Marketing – If you’re doing it yourself, you’re doing it wrong

If you’re handling your garage’s marketing, you could be hurting your profit margin.

Arrann Diamond

10 February 2022

Finding Customers

It’s not what you want to hear, but the likelihood is it’s true.

After all, you wouldn’t let a marketer walk into your garage to fix a gearbox, would you? – of course you wouldn’t. So a mechanic can get a better ROI by letting the experts handle their garage’s marketing.

Modern-day marketing moves quicker than a Bugatti Veyron. By the time you’ve learnt something new and implemented it, it’s outdated.

Poor marketing costs you more in the long run, as you don’t pull in those high value customers consistently.

Sure, your garage may be busy, but the last thing you want is you and your team being “busy fools”, working on any old job with low-profit margins.

Marketing requires time and resources; both are in limited supply, especially when your focus is elsewhere in your business. Without them, it’s tough to get the marketing engine going.

Leaving you with two options:

Hire a full-time marketer.
Outsource to a marketing team.

Marketing requires time and resources.

The first option costs you another salary, pension, national insurance, bonuses, and everything you need to pay staff nowadays.

Plus, hiring one person to tackle all the various marketing options would be like trying to hire a unicorn.

Just try finding someone who can do SEO, write blogs, optimise your Google Ads, build you a website that converts, manage your social media and nurture your existing customers using email and text campaigns.

But it’s not just about having someone to manage these things……you need someone who is focussed on delivering the CORRECT number and the CORRECT type of customers. You know the ones, customers who drive premium brand vehicles who want their car to be well maintained and don’t quibble over cost. Customers who are happy to buy what is recommended.

Let’s face it, trying to find one person who can do all that would be like trying to find a diagnostic superhero who manages the workshop, answers the phone, sees the customers, produces the quotes and cleans the cars! Sometimes you need a team and marketing is no different.

Outsourcing your marketing to a team has enormous benefits:

By taking a step away and focusing on what you do best, your business benefits in every aspect imaginable.

1
Experience and expertise – Marketers specialise in one thing… Marketing. Their expertise in this area is applied to reel in your ideal customers consistently.
2
The latest marketing tools – Only the most up-to-date tools and channels are used by experienced marketing professionals, allowing your business’s marketing efforts to generate a significant return on investment (ROI).
3
Brings consistency to your marketing – It’s easy to get sidetracked with other jobs, putting your marketing on the backburner. A marketing team ensures your business has consistency. And it prevents your marketing strategy from interruptions or gaps.
4
Measurable results – Outsourced marketers want to demonstrate an excellent ROI for your business. Having measurable results is priceless, allowing you to see your garage's budget is well spent. What gets measured gets managed.
5
Thinking outside the box – The best ideas come from stepping away from your business. An outside marketer uses inspiration from other industries to lure the high yielding customers to your garage.
6
You can focus on your business – A marketer focuses on the marketing so you can do what you do best, running your garage. You can spend more time working on the bigger picture or enjoying much-needed downtime.
7
Saves money – Good marketing pays for itself. Outsourcing to an experienced marketer who knows your industry has a smaller learning curve with faster results while yielding an improved ROI.
8
Uses proven strategy/plan – Experienced marketers use strategies with proven results. There’s no guesswork involved and no more sleepless nights wondering if you’re doing the right thing.

Imagine you’ve outsourced your marketing.

You wake up Monday morning after the best sleep you’ve had in a long time. You make a coffee; meanwhile, your latest ad is automatically posted before you’ve left the house. You open your inbox to see a report outlining how your marketing is performing…..nice picture…..good start to the week.

New customers are booking in regularly with only the most profitable jobs. Your staff are happy, you’re less stressed, and your garage is set for another record week.

Heck, you’ve even hired a new technician with the extra money your outsourced marketing team has generated.

Sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it?

The reality is it’s achievable when you outsource your marketing.

By taking a step away and focusing on what you do best, your business benefits in every aspect imaginable.

Now imagine you DON’T outsource your marketing.

You wake up after 5 hours of sleep, and you skip breakfast. You’ve got far too much work on your plate, business calls, meetings, cars to check over. The last thing you want to do is marketing. But, you have to. You do it half-heartedly between calls, it’s not perfect, but it’ll do.

Do you know what happens next? – Crickets…

Your marketing’s not entirely unsuccessful, but it doesn’t generate the traction you wanted.

Now I think you’d agree scenario one sounds far better. But the reality is if you’re handling your garage’s marketing yourself, you’re probably closer to the second.

If you want your business to grow, something needs to change sooner rather than later.

This is where Auto IQ helps

Auto IQ is the UK’s leading business service provider for garages. We provide everything from business coaching, technical training, digital marketing, sales, and more.

Our team of professionals have decades of experience and a proven track record in the automotive industry. When it comes to marketing, we know what works.

With a bespoke marketing plan, your garage can soar to new heights, with minimal input from yourself needed.

We’re a completely different business because of all the marketing

With a bespoke marketing plan, your garage can soar to new heights, with minimal input from yourself needed.

But don’t just take our word for it. In a recent Trailblazer article Simon Williamson from Marc’s Garage outlined how

Simon believes that the marketing Auto IQ does for him has helped his business grow by replacing unprofitable business with more premium brand business. Marc’s Garage now has more time to focus on highly profitable work and ditch the low priced, time-consuming work.

Being selective means fewer cars coming in, less stress on staff, and more profit in the bank.

Here’s how Auto IQ’s marketing team can help:

Website development – We develop your garages site into a high ranking website with excellent conversion rates.
Google My Business – GMB is one of the best ways to appear on Google “map-pack”. Up to 44% of clicks come from Google Maps Pack, and we handle the set-up for you.
Local Directories – We help your business stand out on over 50+ online directories that all garages should be on. We also ensure your message is consistent across them all.
Social Media – 78% of the UK use social media daily. Auto IQ helps develop your garage’s social media, which grabs attention and converts prospects into customers.
Google Ads – Paid marketing can be money miss-spent if done incorrectly. Luckily, Auto IQ’s marketing team provides a strategy focussed on delivering more profit from your ideal customer.
Retarget & Nurturing – The last thing you want to do is spend money on attracting new customers only to never convert into paying clients. We take care of that for you.

And absolutely everything is bespoke to your garage.

If you’re tired of handling your garage’s marketing and want a team of experts to take the weight off your shoulders, Auto IQ is here to help. Call us today, and let’s discuss how we can drive more of the CORRECT customers through your doors, increasing your profit margins.

With Auto IQ, your marketing is placed on auto-drive; you no longer need to worry about what to post, when to post it, or what platform to use… we take care of it for you.

Sleepless nights are a thing of the past, and you can rest assured your garage’s marketing is in the best hands possible.