Ron Ipach

If you are currently texting your clients and are using one of those potentially expensive services that charge a pretty decent monthly fee, and then in some cases, up to an additional dollar per text to send automated and group texts to your clients, you'll probably want to check out a service that I've been recommending to my clients for several years - and it's totally FREE for your first 250 texts, then only .05 cents for each text after that.

https://www.eztexting.com/

Sure, it doesn't have a direct link to your client list, requiring you to export/import your mobile numbers into their system (a 10-minute process) - but once your client's mobile numbers are uploaded into EZtexting you can pre-schedule your individual and group texts to go out whenever you wish.

Happy texting!

Let me start off by asking you a very important but very quick question: what BS story are you telling yourself? Let me repeat that: What BS story are you telling yourself? We all have these stories and shop owner excuses that we keep telling ourselves that we think are true, that when you really look at it, they're really utter bullshit, but we've been telling ourselves the same story over and over that we actually believe it's true.

Case in point, now if you've ever been on one of my live webinars, you know that because I'm live, I can have a conversation with some of the people that are on the webinar. The other night, a gentleman was complaining about car count. He said because cars are made better (another thing I hear A LOT), there are no cars out there and there's a lack of car count, and that's a big problem.

I took that as an opportunity to tell him what I've probably told you before, if you've been watching these videos, that I don't believe that there's a car count problem out there at all because in every city all over the United States, all over Canada, there are cars sitting on lifts right now in your own town, dozens, maybe even hundreds of them, every single day that are being repaired and maintained by other shops, other shops collectively, but on any given day, there are tons of opportunities to repair cars. The problem is they're just in somebody else's shop, they're not in yours.

It's not a lack of cars out there to be repaired, there's just a lack of cars in your auto repair shop. It's a marketing problem, it's not a problem caused by cars being made better. Now I've told that story before. In case this is the very first time you've heard that, please believe me it is a marketing problem, not cars are made better. That's the reason why you don't have enough cars. Now we're past that.

Because I can go back and forth with them, I told that same story. He'd so believed that it was a problem that he wasn't able to fix, that he told me about the shop owner that was less than a mile away from his shop that said the very same thing, that his shop was down with cars as well. I guess the two of them got together and commiserated about the car count being down, and now both of them believe that there's a car count problem out there. That's an example of the BS story we keep telling ourselves that simply isn't true.

I want you to go back and think of all the things you say on a daily basis, maybe, "I can't find good techs," or, "There are no good techs out there anymore." There are good techs out there, they're just not working for you. What you look for, you're going to find. It's just the truth. Let me give you an example, and this is a story I've told my clients over and over. It's a great example of what you look for, you will see in abundance right there in front of you.

A few years back, we bought a beach condo down in Florida. We thought it'd be fun to have a Jeep, to be on the beach, and just the perfect car to have down there. I never owned a Jeep before, but guess what? As soon as I decided I was going to buy a Jeep, I saw Jeeps everywhere, all shapes and sizes and colors driving everywhere. I've been seeing them every single day go by, but I didn't see them until I decided I want to buy a Jeep.

Did everybody all of a sudden go out and buy a Jeep when I decided? No. It's because I was looking for Jeeps, all of a sudden I saw them. There was an abundance of Jeeps driving by me every single day. I just didn't notice them because I wasn't looking for it.

Then I decided I was going to buy a blue Jeep. You guessed it; pretty soon everybody was driving a blue Jeep. There were blue Jeeps everywhere. Everybody didn't go out and decide that they're going to buy a Jeep, and then they didn't decide if they're going to buy a blue Jeep. It's just I started focusing on it and I started finding exactly what I'm focusing on.

If you're saying that there are no good techs out there, you're going to focus on all the bad hires that you've had, you're going to focus on all the bad interviews you've been on, and you're going to say, "See? I told you so. There are no good techs out there." The same thing with your car count.

If you're going to constantly complain and look at the lack of cars that are out there in your own shop, you're going to keep seeing the same problem over and over and over. It's going to become etched in your mind. It's going to be a BS story, but if you start looking around, start driving around and realize there are dozens, if not hundreds, of cars sitting on lifts every single day in other people's shops and not in your shop, you'll realize you have a marketing problem and you'll start to tackle the big problem that you have right there.

