Visualizing Excellence: Transforming Customer Experience with the Tekmetric MotoVisuals Integration

As we progress further into the new quarter, it’s important to take stock of the strides Tekmetric has made, as well as build the momentum to continue providing top-notch service and innovative solutions. From launching groundbreaking new features and building deeper connections in the industry, Tekmetric has kept our foot on the gas in the first quarter of 2024 to measure up – in every way we can.

Supporting Shops with Innovative Updates and Features

At Tekmetric, it’s important for us to provide solutions that are relevant to your shop’s needs. Over the last quarter, we focused our efforts on providing updates and features that you have requested based on what you’re seeing in the field. Whether partnering with another industry powerhouse or helping strengthen reporting capabilities, we launched solutions that help your shop operate more effectively and grow your bottom line.

Sometimes two is better than one – and Tekmetric aims to integrate with a variety of industry solutions so you can access a wealth of information in our comprehensive system. For example, earlier this year we partnered with Advance Auto Parts to integrate MotoVisuals, a cloud-based library designed to provide easy-to-understand overviews of repairs to customers. We accompanied this new integration with a webinar led by Tekmetric’s very own P.J. Leslie and David Lyddall, director of MotoVisuals for Advance Auto Parts. Both speakers discussed their commitment to helping create an excellent customer experience and build customer satisfaction through this solution. The MotoVisuals integration is just one example of how we can continue to measure up together.

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In addition to integrations, we also added new reports and features designed to make your life easier and help your shop run more efficiently. For example, the Multi-Shop Report offers a comprehensive breakdown of payments across all locations, empowering owners to make informed comparisons and strategic decisions. Additionally, the Labor Sales Report was created to provide details of labor sales when looking at employee pay, providing an additional option to accompany the information available in our Tech Report. Finally, our Itemized Tire Tax feature helps ensure that tire shops can provide clear and itemized tax information according to state legislation.

We also recognize the importance of community in the auto repair industry. As we move forward with the industry’s top trends and new product features, we have continued to invest in building connections and stronger relationships with both industry partners and you – our partner shops.

Building Deeper Connections in the Industry

At Tekmetric, we believe in the importance of long-term investments, whether that is in the product we provide, the people we hire or industry trends that we partake in. Our connection to our customers and desire to serve shop owners drives our day-to-day and motivates us to continue striving for excellence.

One of the ways in which we prioritize connection is through the various events we attend year-round across the country. This allows us to have conversations and build deeper relationships with you – the shops that we serve. Additionally, it gives us a chance to discuss what you’re seeing in the field, as well as what features, products and services you need to succeed. These conversations drive our product innovation process, allowing us to continue providing solutions that support your shop’s growth and forward momentum.

At the VISION Hi-Tech Training & Expo 2024, P.J. Leslie, Head of Business Development, was featured on the Kaizen CPAs + Advisors podcast where he gave insight on using Tekmetric’s numbers to continue enhancing the customer experience. Additionally, in March, we sprang forward, with our clocks and innovations, to the Automotive Training Institute (ATI) Super Conference in Grapevine, Texas from March 13-16. At each event, our conversations with shop owners and technicians brought the need for streamlined processes and enhanced customer communication to the forefront. Both needs are priorities that Tekmetric will continue to build on in each quarter of 2024.

In addition to attending events, Tekmetric also aims to support our shop owners in sharing their own insights and lessons about measuring up in today’s industry. For example, this quarter Brian Jesko, the owner of Trinity Auto Haus, joined us for a webinar, “From Technician to Multi-Shop Owner,” where he shared his journey of scaling his local shop and generating countless 5-star Google reviews to attract more business. One of the biggest takeaways from his webinar is the importance of holding a competitive advantage in service experience as opposed to solely relying on competitive pricing.

Continuing Our Forward Motion to Provide Great Solutions

Tekmetric’s product innovation and strong industry connections have paved the way for us to continue our forward motion into 2024 and beyond. This ongoing progress was recently recognized by G2, as they honored Tekmetric with the title of Top-Notch Auto Repair Software for the third year in a row. Talk about a three-peat! Receiving this award three years in a row is an incredible honor and a testament to both our team’s commitment to providing the solutions you need, and the support and feedback we received from you – our shop owners. However, our work does not stop at this recognition. In fact, we are more motivated than ever to continue bringing valuable solutions to meet your needs as we progress through 2024.

As we entered the year, we took a close look at the upcoming trends to set ourselves up for success while also providing valuable insights to the rest of the industry. After all, we’re all in this together. You may have seen some of these insights from our CEO and Founder, Sunil Patel, in his guest article, “Leveraging emerging industry trends in 2024,” with Vehicle Service Pros discussing 2024 industry trends. As a former shop owner himself, Sunil has a deep understanding of how to use industry trends to your shop’s advantage, and his article includes actionable advice on how to apply growth-oriented strategies, maximize value with efficient data use and meet customer needs with modern solutions – all while remaining poised for growth.

