steak but get the chicken wings. You asked…
A few weeks ago I was working with my service advisor on overcoming price objections and dealing with price shoppers. One of the points I was making is that with most callers asking for a quote, it really is a matter of the caller not knowing what else to ask. They looked the problem up…
So, there I was, managing a 3.5 million dollar shop in Largo, Maryland. For three months, I had a pressing need to hire another technician. While my colleagues and competitors complained about car count, I struggled to get the cars out that I had! But things were about to change because “Steve” had just accepted…
“I’m thinking that one session of repair order audits will instantly solve my Average Repair Order problem!” “I’ve been in business for thirty years, but I’m certain that my upcoming thirty-minute coach call will forever fix my business!” “Follow up calls don’t work! I made one yesterday and my car count has not improved!” Can…
So, there I was. I had just arrived in Florida for a weekend getaway and checked into my hotel. The bad news was that it was getting late, and I was getting hungry. The good news was that my hotel had an in-house restaurant, and it was a premium steak house. I knew it was…
How often do you look up your shop online? As a former shop owner, I rarely took the time to review how my shop appeared on the internet. When I first opened my doors, the top referral source was word-of-mouth. But within two years, that dramatically shifted. First-time customers would tell me they found me…