I hope this helps. Go and think of all those things that you tell yourself so often that it's now etched in stone and it's true, and see if you could find the opposite. I guarantee you'll find it everywhere. Thanks for watching. Oh, by the way, I really appreciate all the comments. 

What's New In Automotive Marketing? A lot.

I'm addressing a question from a shop owner named Dave who's been in business for 28 years. He asked, "Is there anything new in the automotive repair industry?" In a word, yeah. A lot has changed in these 28 years. If we look at the car itself, obviously, you know the cars are made a whole lot better than they used to be. You're more in a maintenance business than you were in a repair business. That has changed drastically over these 28 years. Also, what's changed is the consumer, the consumer habits. The way of contacting them has changed enormously. The buying habits of the consumer have changed drastically. Your share of their attention, trying to grab their attention when they're being bombarded by all the advertising that's out there has changed drastically.

When we think about it, millennials, which is now the largest group of people that are out there, they grew up with cell phones in their hands. Everything is online. They're doing mobile searches instead of looking through the yellow pages. They buy things differently and at different times. You and I have changed a lot as well with that. When was the last time that you did some online shopping? I know I did a lot of my Christmas shopping last year online. I didn't even have to leave the house to whittle down that Christmas list. A lot of people are driving less because they can simply go on Amazon and have it delivered in a couple hours. That's changed drastically, the amount of miles that people are driving as well as people are using services like Uber and Lyft for other people to drive them. It's very inexpensive for people to get driven around. Their driving habits are changing a lot.

The one thing I can tell you is the marketing principles have not changed. The way we contact people have changed. The messages we give them have changed. The people we're marketing to have changed. All of those have changed drastically over the past 28 years, but the main principles, the core competencies of marketing really haven't changed much at all. What am I talking about? First off, we got to find the right person to market to, the person we want to attract to our shop. Second, we have to give them a very compelling message. We got to grab their attenton. As I said before, there's a lot more competition for those eyeballs. People are looking at email, they're online. They're seeing advertisements bombarding from all these different areas. We have to be a lot more savvy in how we try to attract their attention. That hasn't changed.

Then we need to give them a very compelling offer. That's a good core competency and make sure that you have that in all of your marketing as well as you got to give them a sense of urgency. We got to have the right target. We have to have the right message. We have to have the right offer, and we have to give them that sense of urgency, so that they come in right now. That all has been the same. Everything else about running the business has totally changed. If you're not keeping up with that, you're going to be left behind. Again, the marketing, the core competencies haven't changed, but everything that layers on top of that, how we deliver that message, that's changed drastically. Who we're delivering it to has changed drastically.

-- Ron Ipach (a.k.a Captain Car Count)

• President/Founder of Repair Shop Coach
• More articles and content like this and originated through Ron Ipach's Car Count Daily campaign
• Auto Repair Shop Owners, Managers, and Automotive Industry Professionals are invited to join 'Car Count Daily Boosters' LinkedIn group to provide resources and gain insight on boosting car count DAILY and filling up the bays in their shops.

I’d like to officially welcome you to the second half of 2017. That’s right, the year is half over. Let me ask you a question; How’s your business doing? Is it exactly where you thought it would be right now? Are you on track to meet your goals? Or do you need to tighten up the bootstraps and get rocking and rolling on there to get the year to where you really need it to go?

I’d like to wind the calendar all the way back to January 1st. You know, the day that everybody comes up with all those great New Year’s resolutions. They have resolutions about how the business is going to go, how much time they’re going to spend with their family, how much vacation they’re going to take this year, how much money they’re going to make, how much weight they’re going to lose, all of those things.

Do you remember that day? Do you remember actually sitting back and making another New Year’s resolution? Well, if you’re like most people, yeah. You figured this year was going to be the year, the year that everything is going to get on track. And I really, really hope it is for you. But if it’s not, well, it’s half over with, and I want to point that out to tell you that it’s okay. It’s okay if you’re not nearly where you thought you would be, because we have another six months to go to be able to pull it out.