Measuring Up with Tekmetric in 2024

As we continue into Q2 and beyond, Tekmetric aims to continue our momentum, looking ahead to the next solutions we can provide that support your goals as shop owners. We want to be a team that plays our A-game each quarter, and we are excited to continue working with you to take your business to the next level. Cheers to a great first quarter at Tekmetric!

Tekmetric has remained committed to 2024 as a year filled with product innovation, providing updates that included feedback from our customers to demonstrate our commitment to a customer-centric approach as we continue to grow. From product updates and attending industry events to elevating our approach to data security, the second quarter has built on the first quarter’s momentum, leading to a vibrant first half of 2024.

Supporting Shops by Enhancing Efficiency

Tekmetric is systematically seeking opportunities to better understand the needs of shop owners and how our product can help shops run more efficiently. Building on our commitment to enhancing shop effectiveness, we focused Q2 on implementing updates that significantly bolster operational efficiency across the board.

Having the right technical team is essential, and with our latest update, shops can now assign multiple technicians to a single job, ensuring greater collaboration and efficiency. This update allows more experienced technicians to supervise staff technicians regarding more complex jobs, giving staff technicians an opportunity to experience hands-on learning. Overall, having multiple technicians on a single job improves efficiency by allowing you to align and prioritize your technician resources.

In addition to the multiple technician updates, we also released the Inventory Activity Feed. To ensure smooth operations and profitability, it's crucial to understand the flow of money. Inventory plays a necessary role in this process and with this update, shop owners now have an extra eye to spot inconsistencies in pricing and quantity. This new feature allows shops to monitor key changes made to parts inventory, identify and rectify errors and enhance operational efficiency and employee training initiatives.

As we move into Q3, we continue to strive for further updates that increase productivity within internal operations or streamline the customer experience from the first touchpoint until repair completion and beyond.

Commitment to Education and Learning Opportunities in the Industry

In an industry as complex as auto repair, there is no shortage of learning opportunities to improve your shop or learn how to incorporate customer feedback into our ongoing improvements.

At Tekmetric, we value a commitment to growing our knowledge base and sharing that with our peers at various events, whether it be in-person conferences or through webinars. Our dynamic duo John Phelps and P.J. Leslie attended WorldPac STX in Nashville, Tennessee in late April to share with repair shops key strategies to boost profits through enhanced customer experiences. Their presentation included leveraging digital tools and enhancing the digital buying experience, transforming buyer trends into revenue drivers and customer retention through excellent experiences.

From there, P.J. had two additional speaking opportunities at Thoroughbred Diesel in Winchester, Kentucky and AASPA Tools in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in the month of May where he presented on How Customer Experience Can Change An Industry. At both events, he shared his expertise regarding digital purchasing experiences, leveraging trends for revenue growth, mastering customer retention strategies, and surpassing expectations of the CX generation. Additionally, John Phelps, made an appearance on the Changing the Industry podcast where he discussed Career Shifts and Setting Industry Standards. At Tekmetric, we believe that the desire to give and improve the lives of our customers is ultimately what will drive your business to reach its full potential.

We participated in the ASI & ASTA Summer Social in Apex, North Carolina which provided an opportunity to network and connect with shop owners and tire dealers from the area. Our participation at these events helps us better understand your needs, fueling our commitment to product innovation and excellence in customer experience.

Tekmetric also aims to support our shop owners in sharing their own insights and lessons about measuring up in today’s industry through the webinars that we host. This quarter, we hosted a webinar entitled “Confessions of A Shop Owner,” which included Travis Troy, owner of Honest Wrenches, along with Ward Myers, VP of Training and eServices at Advance Auto Parts, Gregg Rainville, SVP at Steer, and Ian Miller, Partner Manager at Tekmetric. The key points were all about defining and developing shop culture and leveraging technology to be more efficient in the auto repair space.

Prioritizing Data Security

We recently increased our benchmark in data security by earning SOC 2 Type II compliance. Tekmetric meets the five principles that are required which include: security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality and privacy. With SOC 2 Type II compliance, we are able to keep any information that you put into Tekmetric secure, from your shop’s data to your customers’ information. This gives us more confidence that as we continue to improve the quality of Tekmetric, we are also ensuring the security of everything that is entrusted to us.

Keeping Our Foot on the Gas

As we close out the first half of the year, Tekmetric aims to use our customer-centric approach as the fuel that ignites our product innovation. Through our commitment to attending industry events and listening to customer feedback, Tekmetric meets its customers where they are, with constant plans to keep innovating and improving. We head into Q3 with our customer-obsessed mentality to continue improving and streamlining shop operations with Tekmetric.

