With this latest update, we want to deep dive into one of the most beneficial features, buy now, pay later, so shop owners can see for themselves.
Tekmerchant was designed to help shop owners, like you, to build trust with customers, close out the day faster, and turbo charge shop’s payment processing by offering them a fully integrated payments solution, all managed by a trusted team. Building off your existing Tekmetric experience, Tekmerchant is another way to supercharge both your shop’s processes and your customer’s experience at the same time.
More specifically, we're really excited to tell you about our new buy now, pay later feature , making it easier for your guests to do business with your shop -- especially on those more expensive repair orders.
With just the inclusion of Tekmerchant alone, Silver Lake Auto’s shop performance continues to grow. At the organization’s flagship store, average repair order (ARO) has increased by more than $200a month!
And we’re excited to see how much those AROs grow with buy now, pay later.
What is Buy Now, Pay Later?
We all know the story: a customer walks in complaining about a loud grinding noise, hoping they can just get their beaks replaced and on their way.
After an inspection, it turns out they have caliper sticking and need not just pads and rotors, but possibly a new caliper, new brake lines, and all the fluid and parts that come along with it.
What they expected to be a quick in and out routine job turned out to be quite an expense. And now here’s where the tricky part comes in: the customer is hesitant to approve the entire repair order.
The sticker shock of such a big repair they weren’t expecting can generally lead to customers picking and choosing what they want to repair so it fits their budget. And in some cases, this means sometimes putting off important repairs that could end up dangerous if ignored.
That's exactly where buy now, pay later comes in.
With our industry first offering of buy now, pay later via Affirm or Klarna, we make it easy for shops to get those expensive repairs approved by providing customers with the option to pay for the repair over time, while you get paid the same day.
Close Bigger Repair Orders
Here's the best part, there's no extra risk to your shop. You’ll get paid like you normally do on your transactions, while your customers now have the option to split up their car repair payments with either Affirm or Klarna to meet their budget.
And you’ll still see a host of new benefits, like:
Get paid on time by allowing your customers to pay over time
Make more money by increasing your Average Repair Order value
Keep everything simple with one single trusted payment partner
Tekmerchant is all about consolidating your payment processing into one platform, simplifying the hassle of seeing all of your payments right in your shop management system.
And with buy now, pay later, shops can see a huge boost to their average repair order by meeting customers where they are, and giving them the option to pay at a schedule that fits their needs exactly.
Because they don't feel pressured to cover the cost upfront, customers are more likely to make those larger repairs with less hesitance.
In fact, according to Affirm, automotive businesses that leverage their buy now, pay later options see a +85% boost to average transaction size. Meaning, customers are spending up to 85% more.
So, not only do you make it easier for your shop to get paid, but you can boost your average ARO at the same time!
Customers Love Buy Now, Pay Later Options
Of course we have your customers covered, too. They’ll love the fact that:
Payment options make it easy to cover larger, costly repairs
There’s no credit checks and interest free payment options
Your shop provides a modern buying experience they expect
Not only do they gain the flexibility of a payment plan to meet their needs and fit into their budget, but the process is even easier than usual.
Without any credit checks, and with an option of interest-free payments, customers can take advantage without worrying about meeting requirements, or paying back interest like a typical loan.
They can work with your shop to build out a plan that works for them, and trust that their repair is in the right hands.
Providing A Modern Customer Experience
You're also meeting them where they are.
With so many other businesses outside of the auto repair space offering buy now, pay later options, your shop can offer customers the same experience that they’ve come to expect, offering a truly modern customer experience with your modern shop management platform.
After all, if you can pay for your ice cream or pizza over time, why not your car repairs?
Already a Tekmetric customer and you want to streamline your payments? Talk to us today!
With a complete view of how all your shops are performing and access to the tools needed to make changes quickly, shop management systems help run your shop with smooth and agile business operations, provide a consistent experience for customers, and ultimately maximize revenue and support your shop's growth.