So don’t get discouraged if you’re not where you thought you would be. Congratulate yourself if you are exactly where you think you’re going to be, or where you should be. So you’re doing great this year, fantastic. Go out and celebrate. Celebrate the victory. And if you’re not where you need to go, it’s time to tighten up those shoelaces and get really rocking. Don’t beat yourself up. It’s okay. We have a full six months to pull this out.

It’s time to start taking action on everything you’re learning. If car count is your problem, and for most shop owners it is, get going on all these strategies that I’m giving you here for free. Every single day in your email box I’m giving you tons of strategies to help you move forward and keep plenty of car count coming in the door. If it’s about profitability, if it’s about finding that technician, look, we have lots great information, lots of videos that we can share with you, if that’s where the problem is.

Don’t let it be an impending storm. The second half of 2017 is going to be a great year, but you need to start taking action. If you need information, fantastic. We’ll be here to give it to you, but in most cases it’s just a matter of you needing to go and take action.

Time to really start rocking and rolling to get this 2017 to be everything you thought it would be; to lose the weight you want, get the car count you want, make the money you want, have the dream shop that you always knew your shop could be. You got a half a year left. Let’s get rolling.

We all know as local business owners how important it is to get those online reviews because most potential customers read those things before they make a decision whether they want to do business with you. As a matter of fact, 90% of consumers read less than 10 reviews before forming an opinion about a business. Because of this, auto repair shops should want to collect as many positive reviews as possible to stay ahead.

In the automotive industry, for getting new customers in the door, there might not be a more essential tool than positive online reviews. It can make or break a business plan. From a consumer's point of view, Google will almost always be the resource used to find an auto repair shop in each area. Not only this, some potential customers will view online reviews for the sole purpose of ranking shops, or choosing one over the other.

The auto repair shop with the most positive reviews and best Google ranking is most often going to be the one the consumer decides to go to for their car repair needs. The same goes for reviews on both Facebook and Yelp.

Some shop owners may be asking clients: "Hey, if you liked our service, please give us a review." And this is a proven strategy as 7 out of 10 consumers will leave a review for a business if they're asked to.

However, if they're not giving reviews, how can they expect to get reviews back? There's something maybe a little karmic about that, right? If you're not doing it, how can you expect other people to do it for you. Aside from that, if you're not writing reviews, how can you tell them how to do the review?

In other words, if you've never given a Google review, or a Yelp review or a Facebook review, and you've never physically done it yourself it's going to be hard when you ask somebody to give your a shop a review. A shop owner may say - "Sure, I'll give you a review, just show me how to do it," now you're scratching your head and saying, "I have no idea how to do it. I've never given one myself." What are the chances that they're actually going to give you a review? Get in the habit of writing as many reviews as possible using all of the local review sites, so you know how to navigate the waters, and you know how to actually write the review.

Secondarily, sitting down to write a review is not easy. If you get in a habit of sitting down trying to figure out what you're going to say in your review, chances are when you do it more often, you'll get better and better at it. It will start to flow a little better. When you're asking a client to write you a good review, not only are you going to be able to show them how to do this, but you're going to give them some suggestions on how to write a good review for you because, after all, that's what we want to do. We want to get as many good, positive reviews from our happy customers as we possibly can.

Getting in the habit of writing two reviews per week, will ultimately attract more online reviews for your shop.

-- Ron Ipach (a.k.a Captain Car Count)

• President/Founder of Repair Shop Coach
• More articles and content like this and originated through Ron Ipach's Car Count Daily campaign
• Auto Repair Shop Owners, Managers, and Automotive Industry Professionals are invited to join 'Car Count Daily Boosters' LinkedIn group to provide resources and gain insight on boosting car count DAILY and filling up the bays in their shops.

You might be thinking I'm going crazy, right? Talking about advertising in the Yellow Pages in this day and age, but for some shops, advertising in the Yellow Page still makes sense. Now, bear with me. Don't stop and think I've gone off my rockers. Let me explain what I'm talking about:

Everybody's clientele is different. What is the average age of your clientele, of your better clientele? You want the people that are coming in and spending money with you. If you're finding that you have an older clientele, chances are, most likely, they're still using the Yellow Pages. Admittedly, I had to go over mom and dad's house to get a Yellow Pages because I don't have one at my home, but look, I'm not of the age demographic that is off of the internet.

