getting new customers

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Detailing NY

New member
I own a detail shop and i am looking for new ways to get the customers. I trying to expand my business but need to find that little edge. Anyone got an idea?
 
I'm sure you have tried flyers and stuff like that. There is a detail shop that I know of that puts flyers on cars in Mall parking lots and stuff. I thought it was a pretty dumb idea untill I tried to schedule a time to get my truck done. They had to schedule me 3 days out. I guess it worked.
 
I don't know if you've done these before..but anyway, couple suggestions:



1. work with car dealers (some of them may not have time to wax the cars themselves)

2. give referral discount to your old customers to attract more new customers (I still believe personal recommendation is the best advertising for detailers)

3. pick up and delivery of customers' cars to be detailed and returned later



:)
 
this is a great question. i have been trying to think of new ideas lately also. it seems like my shop is in a rut too as far as bringing in new customers. my shop is in a smaller town pop. 15,000 or so. im on the second busiest road in town but not the main road. it just seems like lately that all my customers come from people driveing by. sure i get rfuralls but that only goes for so long when alot of your customers are the same. you still need new customers to get more new business. not that all my customers are repeat customers but its defanently not like it used to be geting new customers everyday. i do the flyer thing also and it seems to work pretty well but being in il right now its cold. that to me poses 2 problems.

1-who wants to go pass out flyers when its 25 degrees out side?

it can quite cold after an hour of passing out .

2- who wants to take the time to stop and take a flyer off there car when its 25 degrees out. but yet they have to when it right on the windsheild. now you have to ask yourself if its going to make the potential customer mad or not by doing this.

i have always offered free pick up and delivery.

there are only 2 major car dealers (2 worth doing work for) and they both pay there detailers by commision so its hard geting anything out of them.

so, i would be realy interested also in hearing so different ideas you guys have or do to keep customer flow up.



thanks,sean
 
I get most of my business from word of mouth. I've never tried the flyer thing, but I'm also not set up to handle the type of volume that can create. I went to www.vistaprint.com and had some business cards made and I hand those out everywhere I go. I leave one in each car that I detail as well. I have also sold limited numbers of gift certificates. I don't like doing that as much because it is promising to clean a car that you can't inspect first. I have to put stipulations on the certificate and I don't like restrictions on gifts so I don't use them very often.

I wouldn't know what it is like to detail in 25 degree weather. That must suck. I fold up in November and don't start up again till March. Too cold and sloppy durring the winter to spend much time out there. I want to still be able to use[/u] my hands when I'm 60. ;) Freezing them over and over doesn't seem like the best idea. :) Props to you cold weather detailers though. You are the elite!
 
I don' know, I'm not a prof detailer..so I might be wrong..

but IMO:



1. The market for detailers remain small - not that many people really care to make their cars look good..so detailers need to fully exploit the small market..



2. The business is a little cyclical IMO..winter time: people care less about how good they car looks...



3. Low entry barrier - Although good and expert detailers is hard to copy, but new detailers can certainly learn the basic skill fairly quickly....

in addition, although may not achive the same result as good professional detailers, many people can detail their own cars with the right equipment, patience, and practice..they may not have the rotary buffers to cut deep oxidation..but they may create a fairly good looking cars sparkle..



I'd be interested in hearing the solutions...but one possible solution is to do other 'auxillary' business like dent repair, oil change, glass repair, tire and wheel shop, etc. in addition to detailing cars..this way detailers can avoid the cyclical effect of the business...while finding extra income (although may need some additional cost)..as well as providing customers with one stop shopping type of business..





just my .02 :)
 
What i have been using to keep my customers coming back is what i call the quick detail system

after i do a complete detail, i offer the customer a quick detail contract which in return they get the vehicle cleaned every two weeks to keep the vehicle looking new. and about every 3 months we do another complete detail on it. It seems to be working, the best part about it is that i do the quick detail at the home of the customer and the neighboors always come to get my card and i get more jobs out of it.
 
its not 25 degrees in my shop. i couldnt detail a car outside right now if i wanted to. must be nice to close up shop like that. what do you do in your off time?



sean
 
<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote' >

<em class='bbc'>Originally posted by NY detailer [/i]
<strong class='bbc'>What i have been using to keep my customers coming back is what i call the quick detail system
after i do a complete detail, i offer the customer a quick detail contract which in return they get the vehicle cleaned every two weeks to keep the vehicle looking new. and about every 3 months we do another complete detail on it. It seems to be working, the best part about it is that i do the quick detail at the home of the customer and the neighboors always come to get my card and i get more jobs out of it. [/b]</blockquote>
I use that exact same tool. Great minds must think alike. :xyxthumbs

I work for a living in the off seasons. I'm sort of a Jack-of-all-trades kind of guy. I work with a guy that buys houses and has em fixed up before he sells em for a profit. I run a crew that does the work. Durring the winter it is fine but during the summer I split that with detailing. I figure that I am young and might as well work while I can. :)

