6 things you can do right now! From your website to social media - here’s how to get noticed by prospects with money to spend on higher-value work.
Over the years we’ve spoken to automotive aftermarket shops in the restoration and performance space and many of them tell us they’d rather have fewer, more focused concurrent ongoing projects in their shops that are more profitable than a larger number of projects that are less profitable.
For example, one restoration and custom car builder told us they had 18 projects in their shop ranging anywhere from $80,000 to $200,000 but would much rather have 8 projects that were valued at $200,000 to $450,000. I’m sure you’re thinking,
wouldn’t we all… Be it a 250k restoration project or a 50k high performance engine and transmission upgrade there are many ways you can increase the average value of the work that comes into your shop.
What we’ve found is that although the shops we spoke to were great at what they do they never seemed to find the time or put in the effort to keep their websites and online presence up to date, possibly losing out on getting higher value projects through the door.
In this article, we’re going to go through some key steps that can help get your shop noticed by new prospects that have money to burn and want to spend it with you, in turn leading to fewer ongoing projects that are invoiced out at a higher cost and profitability.
1. Develop a professional-looking easy-to-navigate website
Do you want to be seen as a professional shop or as somebody who just tinkers with cars as a hobby on the weekend?
The majority of people just aren't going to pay or trust a hobbyist to turn their vehicle into a high-performance badass masterpiece. If your website and online presence are unprofessional, hard to navigate, or just out of date then you’re probably not going to get as many of those high-value clients as you could be getting.
Now you’re thinking, wait a minute! I get clients from word of mouth and referrals all the time! Word of mouth and referrals are great but there’s a ton of money being left on the table because some people are only searching for your products and services online.
To become that go-to shop for high-value projects you need to walk the walk, talk the talk, and have a website that makes you look like the badass shop you are; conveying with it that you can handle those big performance builds or restoration projects.
Here are two ways you can make your website look professional and start attracting more high-value clients to your shop.
Make sure your website is mobile-friendly
If your website isn’t mobile-friendly or mobile-ready, people will get annoyed and frustrated not being able to click on buttons or navigate to different areas of your site. How many websites have you visited where you’ve had to zoom in on your phone just to read the tiny copy or view an image that won’t enlarge, or clicked on a phone number that does not automatically dial the business?
A website that isn’t built for mobile users won’t do your shop any favors because if a user can’t use your website, they’ll leave and go to your competitors for their next big project or upgrade.
From
our research, we found that 40% of auto restoration and performance shop websites aren’t mobile-ready. With
83% of the U.S. population using mobile devices to search for services online you’re going to end up losing a lot of potential customers if your website isn’t mobile-responsive.
Make sure your website is professional
2. Share your high-value projects on social media
3. Engage with your customers. Know your customer journey from the first contact or interaction to delivery
Engaging with your customers doesn’t happen just over social media. You can also engage with them one-on-one through email, private messages, Zoom, website chat, and of course that thing called a telephone, as well as face-to-face when they visit your shop.
When you’re working on a project, ask for your client’s cell number and email address so you can keep them updated throughout the entire project by sending them text messages and email updates with images, and updates of your progress as well as anything cool you’re doing with their car.
Your customers will love to see things like:
- Progression pictures of their project
- New parts being installed and tested
- Their car on the Dyno and the results
- Paint tests spray out cards for color matching
- Each phase of the paint process
- Engine build and test runs
- Before and after shots
- Parts and component fitment tests
- Parts you’re selecting to use on their car
- Paint color, fabric, and other styling choices
- Pretty much everything and anything you can think of to show progress
- And so much more...
Even if they’re only small things your client will be so happy when you message them with updates. You’d be surprised how much people love to see even the little details that go into their project. Plus it’ll make them feel more involved in the experience and they may also share the progress online tagging your shop in the process! Leaving them in the dark for long periods of time because you don’t want to take the time or you're too busy is the worst thing you can do.
In the beginning when you first talk to your customer, bring them into your shop and show them around. Let them see the entire shop, spray booth, dyno, engine build area, offices, and other areas of your shop and all the materials and equipment you’ll be using. By giving them an immersive experience, they’ll be able to appreciate your work more and feel more connected to what you’re doing for them and your brand.
Introduce your client to your entire team as well so they can get to know the actual people working on their project. This makes your service more personal, and a personal service increases the likelihood of word-of-mouth referrals (and repeat customers).
Through our discussions with shops, we’ve learned that many shops document everything from start to finish and build a project book that contains everything that went into a project (big or small) as well as before and after photos for their customers. In the case of full-on restorations, some shops also include a thumb drive with thousands of photos documenting every step of the process and project.
They take the time to do this so their customers can have a detailed history of the project and what went into it so they can look it over when their car is finished as well as have a reference if they need to know what parts were used for future work or upgrades. They’ll also have something that they can share with their friends and family and something that will add value for them if and when they go to sell their vehicle..
Pro Tip: When you work on any high-cost restoration or performance upgrade for a client you’re becoming a part of their lives for a short time. Showing that you care by interacting with them and bringing them on the build journey with you will reinforce their faith in your skills and encourage them to recommend you to others.