A lot of people are on the internet but quite a few people are still intimidated by the internet, and they're more likely to grab a Yellow Pages and search for a business to do business with. We don't want to alienate them, and if you're staying out of the Yellow Pages, you have a 0% chance of them ever calling your shop. This isn't for everybody. I mean, All I've been doing recently is broadcasting the importance of getting found online and getting referrals. Look, I get it, and I can't wait to hear the comments down below the post after this. For some, as a matter fact, for a lot of auto repair shops, advertising in the Yellow Pages still makes sense.

If you recall, if you go way back depending on how long you've been in business, when I first started working with auto repair shops about 20 years ago, Yellow Pages was the dominant place where everybody advertised. If you remember what it was, it was very expensive and there was just page after page after page after page of display ads, and your chances of getting noticed amongst all that noise were pretty slim and none.

Everybody hated the Yellow Pages because it was so expensive, but I found a way, and a lot of my clients found a great way to put in a really good ad and get a lot of business from the Yellow Pages. If you've been with me for a while, you know my style of advertising is a lot different than what most other people will do. The ads that we put in the Yellow Pages actually got a ton, and I do mean a ton, of phone calls, from perspective clients. If you put together a kick-butt ad now you could get the same results.

I currently have a Greater Cincinnati Yellow Pages book here with me. I'm in a suburb just north of Cincinnati. There is an entire auto repair section. It starts on one page and it ends on the very next page, and that's it. A front and back of one page is all it is. Remember, this used to be pages and pages and pages of display ads. Right now, display ads, this one has one, two, three, four, five. Five display ads on this side, and we've got a small ad right here and an even smaller little in-column ad, a couple over there, and that's it.

That's for all the auto repair shops that are in this area, and there are quite a few of them, by the way. Everybody else has decided to stay out of the Yellow Pages. Remember the problems with the Yellow Pages before. They were busy. There were too many, too much competition. They were expensive. Right now, that's not the case, so that's the reason why I would encourage shop owners to maybe look at using the Yellow Pages if you're trying to attract an older clientele.

Again, if you find your older clientele are not the demographic that you're going for, then the Yellow Pages is the wrong idea, but if you're in a retirement community, if there's a lot of elderly people around you and you want to attract them to your shop, this could be a really good place because they still use this. They're not walking around with their mobile phones looking for a shop to do business with. They're actually still using the Yellow Pages.

There's a lot less competition. The ads have gotten extremely cheap compared to what they used to be. The Yellow Page reps, the reality is since everybody's shying away from the Yellow Pages, they're giving great deals. I mean, they're giving away everything possible to get you to advertise in the Yellow Pages.

Leave no stone unturned. Investigate the possibility. Look at the clientele that you have. You might even start asking people, "Hey, do you still use the Yellow Page, Pages?" and if a lot of them do, that might be a really good place for you to start advertising again.

-- Ron Ipach (a.k.a Captain Car Count)

• President/Founder of Repair Shop Coach
• More articles and content like this and originated through Ron Ipach's Car Count Daily campaign
• Auto Repair Shop Owners, Managers, and Automotive Industry Professionals are invited to join 'Car Count Daily Boosters' LinkedIn group to provide resources and gain insight on boosting car count DAILY and filling up the bays in their shops.

Let's say you're looking at your shop's appointment book, and you could stand to use a few more cars in the shop today. You need to know how to get cars in the shop right away.

I'm going to give you three very quick, easy, and cheap ways to get the phone ringing, and get that appointment book filled:

Idea Number One

It's not earth shattering. It's using email marketing. If you've collected and have current email addresses for your clients, all you have to do is just come up with a terrific offer. Now, remember, we're trying to get them in your shop today. So, we want to give them a great offer, to show up today. Let them know that they're getting this special offer, because you need more cars in the shop today, you need them to respond right away, and you need them to bring their car into your shop today. So, the offer is very, very important. A wishy-washy offer isn't going to get somebody to respond. Come up with a kick-butt offer, and email it to them.

Now, the problem with email is, not everybody looks at their emails every single day, and you don't have emails for everybody in your database. But, hey, it's easy, it's simple, it's cheap, so go ahead and do it. And hopefully, some people are going to see it, and they're going to respond today. For idea number one, if you've sent emails before, then marketing via email shouldn't be a difficult thing to do.