I'm saving up money to open a franchise business. I've got some excellent leads and everything is all squared away so all I need is the money to get started. I'll be in business by this time next year. :up It is going to be beyond the regular detail work that I do now. I am going to expand to paintless dent removal and things like that and work out of dealerships. It'll be nice. Gotta move to Dallas first though. Salt Lake people couldn't care less about their cars on average. I'm tired of doing cars for people that don't even care about what I use to detail it.
 
well for not being a pro you hit that one right on. the market does remain small and people do not care about there cars near as much in the winter as the summer months. i just cant help but think there has to be a way to keep things a little more busy in the winter. we go from booking 2 weeks ahead in the summer months to day by day in the winter. im not expecting to be booked year round. im just looking for that happy medium.



thats what keeps me in business is all the other services we offer. car audio and alarms/remote starts made my winter this year. now if i could just stay busy all year with both life would be great.



i think location has a lot to do i dont mean location of shop. i mean the people around your place of business and how they spend there money. that and population plays a big role in it too.



thanks, sean
 
I detail car's every change i get, whether it is cold or hot. I make my appointments with my customers. They come to me or i go to them. I need to make the appointments as i own the detail shop part time. I am a full time auto adjuster for an insurance company.

I also sell my own products.

The detail business is very competitive, it's not always about getting the new business, but keeping the customers you already have. It takes time but word of mouth is quicker then a flyer going on someone's car.
 
what do you guys think of this idea?

My local pizza shop is extremly busy and we are good friends. I made 500 flyers and he is placing them on every pizza box when they go out for delivery. (hope this works).

I also have a flyer in his store that gets the customers attention. I offer one large free pizza, with every complete detail. The owner of the pizza shop cut the price down for me at $5.00 a pie and he will deliver it for me.

Don't know if this will work as today is the first day the flyer is in the pizza shop.

We all know our customers and they all want something for nothing. this cost me only $5, and i still make a great profit.

I even have an account with him so people can just order the pies. They must show the receipt from me to get the free pie.

Anyone else have any idea's that i can use?
 
I think you need to decide how and in what way you wish to expand your business. Do you want to increase the volume of business or look at maximising your current business. Going for volume is a lot harder, for example if your customer base increased by 200% do you have the resources to service this volume?



If you are looking to maximise profit, this takes you on another path completely and ranges from looking at minimising costs, finding ways to add value or increase the return rate of existing customers. It is well known but often overlooked that your best source of advertising is your existing customers.



Forgive me if I am pointing out the obvious to you. I used to help small businesses a few years ago, some of the time people forget the basics and spend time and money in ineffective ways.



Steven
 
I think you need to decide how and in what way you wish to expand your business. Do you want to increase the volume of business or look at maximising your current business.





i want both. because i dont think either is going to happen to extent that you are syaing. that would be wonderful to increase my business by 200% but given the town i live in i dont know if that is possible. on the other hand the town i live in is "cheap". by that i mean its hard enough to get a $145.00 complete detail out of them once a year let alone more. dont get me wrong i have the select few customers that come in once every couple weeks/months. but that volume isnt enough. i need to find the happy medium between the two solutions. i need to grow the overall volume of new customers as well as grow the amount of visits and spending with my current clientel. i do know the power of word of mouth. its got me this far. i get customers comeing in from up to 30-40 miles away because of my reputation. i know the obvious solution is move. i need a bigger town with not so prctical spending habits. thats just not possable at the current time though. that and i know this town has a lot of potential in the comeing years. i also know there is something when you provide as many services as i do in a town of 15-20000 and geting customers all the time that say they didnt even know i was here. i have been open now for 2 years and 6 months in the same location. thats a problem. i can stand in front of my shop any day of the week and pick out every other car that drives by and we have done some type of service to it. but then again i can go 3 miles away to the other side of town and not see one car that iv even done a hand wash on. i am the only "detail shop" in this town. there are 4 self serve car washes, and one car wash with express detail services. it kills me to see how busy the express detail shop stays. the cost of there express detailing services arent that much cheeper than mine. but the quality of work, (its a joke) you cant even compare. the time we put into each car and quality of products are 10x that of the "express detail". people around here dont care that some 17 year old kid just drove there car into a non touchless car wash tunnel scratching there $45,000 car and then pulled into a detail bay where he is going to be useing some wax with less standards than turtle wax and puting it on with an orbital all over the entire car(not bothering to cut in by hand) then takeing it off the same and sending it out the door in 35 min. for the same $35.00 that i wash there car by hand with clean water non harmfull non abrasive car wash soap with a wool mit and use meg. gold class paste wax by hand with mf towel spending 1 1/2 hours on it and it being right.

thats the other problem i need to figure out a way around. i could go on forever and i almost did, sorry. i know this turned into me venting and got a little out of hand but i wanted you guys to knw just what im dealing with in hope that one of you might have found a way to overcome the same problems im going through.

sorry for the long post and thanks, for the help, sean
 
I am wondering if you are in direct competition with the touchless car washes. For the average guy in the street these are the places you go to clean your car, a business like yours is where you visit if you want a perfectly clean car. I have no doubt that you can offer a better service without much of a price differential, but I think your market research would show they do not see the direct competition. You are probably seen more as a boutique, so maybe that opens up new markets for you.



