Micki Woods is a former shop owner who went on to found Micki Woods Marketing, helping collision repair shop owners build a local brand that stands out to effectively reach their ideal customers.
Woods appeared on an episode of The Collision Vision podcast, driven by Autobody News and hosted by Cole Strandberg, to explore what makes great marketing in collision repair, how to build trust and visibility in a local market, and where to focus time and dollars to drive real ROI, especially with an independent shop’s budget.
Shop Marketing Mistakes
“The economy is weird. Shops are all of a sudden now slow,” Woods said. “They went from being so crazy busy to now being so slow that they're dying for work.”
Woods said she sees a lot of shops pour a lot of money into social media expecting to immediately see a boost in business.
“That's an issue that people had when Facebook came around,” Woods said. “They thought, ‘If I make a Facebook business page, then my business will explode.’ And that's not necessarily the case.”
While a handful of collision repair businesses do establish themselves as influencers, “For 99% of the rest of shops, [social media] is really just no ROI. So I think that's a huge miss,” Woods said.
Magazine ads and billboards also don’t see a large ROI, she said.
Strandberg asked why many shop owners only invest in marketing when work slows down.
“I think they really don't see the value in it,” Woods said. “They think that the customer is going to file the claim, the insurance company is going to tell them where to go, and the customer is just going to go there.”
Woods said there’s a gap between the customer filing the claim and choosing a shop, and marketing helps get shops in that gap.
“[Shop owners] don't realize the power and value of marketing and what it can do for their shops,” Woods said.
Marketing is not a cost, but an investment, she added. “It’s a direct revenue generator.”
When work in progress slows down, shops only think about “minimizing cost outlay,” Woods said. “They're in this really tight, fearful state, which then doesn't allow them to really step into that uncomfortable place. But that's where the magic happens. That's where the good things are happening.”
First Steps to Marketing Your Shop
Woods said often, shop owners who contact her agency have never done any marketing.
One of her clients who owns a smaller, independent shop wanted to be busier. When they first reached out to Woods two years ago, they only had a very basic website and no Google business profile.
Before spending any money on marketing, Woods recommended the shop get its digital foundation in order.
Make sure the shop’s website is mobile-friendly, with high-resolution, current photos of the shop itself, staff members and “before and afters” of customers’ repaired vehicles. Hiring a professional photographer is best, if possible, but most smartphones take clear enough photos.
The website should also have contact information – address and phone number – on every page, and accurate operating hours.
Then optimize the shop’s Google business profile, which is free. Ensure the business hours are accurate, and add photos of the shop and repairs as well.
“And most importantly, make sure you're pushing for Google reviews,” Woods advised. “We live in Google's world. People are going to Google.”
It’s important the shop establish its brand and present it consistently across all platforms, through uniform logos, messaging and a core value statement.
“Oftentimes the owners really don't know who they are and who they want to portray their business to be, so it ends up being a very scatterbrained feel for everybody,” Woods said.
“Once you have that, then when you start to push forward with any marketing, even if it's a banner at a football game…it's all consistent, which is really important, because people aren't going to resonate with one logo one day and two months later it's a different logo, different colors,” Woods said. “The power happens with the consistency of the same thing over and over.”
Picking Up Speed
Once the foundation is laid with a strong website and Google business presence, a shop can move on to other tactics to gets its name and brand out there.
Woods recommended focusing on one or two channels. “It's not the spray gun approach, where I want to do all the things. Pick a couple of things and be really immersed,” she said.
If a shop joins the local Chamber of Commerce, for instance, make sure someone from the team attends every meeting. Perhaps they could give a presentation, or the shop could be a sponsor.
“People don't want to do it because it takes effort, it takes time. It's a sacrifice, but it's a huge value,” Woods said.
When customers come in, ask how they heard about the shop, whether it was an online search, word of mouth, or seeing an ad or banner out in the community.
“Track your ROI so you know what you're getting from what you're spending, which is important,” Woods said.
Effectively Using Social Media
Every shop should at least have a Facebook page, Woods said.
“Create the profile. Put some photos in there. Make it look nice. Fill out your basic information and put a few posts,” she said. “At least if you have that, then when somebody gets into an accident, if their car’s at the shop and they just picked it up, they want to post it on Facebook. Now they can tag your shop.
“So now other people are like, ‘Oh my gosh, her car looks amazing.’ And they click to go over to your shop to see where did that get fixed at? They can't do that if you don't have a business profile,” Woods said.
Other social media platforms are tough because most people use them more for entertainment.
“You've got to be really creative and have an extremely unique positioning and strategy to actually get ROI [on other platforms], and so oftentimes the juice just isn't worth the squeeze,” Woods said.