Idea Number Two

This is the way that I love more than anything else, is using a mobile phone and text message marketing your offer to them. So, if you've been collecting and getting permission to send them texts (which you should be doing), you can just simply send a kick-butt offer to them, and get them to respond immediately via text. Now, you can do them one by one, just grab your phone and start texting people individually, or there are some services out there that you can group text everybody, and get them all done in one sweep at a time.

But the important thing to know about text message marketing is, it's a brilliant way to contact people, because 99% of texts get opened. And even more importantly, 95% get opened within the first three minutes [Forbes]. So, you send out a text, people are going to look at it, and they're going to respond within five minutes. Now, if you put together a kick-butt offer, you will get your ringing right away. I love that idea, and on a separate video we'll kind of go into detail on exactly how to do your texting and everything. That's a much larger subject to cover. Certainly not one I'm going to be able to cover here.

Idea Number Three

You're going to hate this idea. I know you're going to hate it, but it's a tool you already have, and most people under-utilize the tool. And that is using one of these. A phone, okay? Just a regular, old-fashioned, home phone, and you start dialing for dollars. I mean, think about this. How many people have been in a shop that declines services? Well, wouldn't it be a great idea to call them up, and just kind of look at all the people that decline services, and come up with a kick-butt offer to get them in the shop today. Let them know:

"Hey, we have a few slots open, I'd like to fill it."

"This is once in a lifetime offer."

"I'm going to give you an offer you can't refuse."

Dial for dollars, and that will get people in shop.

Now, I know you hate it. Let's face it nobody, especially an auto repair shop owner, wants to get on the phone and start cold-calling people. But, hey, you want to put people in your shop today? You've got their phone numbers, you've got their buying history, you've got their unsold service history. Dial for dollars, and people will come to the shop./

Now, those are three quick and easy, down and dirty, inexpensive, almost free ways, to get people into your auto repair shop. Pick the one you want, and do it.

--> Ron Ipach (a.k.a Captain Car Count)

• President/Founder of Repair Shop Coach
• More articles and content like this and originated through Ron Ipach's Car Count Daily campaign
• Auto Repair Shop Owners, Managers, and Automotive Industry Professionals are invited to join 'Car Count Daily Boosters' LinkedIn group to provide resources and gain insight on boosting car count DAILY and filling up the bays in their shops.

Maybe this has happened to a number of you auto repair shop owners out there… you put together an offer to send to your prospects and clients. Not just any offer, I mean a really, really killer, can’t-miss deal like "$50 off any service that you perform." Now you know that there will be skeptics out there looking for the hidden strings, so you announce that there is no minimum purchase required and no restrictions on what they can buy. And to prove that you won’t jack up the price first and then take the $50 off the total later, you tell them not to produce the coupon until after they’ve been presented with the bill. Oh, and for the icing on the cake, you offer a 100% refund if they aren’t totally thrilled with their experience with your auto repair shop.

The timing is right. Folks are always looking for the good deal. They need what you are offering. You send your no-fail offer to the right list of folks, and then you get ready for the bundles of people beating a path to your door… but they never come. What the heck happened? Did you miss something? Was the offer too good to be true? Wouldn’t you just love to ask every one of them why they didn’t take you up on your offer?

Even the most experienced of marketers aren’t immune to this phenomenon to a certain degree. A couple years ago, I offered to give away copies of a brand-new marketing course to the first 200 shop owners that wanted them. The offer was (I thought?) brain-dead simple. Invest $197 to get the course. Take 60 days to go through the course then call my office and get all of your money back. (WOW!) I also added a 30-day, no-excuses needed, 100% money back guarantee too. And to cover what I thought was the final hurdle, I assured everyone that there were no more payments and nothing else to buy.

While I still ended up doing very well with this campaign, even though I was a bit short of my goal of 200. What went wrong? Was the offer too good to be true? Was it too complicated? Did I miss something?

The point of today’s message isn’t to commiserate about the lack of response to our advertising efforts. Nope, it’s to tell you about a free online site called Survey Monkey that we can use to help us find out where we went wrong with our offers. With Survey Monkey we can set up a quick 2-minute survey and ask our prospects why they didn’t respond. And then, based on their answers, hopefully we’ll be able to craft or edit existing offers that will get a much better response the next time.