In today’s auto repair industry, data can play a key role in a shop’s ability to repair a vehicle more efficiently and accurately. Traditionally, repair information was documented informally, often by hand on paper. Today, this information can be captured and processed electronically, leading to a significant acceleration of the repair process – and a more positive customer experience. 

The transformative power of data extends beyond streamlining individual repairs. In fact, by strategically analyzing your shop’s data over time, you can also use the information to grow your shop. However, to maximize the impact of data, it’s important to know what kind of data is most effective to use in your shop. Some of the more evergreen data – performance over time – is useful in your long-term strategy, while others, such as real-time performance metrics, are more helpful in making short-term tweaks to promote better performance. In this blog, we’ll discuss how you can distinguish between evergreen and real-time data and where you can use both to grow your shop.

Understanding Real-Time vs. Evergreen Data

Before you can decide how to use data, it’s important to understand the difference between evergreen data and real-time data. Real-time data is live data that is available as soon as it is generated. It allows you to manage your shop and respond to situations instantaneously as they happen. On the other hand, evergreen data is used in hindsight, after a timeframe has ended. Most shops use this type of data to reflect after the repairs are complete.

Both forms of data have their uses. Real-time data allows you to respond to situations as they happen in a way that helps support your business. Evergreen data helps you track long-term trends and their effects on your shop. With Tekmetric, you can leverage both types to keep your shop running smoothly. When you leverage data strategically in all forms, you can optimize your shop’s operations and processes, create an excellent customer experience and prime your business for growth.

Stay Ahead of the Curve with Real-Time Data

Real-time data enables immediate visibility into what is happening with your shop at any given time. From inventory to customer communication to repair progress, you can review different buckets within your shop and respond as the day progresses. This capability allows you to make decisions on the fly without having to wait until the end of the day, week or month to know which parts need to be ordered or how many repairs you have completed. Strategically, real-time data can be used for short-term decisions that have long-term effects, ultimately becoming an integral piece to growing the shop’s bottom line.

Examples of how you can use real-time data might include:

• Track daily progress with the shop dashboard:  Reviewing this in real-time allows you to respond to potential bottlenecks or problems that arise throughout the day. For example, if you see $15,000 in work pending approval before lunchtime, you can encourage your service writers to conduct follow-up calls to get approval and begin the work.
• Send out rainy-day coupons: Business tends to slow down on rainy days. However, if you experience this, you can respond in real-time by sending a rainy-day coupon incentivizing customers to come in for quick-turn work, like oil changes. 
• Monitor multiple shop locations with Tekmetric Multi-Shop: Multi-Shop can show you the performance of each shop at any time, from any location – so you can make decisions that support the strengths of all your locations. For example, you might move a car from a very busy, overrun location to another, slower location. Make sure you return the vehicle to the original location for easy customer pickup to maintain your customer experience. This maximizes workflow between high and low volume locations.

Analyze, Determine and Predict Trends with Evergreen Data

In addition to real-time data, you can leverage evergreen data by analyzing trends and your shop’s data for predictive forecasting. One of evergreen data’s biggest advantages is that it captures a period of time without the need for constant refreshing. This can help you review your shop’s performance over longer periods – year-over-year, month-to-month or quarterly – so you can implement long-term solutions to promote growth.

Examples of using evergreen data include:

• Create more business with declined jobs: When you want to influence cash flow for the coming weeks or months, you can follow up on previously declined jobs, such as an oil change or tire rotation. This customer-centric approach can not only build your customer relationships, but also drive business during a slow month.
• Create value with Shared Customer History: You can share your customer’s history across multiple locations, bringing extra value through this evergreen data. For example, if a customer asks when they had their last oil change, your service advisor will be able to pull that information within seconds – no matter which location the customer last visited.
• Create custom financial reports to track shop performance: Tekmetric’s financial reports give you the power and flexibility to create a report that tracks what’s important to you, without any extra noise, and make decisions based on past performance. For example, you can utilize the Time Period Configuration feature to compare data from the previous year or another custom time period, identifying bottlenecks and adjusting your strategy accordingly.
• Track month-over-month trends with comparative reporting: Pay attention to the trends that occur each month in comparison to the same time frame in previous years. This will allow you to spot trends and respond accordingly, such as preparing for a particularly busy season or implementing strategies to create more work in a slower season.

The Price of Ignoring Data

Time is money. Evergreen and real-time data allow you to manage your shop’s time and resources in the most efficient manner to generate profit while providing an excellent customer experience. To grow your shop, ensure you are using both forms of data to your advantage. Combining evergreen data’s longevity with real-time data can lead you to a multi-faceted business strategy, creating a customer-centric approach that ultimately generates more cash flow, profit and growth.