John Fabrega

On 3/29/2020 at 1:30 PM, BrandonNco said:

Just be sure you are taking all the proper steps to make sure you are in compliance with the laws around texting your customers as it relates to “marketing”. 
 

Definitely! If sending messages promoting a product or a service, make sure you have express written permission and bullet-proof opt-out capability.

@CAR_AutoReports You mentioned "We are working on ways to integrate texting into our platform" above. I'd love to chat with you all about integrating our text platform.

John / 850-205-1111 (Call or Text)

Having been in telecommunications for over 25 years, I can't agree more with Joe. It is easy to have the 'newbie' answer phones and when they get really good at it, they end up getting moved to something more 'valuable' and a new neebie takes over. It's difficult not to do that but can have a major impact.

Make sure to occasionally 'mystery shop' your number. Have a friend or call while you are monitoring and make sure the experience is one that you would feel good about if you were calling a business.

A very old trick is to put a mirror by the phone or attached to the computer screen. Take a look when you're on the phone. If you're smiling it comes through in your voice and your attitude. It also helps you have a better day.

Keep Smiling!

I have refused to join them for years. Won't due business with a business that has such unethical business solicitation scare tactic practices. I would give them an 'F' rating if they could be rated.

Food for thought for those that are advertising on radio and want to improve their ROI...

If your ad contains your telephone number you can leverage your spend and improve the responsiveness to your ad by text-enabling your number and changing the ad from 'Call 111-222-3333' to 'Call OR Text 111-222-3333'.

I agree with both of your assertions that the auto repair guy in the group is the easiest referral. It may also be the easiest one to mess up. Make sure to give those referrals extra attention as the referrer will likely bring it up as a testimonial and the more others hear others talk about how you've saved their bacon, the more likely they are to put their reputation on the line.

It's probably pretty rare that your fellow members will be actively pursuing leads for you. It happens more opportunistically when they hear about somebody's car needing repair or a negative experience getting a repair done so I'd say keep it as short and simple as possble. i.e. 'Who fixes your cars?'. Let that then lead to... 'I have a guy...'

We have a couple of customers that provide 'reputation management' services. They work with you to craft the hopefully most responsive 'ask' for the review and then with simple clicks take the customer to an initial review where if the customer chooses fewer than X stars, it notifies you so you can fix the problem. If the customer gives a positive initial review it gives them choices and routes them to the review platform of their choice (i.e. Google, Facebook, Yelp, etc).

I'd be happy to make some introductions if desired.

I posted a pretty easy method to ask for and get Google reviews a while back. A number of folks are using it and seeing good results.

It looks like you've already taken @Alex's advice and changed the font colors. Or at least it appears to now be white in Chrome, Firefox, and Android browsers.

Of course, I would suggest adding 'Call or Text' wherever you list your number and make them clickable on the mobile version. I found out that the number itself is clickable, but it's not obvious.

Clearly, a goal of your website, Facebook page and other marketing materials is to encourage visitors to initiate contact. Making that as easy and frictionless as possible will result in more inquires and more business!

1 hour ago, mmotley said:

For some reason I can't edit my last post, but anyway, I should have mentioned that you will meet some great people through BNI. We have an AMAZING CPA in our group. A great financial guy that is gonna set us up with something similar to a 401k (pretty much IRA accounts or something like that), a lawyer, etc, etc. 

+1 on BNI for Auto Shops. I've been involved in a BNI chapter and subbed at a few others. The Auto Repair guys always seem to do well as do plumbers, electricians, and HVAC folks.

Not quite as nicely, but. If you go to your page (example: https://www.facebook.com/BusinessTextBox/    ) then add reviews to the end and hit enter, it becomes https://www.facebook.com/pg/BusinessTextBox/reviews/  you can then use the URL shortner described previously. Unfortunately there desn't seem to be a way to pre-populate the level of review.

Two questions if I may:

1. Do the texts that go in/out of ShopManager.com use your existing shop telephone number, some other number or an email address?
2. If not, does somebody have a good contact there that they could introduce me to that might be willing to discuss an integration?

Thanks!

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47 minutes ago, Jay Huh said:

Yesterday I gave away our own branded magnetic cell phone holders. I have 1000 of them and get cost me about $1.20 each. I have them in all my cars and there's a big logo staring back at me everytime I get in my car before slapping my cell phone on it. Customers LOVE it bc those things work really really well.  I saw a while back someone was giving away air freshners with oil changes and I thought that was a great idea. For some reason small things make customers happy. 

On a side note, bulk of the $10k is from long double ended box wrenches that are awesome

Link and/or pics?

The flashlight adds look great. My wife/English Teacher would smack my knuckles with a ruler if I didn't advise you that 'does' should be 'do' in the following sentences.

