The Digital Shop® Blog
Marketing for small businesses, like your auto shop, has changed drastically. In the past, your shop may have relied on billboards, newspaper ads, or manual calls.
Today, technological advancements have made it much easier to connect with customers. SMS text marketing may be the most effective way to get your message across while strengthening your connection to clients. In fact, the average opening rate for SMS marketing is 98% and response rates are up to 295% higher than phone call responses.
Keep reading for an in-depth look at why you should implement SMS text marketing for your auto shop.
Ways Automated Text Saves Time for the Front End
Automated text takes the strengths of text marketing and allows you to benefit from them at scale. With the right software, your shop can use automated text marketing for:
Appointment Reminders
No one wants to forget regular car maintenance or an upcoming service appointment. Despite this, it’s all too easy for life to get in the way–and when it does, your customers could easily forget about their plans until it’s too late.
While you can’t prevent your clients from running into unexpected problems, you can remind them when they have an appointment coming up.
By implementing software, this process is effortless. It takes the responsibility off of your staff to manually call and instead sends automated reminder texts to customers.
Promotions and Sales
Offering coupons and promotions is a great way to attract customers, however, providing opportunities to save is only half the battle. You’ll also need to make sure your clients know so they can take advantage of them.
That’s where automated text comes in. Thanks to the high read rates associated with texting, almost everyone who gets these messages will see them. That increases the likelihood that they’ll actually get to benefit from your deals.
Soliciting Feedback
Businesses rely on feedback to ensure they’re doing everything they can to serve their customers. An automated text message is one of the easiest ways to ask customers for their thoughts.
There are all sorts of ways automated texts can help you solicit customer feedback. Depending on what you need, you could ask them yes or no questions or include a link to a more detailed survey.
Ways Automated Text Saves Time for Service Advisors
Clearly, automated text comes with countless benefits for your customers and front-end employees. Still, you might not know that it can be just as helpful for your technicians.
Though technicians aren’t responsible for reminding clients of upcoming services, they’ll appreciate the decrease in missed appointments and increased productivity that text reminders can create. Additionally, your Service Advisors will be able to respond to any issues that come to light through customer feedback. That way, they can improve their level of service and boost your business’ reputation.
Updating Progress of Repairs
It’s no secret that customers appreciate updates on their car repairs–and that they can get annoyed when they aren’t kept in the loop. However, sending updates on repair services can be time-consuming for Service Advisors forcing them to stop their workflow.
Automated texting software can help your Service Advisor send repair status updates to customers as quickly as possible. Your customers will be happy with the improved feedback they receive, and your Service Advisors will be happy about spending less time sending these updates.
A Time-Saving Solution
Despite the benefits of automated texts, some solutions are too expensive or too complex to be realistic for independent auto shops like yours. That’s where AutoVitals comes in.
AutoVitals offers affordable software that integrates automated text for you, making it a cinch to introduce this highly effective marketing method. Along with automated text, AutoVitals can help with:
- Digital vehicle inspection
- CRM
- Loyalty Management
- Workflow management
AutoVitals uses digital marketing solutions to help auto repair shops increase car count and drive profitable growth. If you’re ready to uplevel your business, it’s time to set up a demo.