4. Educate your customers and demonstrate your skills
Educating your customers about the work you’re doing can help you connect with them more easily and help them enjoy their vehicle even more.
Time and time again, people may come into your shop looking to get cool work done on their cars, but they don’t know anything about the process. They don’t know what goes into the vehicle to make it perform better and look cooler. They may know virtually nothing about their vehicle, they just know they want it to look great, sound good and go fast!.
They may take their cars to car shows or cruise nights to have fun and show off their awesome ride but as soon as somebody asks them a question they may not have the answer and this can be embarrassing. They just spent a ton of cash on a restoration or performance upgrade but they may not have a clue what went into their car. They just know they spent a good chunk of their hard-earned money.
By helping to educate your clients about the work and parts that went into the restoration or performance upgrade they’ll be able to talk more intelligently about their car and feel more invested in the work and aftermarket parts they may have purchased from you. They’ll feel more involved with the community and happier about the work you did to their vehicle.
Instead of just leaving your customers with a one-of-a-kind ride, leave them with the full experience that went into creating their upgraded vehicle.
To get more high-value projects you’ve also got to educate your potential clients and show them why you’re the best. If they can properly convey the work you performed for them to others you will most likely get more referral work.
Don’t forget to educate your online audience too
When educating your customers don’t forget to post on social media and your website about all the work and upgrades you’re making to their car. This will show your audience that working with you isn’t just a buy-it-and-wait situation. It’s a whole journey from start to finish.
Another thing that we’ve found helpful is to demonstrate your skills by posting helpful tips online and videos of the work you’re doing. By showcasing your skills and being seen as an authority on the subject to your audience you’ll be able to attract more customers to your shop and people will perceive you as an expert in the auto restoration and performance industry..
Pro Tip:
If you educate your customers and your audience, they’ll be able to tell you exactly what they want for their project easier. They’ll also understand the reality of the cost of such a project and they’ll feel more confident talking shop when asked about all the upgrades and features they might want to be included in restoration or performance build.
5. Always display up-to-date proof of the work you do
Your prospects want to see your latest awards, current, and past projects as well as projects that have been featured in magazines, news articles, and big shows like the SEMA Show and others.
Posting this information to your website consistently can be very informative to prospects that know nothing about you. Post those magazine cover shots, articles, awards, and past and present project image galleries are huge when it comes to prospects deciding if they want to engage with you to work on their project.
We see so many shops in our industry that either don’t have much on their site featuring the work they’ve done or the accolades they’ve received. If they do, what they have is limited or very old. Prospects don’t want to see awards and projects from ten years ago. They want to see all the awards you’ve won as well as the projects you’ve accomplished in the last couple of years or even last month. They want to see the quality of work you do and that you’re an authority in your field and that you are up to date and using the latest aftermarket trends and processes.
You should also display testimonials and show prospects what your previous clients have said about your work. If you can post video testimonials, nothing sells high-value work like a testimonial from a happy customer!
Anything that you can do to keep your site fresh and up to date will help you become known as a trustworthy shop and encourage people to reach out and work with you.
Pro Tip:
Proof points don’t just belong on your website. Think about adding any key awards or publication logos to the bottom of your email signature to add to your image as a trustworthy professional when emailing current and future clients.
6. Always continue to tweak your processes to improve the customer journey
Developing a process for every step in your client project workflow process from the time a prospect contacts you to the day they pick up their finished vehicle, no matter the size of the project or work being performed, is critical to success.
We all know that the time it takes to complete a project or set task is the time it takes to complete the specific task, most of the time there’s no changing that. Then there’s always staff and parts availability that comes into play possibly slowing things down and sometimes you just can’t control that.
Some clients will always want their projects done faster and sometimes cheaper, unfortunately most really don’t understand what goes into the work you do so you should always have processes and tweak them as needed to add value to the experience as this will counter the “Amazon effect” of faster, cheaper or ‘can’t you just…
We have clients that use software-based project management tools like
Basecamp,
Teamwork, and
Klokwork
to track all details of a project including time and parts. For larger builds and restorations, shops will also use photography to document and keep track of all aspects of the work they do. They’ve also developed templated documents that their team members can work with that detail every aspect of a specific project task so that the task is completed the same way every time in the end saving time and money.
We know that in some cases every project is unique and you just have to run with it but the more things you can build a process around the more efficient your team can be resulting in clients that get their vehicle back sometimes sooner than expected, meaning they’ll be even happier with your work, hopefully tell all their friends, and come back for years to come.
Pro Tip:
If you’re stuck for ways to improve your processes remember you can always ask your clients. Get their feedback on how you can make your work more efficient and improve the overall experience.
Creating excellent customer service by developing an amazing customer journey is a great way to improve your chances of getting more high-value projects into your shop as well as repeat work.
We’ve just touched on six things you can do right now to bring in more high-value clients but there are many more things you can do to help improve your chances of bringing more high-value work into your restoration, performance, and restyling shop so we hope these six tips have given you some insight on how you can do just that and where to start.