• Long lasting 18650 rechargeable battery INCLUDED- many flashlights in this price range does do not include a battery!
• Convenient hidden micro USB charging port - a lot of other flashlights in this price range does do not have a direct charge port!

On 6/6/2017 at 11:50 AM, Ron Ipach said:

I want to talk about collecting the right information from every one of your customers while they’re in your shop. What do I mean by that? When we’re talking about marketing, it’s important that we collect all the current information that we have on our customers so that we can continue to market to them. Marketing to your current customers, it’s like picking the low-hanging fruit. It’s the easiest group of people to get back into your shop, so we want to make sure that we collect all the data that we can from our customers while they’re sitting right there in our shop.

...

Then, the next thing that I want to make sure that you get is the two phone numbers that they have. One is their home phone number. Some people don’t have home phones anymore. I happen to still have a home phone number. If they don’t have their home phone number, certainly, they have a cell phone. You want to make sure that you’re collecting that data as well.

...

Then, if you get their cell phone number, you can send them a text message, and 99% of text messages get read, and 95% of them get read within the first five minutes. So it’s a very valuable way to be able to market to them.

 

Right on regarding the effectiveness of text messaging. That's simply the way most people communicate these days and they appreciate it if you make it easy for them.

NOTE: Make sure that the search you use is as specific as possible. Including the City & State usually works. Otherwise, you may be sending Google Juice to others.

When I clicked on Matt's link above, it took me to Premier Motorcars in Tallahassee and I thought 'small world'!... until I contacted Matt to get together for coffee and he said he is in Texas. (long drive for coffee). If the search term in the link is broad and gets a lot of matches, Google will pick the closest geographical match.

5 minutes ago, mmotley said:

Hmmmm, don't know how to edit on this new forum layout, but make that 3 5-star reviews in 2 days!!!

(If you are accessing the forums via a PC, there should be an 'Edit' button for your previous posts in the lower right corner)

Which method are you using to send the link to customers?

Among all of the other online ratings, there is an easy and fairly frictionless way to increase your Google reviews and thereby improve your Google ranking. Here is an easy way to create a link that will take people directly to your Google reviews and pre-populate the review with 5 stars.

Here's How (If you would like me to do it for you, just shoot me a PM)

1. Search for your business. Usually your business name and city and state will get you there. This is an example for one of our illustrious ASO leaders
     NOTE: UPDATE : Make sure that the search you use is as specific as possible. Including the city & state or Google may take others to the wrong place (see post lower in this thread)

.

2. Click on 'Write a review

3. When it brings up a review STOP there. Go to the long URL at the top of the screen and add a 5 to the end.

4. Highlight and copy the entire URL.  (To copy, either right-click and choose copy or just type CTRL-C)

5. Go to http://Goo.gl  (Google's URL Shortener) and paste that long URL into the box (To paste, either right-click and choose paste or just type CTRL-V)

6. Click to copy the shortened URL and paste it somewhere you can find it or write it down (exact capitalization is required). In this case it's: goo.gl/WkHvCJ

7. Test the the shortened URL by pasting or typing it into your browser. If it worked, you should get something like this. Note that all 5 stars are already gold!

Now that you have the link, you can...

• Add it to your website
• Include it in your emails
• Include it in your TextBox text message thank yous!

Of course, providing awesome service so they keep the 5 stars and add positive comments is in your court!🚗

I normally listen to Audiobooks -constantly- but saw the recommendation for Six Tires No Plan on the other thread and picked up a used hardback copy via Amazon. I happened to be traveling to present to a repair 20 group in Houston last weekend. Started reading when I boarded the first flight, finished it as I was landing in Houston. Good read. Planning to go by the local Discount Tires to talk to the manager and see if that great corporate culture described in the book appears to be reality.

Thanks for the comment @lmcca

Quick clarification, the per number charge for additional marketing numbers is about 1/2 the cost of the 'real' number.

One challenge is that some marketing numbers (i.e. Kukui numbers) are not eligible for activation.

You didn't include any of the flavored fruru coffees... which is fine because I can't stand them. My only twist on my black and strong preference is that it usually ends up cold. I have to make a cup as soon as I get to the office, but by the time I get to drinking it, it is usually cold. I've learned to live with it.

Are you able to type your own text or use templates only? Are you able to attach pictures?

Yes, you can always type in anything you want and you can also easily modify any templates (there are up to 10 templates on each computer).There are some videos here that show the primary interface. It has changed a bit but it is pretty close. Of course, doing an evaluation trial is the best way to really see how it works.

Yes, you can both receive and send picture messages. (At this time we only support picture messages, not .pdf or .doc or video, but of course you can include links that would bring up any of those)

Looking forward to great things to come.

I like the first one better also. I am obviously biased, but I also believe that the investment in either ad would be better leveraged by including 'Call or Text' in the call to action.

@mspecperformance, Based on some research, I think it was created by: http://www.neadcorp.com/supermarket-advertising