If your customers don’t understand their estimate, their repair order, or the progress of their repair, they may become frustrated or even decide to take their vehicle somewhere else.
But when service advisors communicate effectively with customers, they’ll increase the likelihood that each customer will become a repeat customer who will refer their friends and family to your shop. In other words, clear communication with your guests can exponentially improve your profits.
Everyone at your shop has their own responsibilities, but they all need to be skilled in communicating effectively with each other and with your guests.
Your service advisors in particular need to be great at communicating with your guests because they are the ones who will set the stage for your guests’ experience at your shop.
Here are three service advisor tips for assessing and upgrading communication with your guests.
Tip 1: Create a Streamlined Intake Process
When a guest enters your shop, it’s important that one of your service advisors immediately takes them through the intake process so the necessary repairs can get started as soon as possible.
Some service advisors might jot down key details about a guest and their vehicle, or use a spreadsheet to try to keep track of that information. But these methods can quickly become unorganized as important information gets lost in the mix.
Shop management software can help service advisors speedily move guests through the intake process while remaining organized.
For example, features like Default Inspections will make it even easier for your team to provide the same level of service to every customer, prompting service advisors to gather the same information every time to ensure no stone is left unturned in giving customers amazing care.
Tip 2: Help Guests Prioritize Repairs
Service advisors also help guests prioritize repairs during their courtesy inspection before the estimate. By showing customers what needs to be repaired, why they need it repaired, and what repairs they may be able to hold off on until their next visit, service advisors can put your customers at ease.
Digital vehicle inspections are a great tool that service advisors can use during this stage to explain and show key details, such as which part of the vehicle is experiencing an issue and how severe the issue is.
Guests will be able to see with their own eyes what’s wrong with their vehicles, and as a result, will be more likely to say “yes” to the proposed repairs.
You can even incentivize your service advisors during this stage by making it a friendly competition: the team member who sells the most repair work that month will win a reward, like a gift card to their favorite restaurant.
You can also remind service advisors that the more skilled they become at communicating with guests, the more they’ll be able to grow their careers.
Tip 3: Leverage Technology to Update Guests
As technicians work on vehicles, guests will be waiting, wanting updates on how far along the repair work is so they can get back home (or wherever their next destination might be).
With a cloud-based shop management system, service advisors and technicians can collaborate with ease. Service advisors can get a bird’s-eye view of every stage of the repair process without having to interrupt technicians.
As technicians progress and complete repairs, the software will reflect that. Armed with that information, service advisors can then contact guests to update them.
Shop management software with true two-way texting capabilities enables service advisors to send updates directly to guests’ phones. Service advisors can message guests through the system, and guests will see the messages as text messages.
This approach cuts back on the back-and-forth that often occurs with phone calls, and is an effective way to keep all of your shop’s customer communications in one place rather than on individual service advisors’ phones.
Tekmetric: Level Up Communication With Your Guests
Tekmetric’s customer profiles, digital vehicle inspections, and true two-way texting enable your service advisors to communicate clearly with your guests.
The results? Repeat business, referrals, and higher profit margins.
When your team puts these service advisor tips in action, your guests will be impressed and will remember your team next time they need repair work, or when their family and friends need repair work.
The holidays are a special time of year when we make memories with the family, give thanks, and spread joy. However, with social distancing guidelines still in effect, this holiday season will look a little different. Because this year has been challenging for many people, it’s more important than ever to stay positive and spread cheer to past, current, and prospective customers.
Making people feel warm and fuzzy this holiday season will get them to remember you, leading to more business immediately or at some point in the future. And even if not every person you positively impact comes to your shop, it’s okay! You’re still paying it forward to your community, which bolsters your shop’s reputation and can lead to more referrals down the road.
Here are ten ways you can connect with guests this holiday season.
Similarly, your automotive service advisors might enjoy talking to people but feel worn down after a long day of helping customers and building repair orders.
We've talked before about how modern shop management systems make it easier for your team to communicate, collaborate, and get things done.
Going a step further, there's an opportunity for shop owners or general managers to help create a culture within your repair shop that not only boosts productivity and maximizes efficiency, but rewards success and contribution as well!
“Receipts.” We all know the literal meaning of this term—those pieces of paper or emails/texts a retailer sends you as proof of purchase, in case you want to exchange or return an item down the road.
In a casual sense, “receipts” also mean “proof” in the event of a dispute. For example, if your dog could talk and claimed he definitely did not steal the pizza from the picnic table, you could show him “receipts,” which could be a photo your astonished friend snapped of him while he was dragging the pizza away. Busted!
Ok, but in all seriousness, as a business owner, you interact with receipts in two ways:
You give receipts to your customers once their repair work is finished
You get receipts when you purchase items for your shop (like parts)
Even though receipts exist in practically every industry, there’s a huge difference between the receipts customers get from an auto repair shop versus the receipts they’d get from a restaurant or clothing store.
Look at it this way: you don’t go to a restaurant and get an estimate for how much your food will cost. You see the prices on the menu, order, and then pay at the end. But in the auto repair world, we have to scope out the work with an inspection and estimate. That’s where the shop and the customer come to an understanding of the repair work that will occur, and get a preview of the cost, before any work gets done.
Without a solid inspection and estimate process, there can be a higher risk of misunderstandings and miscommunications, which can diminish customer loyalty and lead to credit card chargebacks. For example, a customer could misunderstand the severity of the need for a repair and decline it when they get their estimate, and leave a negative online review that their car still has issues. Or, a customer could say they don’t want a particular repair, but a service advisor misunderstands them. The repair happens, and the customer is upset when they get the final bill because they’d communicated that they didn’t want the repair.
That’s why estimates and receipts are extra important in our industry—they protect shops and customers. They give your customers peace of mind; they have a record of what repair work they got done on which day, and how much they paid. And in the event of a customer claiming a certain repair didn’t happen on a particular day, you could pull up your copy of the estimate and the receipt and set the record straight. You won’t have to deal with a frustrating back-and-forth process that can stretch out for days.
But beyond literal receipts, there are other elements of safeguarding your business. After all, protecting your business isn’t just about protecting it from financial and legal standpoints, although those are two important areas. You also have to think about things like your team’s productivity, employee management, healthy margins, and more. Auto shop management software is a great core tool that can help you safeguard your shop from multiple angles.
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