Because I was able to survey clients who the deal was offered to, I was able to improve upon my course offer and fill the last few spots to hit my 200 goal.

Hopefully if your shop can start surveying clients and prospects more often, you'll have a better handle on what they want and what offers will get them more excited.

- Ron Ipach (a.k.a. Captain Car Count)

Somebody recently sent an email to me asking the same question that I get dozens of times every single month. Basically, it says, "Ron, how much should I budget for my marketing?"

I have a very simple answer to that. One that actually a lot of people are gonna totally disagree with me...

My answer is, throw out the marketing budget. You do not need a marketing budget, and here's the reason why: A lot of times, I've heard five, six, or even three percent of your growth sales should be used towards advertising.

Now, that might be a good number for some months, but it's a horrible number for other months. But if you're budgeting and you're only gonna have a certain amount of money for marketing every single month, your business is gonna be going to be heading on a downward slope.

For a lot of our clients, the summer months tend to be their busiest month. They don't need to be spending a lot of money on marketing at all during those months because they're just naturally busy. But then when the kids go back to school in August and September, everything screeches to a halt.

So I'm gonna say throw out the marketing budget and spend it where and if you need it. You don't need to spend a lot of money on marketing if you're naturally busy. You do need to spend a lot of money on marketing if you're gonna be slow.

Now, this goes to ... I guess I should mention, it's not a matter of just throwing a bunch of money out there on marketing. You have to do good quality marketing. You have to have the right message sent to the right market at the right time using the right media. In other words, a way that they're actually gonna see your marketing. You have to get all of those things straight.

So I'm going to probably guess that if you follow me and participate in my Car Count Daily campaign by watching my videos, you're getting a good idea, a good sense of what good quality marketing is. I'll assume that you're doing good quality marketing.

Now, if you're spending money on good quality marketing, you're gonna get good results. If you don't need it during the summer months, slow it down. If you're gonna need it in the fall, you need to raise it up. I don't like marketing budgets for that reason, because everybody gets used to spending the same amount of money every single month, whether they need to or not.

Pay attention to your numbers. Pay attention to what your shop is telling you. Pay attention to what your car count's telling you and spend the money when needed.

Also, if you're running short of your numbers, you may need to spend a lot more money and put in a lot more effort on your marketing for those specific months. Don't look at marketing as an expense. Look at it as an investment. A marketing budget is something to be spent. Marketing investment, your marketing dollars if it's done right, is actually an investment. It's not taking money, it's actually attracting more money to your shop.

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.

Obviously, what you want to do it get their correct name. Make sure their name is spelled correctly. Have that in you database.

Then, also, we want their mailing address. Everybody’s got a place they’re living. They’re not living in their car, chances are. So we want to make sure that we get their home address so that we can mail something to them.

The next thing on the list is we want to make sure we get their e-mail address. We want to make sure that we’re getting the right e-mail address. Not the e-mail address the junk e-mail that a lot of people, including me, I have a junk e-mail address that I give to everybody because I don’t want them to contact me. We want to make sure that we get their actual e-mail address. The one that they actually do check. It’s very important you do that.

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.

What you’re going to be able to do with all this, if you have a home address, you can send them a piece of mail. If you have an e-mail address, the good e-mail address, you can send them an e-mail. If you have their home phone number, not only can you pick up the phone to call them, I call it dialing for dollars when you’re on your slow days to see if you can get some of them to your shop, but you can also do something. It’s a technology called the voice broadcast where you record a message, and it blasts it out to everybody’s home phone number and leaves a message just like you would’ve left a message on their voicemail by calling their home if you called them one by one. This is different, where you just record it one time and it blasts it out to everybody. 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.

But none of this is going to work for you if you don’t have the accurate data in your database. So here’s a suggestion that you start right now, today, with the very next customer that walks through the door and you start collecting that data. Think of it like when you went to the doctor’s office the last time. What they did is they handed you that clipboard and said, “We’re updating our records. Please fill all this out.” You can protest all you want, but they’re going to make you fill those forms out every single time you go in. Why? They have insurance forms that they need to fill out, and they got to make sure everything’s accurate. You, you need to market to them. You got to run your business off of this data. So require that they fill out each and every one of those lines. Their name, their e-mail address, their phone number, their cell phone number. You want to make sure that you collect all that data so that you can market to them.