Features such as unified reporting across all your shops and shared customer history work to create seamless processes for managing your business as a centralized organization.
Remember spring and summer of 2020? A lot of us are probably trying to forget and move forward, and we feel you. It was a scary time period for everyone, including the automotive repair industry.
Last April, auto shop owners were wondering, are my customers going to come into the shop? If people stay inside, are they going to drive less? If they drive less, are they still going to come into the shop as frequently? What if other industries are affected, and people have less money for repairs?
We were nervous like everyone else. But anyone who knows Tekmetric knows that we’re committed to driving the auto repair industry forward; we wanted to answer these questions and put Auto Repair Professionals’ minds at ease.
We also wanted to enable shops to not only endure the pandemic but also grow and come out stronger than ever before.
Strength in Numbers
If there’s one thing that makes us feel confident, empowered, and like we know what’s going on, it’s numbers. (Tracking shop performance and providing insights is kind of our thing).
We’ve seen the power of metrics in shops across America, and we know that customers, service advisors, technicians, and the entire auto repair industry benefit when auto shop owners can make informed decisions.
So we launched the TM-500 Index. The TM-500 tracks the Average Repair Order and Car Count of five hundred auto repair shops located across the United States. But data don’t mean squat if it ain’t easy to read. The TM-500 let’s users sort data by time and region so they can quickly explore trends.
Want to know the ARO and Car Count between the months of June and November of 2020? Simply set the time period “by month,” and the TM-500 will generate an easy-to-read graph.
Want to know if shops in midwest states had a higher or lower Car Count than southwest states last summer? Simply set the time period you want to observe, and hover over different regions on a map of the United States to learn how they performed.
Just as the Tekmetric system for auto repair shop management gives shop owners better insights into their shops, the TM-500 gives Auto Repair Professionals better insights into their industry.
But knowing is only half the battle.
A Catalyst for Digital Transformation
The auto repair industry has lagged behind almost every other service industry in how we utilize technology. Almost anyone with a smartphone can order a pizza, sushi, enchiladas, or any other food they want and track it while it’s being delivered to their door.
Meanwhile, someone paying hundreds or even thousands of dollars for a new transmission still has to go in-person and deal with a half-legible piece of paper that feels greasier than the pizza and enchiladas put together!
But we get it. People are sometimes reluctant to change. For many auto shop owners, however, the COVID-19 pandemic was the “now or never” moment to fully digitize their shops.
In 2020, Tekmetric prioritized the rollout of several features we had been working on to help shops provide their customers with the experience they’ve come to expect in almost every other part of their lives. In April of 2020, we rolled out Text-to-Pay, allowing shops to invoice and collect payment via text message.
In November of 2020, we rolled out True Two-Way Texting to make it easy for service advisors and customers to communicate throughout the entire repair process.
Combined, these two features enabled Tekmetric users to provide a completely touchless experience to their customers without sacrificing the quality of their work or customer service.
Much like in other industries, customers who bring their cars in for repairs appreciate the extra service and transparency of a more enhanced, digitally assisted customer experience.
As we watched many shops grow by using Tekmessage and Tekmerchant, we kept an eye on the overall performance of the TM-500. We were able to see when shops began to bounce back in summer after an early slump, and developed other understandings about where the industry was headed.
Over time, we have added new metrics to the TM-500 such as state-by-state Labor Margin, Parts Margin, Effective Labor Rate, and Car Count to gain a more complete picture of these high-performing shops.
What Have We Learned Since the Onset of the Pandemic?
When making conclusions about where the industry is going, we like to be informed by both quantitative and qualitative data.
The numbers give us a factual look at what’s gone up or down, and talking to people in the industry helps us make correlations between how certain behaviors, processes, and principles affect these trends.
Between the data we gathered from the TM-500 and the feedback we were able to gather from talking to auto shop owners, here’s what we have learned.
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