I agree with you that handing out flyers in the cold is no fun, but if you can time it for when the temperature starts to rise, you could get a few more customers.



You seem to have good penetration of your local area, but as you point out, outside of 3 miles someone else is cleaning there cars, I would consider mail shots, flyers etc to hit this market. Thinking up some angle for publicity would get the local radio/press interested.



Conduct more market research, why are people going elsewhere and not to you. What do they like/dislike about your business. No body wants to hear bad things about there business, but if it offers insight or a chance to make money it should be considered.



I do not know how are what systems you use to advertise, what are the benefits and features of using your business. Again it is obvious but worth remembering that people buy benefits and not feature.



I understand your frustration, I ran my own business for several years, selling advice on purchasing HiFi equipment, this made some money but in the end I had to diversify. You are already doing this but it does seem you are experiencing strong seasonal market demands, this is very hard to break, but is not impossible.



If I were in your position I would try brainstorming or asking for any wild idea on Autopia (as you have done), it sounds a silly thing but can yield good results.



Please take these comments as hints or reminders of things you are probably doing already, it is not intended to criticise or upset you in any way.



Steven
 
I found something that worked for me today.

I have the same kid coming to me every weeked. He has a 1997 Acura 2.5. He also has a lot of friends, but for some reason his friends never call me to have them detailed, If offered my customer 50% off if he brings me new customers, but he would have to get me at least 5 complete detail jobs. While i was doing his car, he got on his cell phone, within 2hrs all his friends were calling to make appointments, I'm booked all next week and me and the customer are both happy.
 
I had a deal last year for some of my customers. For every referal they sent me I would give them a free coat of SG. I usually charge $20 a coat so it worked out well. It doesn't take long to apply the coat and it just gets them more and more addicted to Klasse. Since the deal was just for a wash and Klasse, they would usually pay me the to do a detail as well. So I made business both ways.
 
When I first started my mobile detailing business, I relied mostly on flyers. I would put them out at DFW and Dallas Love Field, until I was told that it wasn't allowed. After that, I went out to the rich neighborhoods and put them on doors. Took longer that parking lots, but no worry of security chasing me off. Any time I didn't have an appointment, I was putting out flyers. If I had a car in the morning, but none in the afternoon, I would stay in the area I was working in and hit as many houses as possible.



I got Mike Lalor of the Dallas Stars business doing this (he has since retired and moved to Wisconsin). I was walking up to the door to put a flyer on it, and his wife was opening the door to get the mail and I almost ran into her. I handed her a flyer and she made an appointment on the spot for the next day. I did his cars and Craig Ludwig's cars and Harley until Mike retired and Craig left to coach a minor league hockey team in Minnesota. I have several other long term customers due to either flyers or business cards.



I also have a sign on the back of my car with my business name and number. One person saw it and told his boss. I have been doing their cars for over 8 years now-between the big boss, his partner and their CFO, I get about $10,000 in business each year, because they get their cars washed every week and waxed at least once a month--high end stuff, too. A Bentley Continental, Lamborghini Diablo, Mercedes CL500, S600 and ML430, BMW 740iL, Cadillac Escalade, Lincoln Navigator and a full sized tour bus. Definitely the type of clientel you like to keep happy.



If you are not listed in the yellow pages, do that ASAP. I started off with a small 3 line insert ad and used that for a couple of years, they just went to a listing. Only one other mobile detailer in the Arlington Yellow Pages, so since my business name denotes that I am mobile, I believe an actual ad is unecessary. No drop off in business since I went just to a listing either.



I no longer advertise--no flyers at all. I may drop a business card here and there, but I rely on word of mouth and repeat business and since 94% of my business is repeat or referral, it is nice to have been able to ax the advertising budget. I occasionally give price breaks to regulars who refer business to me, but that is about it.



Your absolute best way to improve you business is to be the best detailer possible. The fact that I am mobile gives my customers the convience of on-site detailing-much easier to have me come out and clean their 5 cars at their house that have them drive them one by one to a shop. You want to find an extra selling point your competition doesn't have-high end waxes, QD included in washes, stuff like that, in addition to being better than the competition.



Another suggestion--do not undercut your competition's prices. Being the lowest price will suggest to potential customers that you use low quality products or cut corners. Try to be at least a bit above average.
 
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