Just assume that they’re going to give you that data and no questions asked. If you just ask for an e-mail address, now there’s a dialogue that kind of goes back and forth. If you simply hand them a form that says “We need all this information for our database, for our records,” they will go ahead and fill that out. Make sure that you get that done.

You also, at the bottom of that form, you want to have like a little disclaimer that by singing below, and you want to make sure they sign it, by signing below, you are allowing Ron’s Auto Repair to contact them by mail, by phone, or any other electronic means necessary. You want to have that little catch-all, cover-your-butt legalese on there so that when they sign it, they literally have given you permission to market to them using all of those means.It all starts with good information if you want to be able to market to your current customers. Your current customers are your best source of income, and we’ll cover that on other videos like this. You got to make sure that you have the data first so that you can market to them in the future.

note: Be sure to watch the replay of my Live Webinar

Hi Shop Owners!

I wanted to come over shop owner forum and offer you an exclusive invitation to join me TOMORROW NIGHT on my Free Webinar - 

Registration is now open for my free Auto Repair Webinar - 

I'm going to be talking about what it takes to go from just being an ordinary shop to an EXTRAORDINARY shop.

What do I mean by ordinary?

• It's where 95% of shop owners lie.
• Car Count numbers aren't nearly where they should be
• The shop is not meeting their financial goals.
• Their time is being sucked up.
• They're working entirely too many hours.
• They're not getting a chance to spend time with their family.

In other words, the shop isn't exactly what they thought it was going to be when they started it.

What I'm going to be talking about is what it takes to be in the top 5%, where it's making money hand over fist, where you're being able to take time off. You're going to be able to spend time with your family, go do what you want to do with whoever you want, whenever you want to do it.

Those things that if you roll back to the day that you started your business, you thought you would be able to do.

If this sounds like you, click here to learn more and register now...

(** WARNING: Spots are filling up FAST, Click here to Reserve NOW **)

Every day during a shop owner's work week I'm going to deliver one tip, trick, tactic, strategy or insight that can be put to use right away to immediately start to boost the car counts in every shop.

That means over the next year you're going to get over 250 videos, audios, and blogs that you can consume in less than three minutes per day and then act on them in less than two. 

CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO CAR COUNT DAILY

Free Report:

Everyone knows how expensive advertising the repair shop can seem at times. So much so that many auto repair shop owners are hesitant to even begin to construct an auto repair marketing game plan. 

Because of this, in a file attached, we dug a little deep to provide you with 10 absolutely free ways to market your automotive business in order to boost the car count in your shops. 

Check out these 10 Strategies to Increase Your Car Count Without Spending Any Money (file attached)

Enjoy.

- Captain Car Count 😃

P.S. For more free daily content please subscribe here: http://www.carcountdaily.com

Free Report.compressed.pdf

All,

Last week I held a free tele-conference for my clients and I received so many positive comments on it that I'm going to do it again and open it up to the rest of you that may be interested in getting more car count.

(NOTE: This is all pure content - no sales pitches whatsoever!)

For details, go to www.SuccessfulShopOwner.com/?page_id=257

All,

Please check out my new video trailer for The Auto Repair 'Event'. Let me know your opinions of it.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH IT

Thanks!

Please answer this question...

"If only I had ______________________________ , my business would be so much better."

(I realize you may have more than one answer, but only list the top one or two 'wishes' that immediately pop into your head.)

If you need more good customers, or want to get your best customers coming in more often to spend more money in your shop, you'll want to check out this free marketing course.

CLICK HERE to get the Free Marketing Course

Let me know what you think about when you get it.

Best,

Ron Ipach

All,

If you're finding money to be a bit tight right now, here's a promotion that'll help bring in some quick cash for you.

CLICK HERE TO SEE IT

Best,

Ron Ipach

Happy New Year to all!

In case you've been living under a rock, you may have heard of this little community on the internet called Facebook. What you maybe didn't know is that Facebook is a great place to attract new customers to your shop.