“If you want to have a presence, by all means, if you've got somebody in-house that will do things for you, that's the way to do it,” she added. “Have somebody in the shop do birthday photos for your team, shop lunches, Christmas parties, those types of things where you can tag your employees, you can highlight people. People want to see people.”
Whichever social media platforms a shop does use, it should be consistent about posting to it, Woods said.
Email Marketing
Email marketing can be valuable if done properly.
For instance, Woods said, one of her agency’s shop clients pulls customers’ birthdays from its database, and sends a coupon for a free oil change at a partner mechanic shop and a voucher for a coffee and cupcake at a partner bakery.
Another shop client does a monthly email with seasonal car care tips and a list of local events.
Those emails can help a shop stay “top of mind,” but they have to be used carefully, because if a customer unsubscribes, the shop can never contact them through email again.
“They already get so many emails, so there's got to be value, and it can't be so often that you're pestering them,” Woods said. “So it's a fine line, but it can be wonderful.”
Reputation Management Through Customer Reviews
“This is huge,” Woods said. “Reviews are so powerful. If you are not maximizing your reviews, it's a huge mess.
“It's inexpensive to do, but it's hard to do,” she added.
Some shops use software that automatically texts a link to a customer asking for an online review a set amount of time after picking up their vehicle. Others post a QR code on the front desk that can be scanned to leave a review, or send an email.
Either method is more effective than waiting for a customer to remember to leave a review on their own.
Of course, some reviews will be negative, which can be an opportunity to respond with an offer to make it right.
“Everybody knows bad things happen. It's not when bad things happen, it's how do you deal with something bad after it's happened,” she said.
Woods recommended shop owners and managers resist the urge to respond directly, because they’re “too emotionally invested, [they’re] going to fire back. And that's not a good look.
“It becomes a battle, and it appears to [potential] customers as if you are not kind, you're combative, and they don't want to deal with it,” Woods said. “They're like, ‘Something doesn't go right with my repair, is this the way I'm going to be treated?’”
Some negative reviews don’t need to be addressed at all.
“If Janice left this one-star review and Janice is cray cray, we're just going to let her review sit there, because if you respond, now you open up the can of worms and now it's a mess,” Woods said.
Optimize Your Shop
The shop itself is an important part of marketing the business.
When customers pull up, they want to see clearly marked parking spaces and a clean lobby door handle.
“These are the things that a customer is noticing, whether they're consciously noticing or not,” Woods said.
Live plants or flowers inside the lobby can lighten it up, as can making sure it doesn’t smell “greasy and gross, or like we just heated up a McDonald's cheeseburger in there,” she said.
“It's the whole experience. Paint your walls, clean the scuffs off the walls. Vacuum your carpet,” she said. “It's the little things, because from a customer's perspective, if your front office looks like this, what does it look like when you're repairing my vehicle?”
Customers are looking for an expert in collision repair, not someone who “can't even wipe the dust off your front counter,” Woods said.
Standing Out as an Independent Shop
Woods said the first key to marketing an independent shop is “dominating Google.” There are customers who have had poor experiences with DRPs, and actively seek out another option through Google.
“A lot of the consolidators aren't spending the money on digital marketing, so there's an opportunity for independents to go there and maximize it,” Woods said.
Consolidators also often step back from marketing if they get a local dealership account.
“As an independent, you have the opportunity to go [to community events] and be present, make the relationship, because the consolidator doesn't have the boots on the ground to be able to be in there on a regular basis,” Woods said.
How Marketing Ties into Staffing, Growth
There are shops that do a good job marketing themselves on job boards, Woods said, adding elements like videos to show how well they treat employees.
However, she thinks word of mouth – satisfied employees telling other people how much they love their workplace – is still more powerful than any job posting.
“When I worked for Valley Motor Center early on in my marketing career, we had people beating down the door because the shop owner was incredible,” Woods said. “He gave cash bonuses at Christmas time. We did a Thanksgiving feast. We did events in the park where we bring our whole families, and the list goes on and on. The benefits he gave us, he paid us more than any other shop around.”
It sounds expensive, but it made the employees feel “like we were family,” and they told everyone how much they loved their jobs. The business had a steady flow of applications.
“People were dying to get into that shop…and it was because of the culture that the owner made that drew people to it, because they wanted to be a part of that,” Woods said.
Shop owners looking to add more locations need to gain visibility for their business, Woods said, and marketing is a big part of that.
Opening a new location in a new market requires brand awareness.
“We've got to get you up to the top of Google, and then we've got to build out your Google business profile, your website, all the things we talked about initially, those are going to be foundational pieces at your new location,” Woods said.
Abby Andrews