Together with my friend Greg Pitstick (one of the leading authorities on using Facebook for business) we just shot a brand new video explaining how this all works.

You can watch the video here: www.4carcount.com

Get ready to take lots of notes because it's packed with a lot of great info.

Enjoy ,

Ron Ipach

PS: Watch it right now, because I'm not going to leave it up on the internet for very long.

www.4CarCount.com

Hi all,

I just came back from Las Vegas where I held The Auto Repair Event. Here is a video I put together for my clients where i talked about the 'new' economy and where the future of marketing your auto repair shop is headed.

(Note to forum moderator: this is also being used as a 'sales' video for the recordings of The Event. If it is outside the rules to have this type of video, please remove it. To re-shoot the video without the links to my sales page would take too long.)

Enjoy...

http://theevent2010.s3.amazonaws.com/Event%20audio%20sales.mp4

Here are some stats that I came across the other day with regards to where people in the US are spending their time these days…

• 
   
  
• 76% of people in the US actively use the internet
  
• The average person spends over an hour every month on Google
  
• The average person spends over an hour every month on YouTube
  
• And get this… 126 million in the US are on Facebook and they average spending 32 minutes socializing each time they visit!!!
  
• Even better, 42% of people over the age of 50 (our best customers!) use social media sites like Facebook and Twitter – and that number doubled over the past year!
  

Lets contrast that to a few other tidbits…

• 
   
  
• Yellow Page usage is way down (I couldn’t find any official figures, but you already know this is true)
  
• Newspaper circulations continue to slide by double digit percentages every year
  
• More than half of TV watchers record their programs (and blow by the commercials)
  
• The cost of mailing a letter is going to cost 5.6% more real soon
  

Soooo…. The majority of Americans are getting online and spending an incredible amount of time while there, and the effectiveness of the ‘traditional’ way of marketing your business is declining quickly and getting more and more expensive. Any thoughts on where you might want to focus your efforts now and into the future??

The Best Way To Get Noticed Is To Stand In Front Of (not behind) The Stampeding Crowd!

Best, Ron Ipach, CinRon Marketing Group

Last week I sent out an email to my shop owner clients titled, “Zero Cost Advertising for Your Auto Repair Shop that Really Works” that was promoting my upcoming Auto Repair Event in Las Vegas. A few hours later I received an email from a past client that was obviously upset that the email didn’t contain all the nitty gritty details of what my new strategies were, as well as full instructions on how to put them to use.

He called me a ‘plaid suit salesman’ because my email got him so excited about the killer results that I got from testing my new strategies that would produce new customers in his shop without spending a dime on advertising, but then I made the dastardly sleazy switch – in order to get the strategies, it would cost him money to learn all the details on how to put them to work for his shop.

Apparently, unlike with his business, when he packages up his knowledge, expertise, and experience and then markets them to his clients, he’s allowed to get paid for performing them; I’m in an entirely different business. When I market my knowledge, expertise and experience, mine should be given away for free.

Does that sound right to you? Is it sleazy of me to expect to get paid for the services that I perform? If you think so, look in the mirror and ask yourself the very same thing. If the answer is yes, then adjust your business plan accordingly. Then whenever a customer is unwilling to spend any money to fix his car, just go ahead and fix it for him for free. Forget about all the money and time you’ve spent honing your skills for the past dozen years. Forget about the knowledge you’ve gained while being in the trenches running your business. Forget about the enormous risks you take every day as a business owner – because after all, since this guy doesn’t WANT to spend money on his car… he’s entitled to your services for free.

What a great business model, huh? You’ll get quite the reputation in your community, right? Sure the profits will be non-existent. Maybe you can make it up with more volume?

Okay, okay, I know I’ve gone way over the top to show how ridiculous this guy was being. I’m sure you got my point a long time ago since I have no doubt that you’ve dealt with folks just like him and were left scratching your head while trying to figure out their logic. I hope you fired them too.

Since when is developing an excellent product or service, marketing it in a compelling way so that your prospects get excited about having it, and then expecting to to get paid for it, drum up images of a sleazy cigar-smoking overweight balding guy in a plaid suit? Sheesh!

Am I wrong, right, or somewhere in between. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Best, Ron Ipach, CinRon Marketing Group