Marketing question...

M

MirrorDetailing

New member
I see some other people's companys on here that make a good amount annually and are always slammed. I am curious how you market your business. Granted right now I am about a month away from my website being finished, and its cold as hell here in GA. But my question is how did you guys from the get go really get your name out there. Right now I contract for 1 shop, 1 auto broker company, and sponsor a car club, which I see VERY little business from. The rest being word of mouth. But how did you guys go about getting your name really out there.



I have been doing this full time since April last year, and this is the start of my first full year. Even though is been below freezing every day, and the weather is not great, I know once it warms up it will start getting better. But other than going to car shows and event what else can I try to market my name to?
 
I had 20,000 business cards made.. Clean cut, professional, and simple... Went to the parking lots of the mall, publix, target, anywhere people go on the weekends and shop... And stuck them on the drivers windows of every car insight... I saw about a %.5 return, or let me say call back... and landed about 20 to 30 people... I handed out all those cards in 2 weekends and scheduled those people in two weeks... I just kept doing it over and over again.. Eventually I built up a customer base and sorted out who was worth keeping and who wasnt worth keeping... Stuck to the good customers and got rid of the bad ones... After that I worked the good customers hard on upselling them and on friends and family... 1.5 years later I have people who never miss a week of getting their cars detailed, and currently %70 of the people i service are high end...
 
Also be ready to answer the phones after doing that.... Have your prices down and ready to go... You have to be a sales person before you can be a detailer...
 
Details said:
I had 20,000 business cards made.. Clean cut, professional, and simple... Went to the parking lots of the mall, publix, target, anywhere people go on the weekends and shop... And stuck them on the drivers windows of every car insight... I saw about a %.5 return, or let me say call back... and landed about 20 to 30 people... I handed out all those cards in 2 weekends and scheduled those people in two weeks... I just kept doing it over and over again.. Eventually I built up a customer base and sorted out who was worth keeping and who wasnt worth keeping... Stuck to the good customers and got rid of the bad ones... After that I worked the good customers hard on upselling them and on friends and family... 1.5 years later I have people who never miss a week of getting their cars detailed, and currently %70 of the people i service are high end...
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This is a great example of something that a lot of us look past all the time. There are LOTS of ways to market, from newspaper, to flyers, to direct unaddressed ad-mail, to card-tagging, to radio ads, etc. Some ways will work better than others depending on market segment and particular geographical location.



That all said, the MOST important thing, and what we often overlook, is dedication and effort. 20,000 buisiness cards is a s***load of cards, and sticking them on all windows in sight at malls and large parking lots is a good amount of work, not to mention I'm sure a few people yelled at you too while you were doing it (if not the addition of mall cops, etc). Most folks here on Autopia would say that this type of marketing is the worst you can do, yet, you have proved that with dedication and effort, it can be done successfully. Props to you for that marketing campaign :xyxthumbs
 
WAS said:
This is a great example of something that a lot of us look past all the time. There are LOTS of ways to market, from newspaper, to flyers, to direct unaddressed ad-mail, to card-tagging, to radio ads, etc. Some ways will work better than others depending on market segment and particular geographical location.



That all said, the MOST important thing, and what we often overlook, is dedication and effort. 20,000 buisiness cards is a s***load of cards, and sticking them on all windows in sight at malls and large parking lots is a good amount of work, not to mention I'm sure a few people yelled at you too while you were doing it (if not the addition of mall cops, etc). Most folks here on Autopia would say that this type of marketing is the worst you can do, yet, you have proved that with dedication and effort, it can be done successfully. Props to you for that marketing campaign :xyxthumbs
Click to expand...



Yep, its a dam good example. I have about 900 cards left of my first stack I bought, and 20k is ALOT of cards! But yeah I actually do this at car show's and events, that way I can approach the owner of the vehicle and talk with them. But doing this near the mall near me, Mall of GA, I would get ran off by the mall cops REAL fast.



Though now that you say this, I have a friend who runs a Valet system for a mall, and I can find out about working a deal with him to put cards in the center console or something for the car's that come through the valet at his place.
 
Lol yeah the mall cops, such a big parking lot you can see them coming from a mile away.. By the time they caught on the parking lot was already done... Now I do direct mail, which is very pricey, to home owners whose house is valued at more than $700,000... That gets good response... But again its very pricey... I go to car shows, dealerships such as ferrari, bentley, bmw, cadillac etc and give them the run down of what I do, how I do it, why I do it, and when I do it... Now after those 20,000 business cards its just a matter of working the customers I Have and come across... My vinyl wrap on my van gets some good calls, meeting people in parking lots, neighboors of customers, coworkers of customers, family members... Like I say you have to be a sales person before you can be a detailer... Have the routine down on the phones, products, equipment, insurance, licensing, process, etc... Now after so many calls and the phone ringing a few times a day for the last oohhhhhh 2 years, I can sell sex toys to a nun... Advertising is nothing with out YOU being a good sales person!
 
jdoria... To answer your question the average customer with me spends $112, so im quessing thats around what my return was... Sorry it was a long time ago... 20 customers or so x $112= $2,240... That doesnt include any reoccuring purchases, or any other cars they had done at the time... Cost of cards $150/ 5,000= $600 for 20,000.... it was a pretty good ROI..... We handed them out every saturday for about 5 hours or so.... 2 of my little cousins, and I... They got paid in big macs and candy, plus a few bucks I wana say like $20 a day...
 
LoL. Nice work man! Doing the card/flyer type thing at parking lots is great. It is how i use to get a lot of business when i first started off but now it seems that that method does not work as well as it once did.



I'm currently trying to figure out some new ways of advertising ontop of the business card tagging car thing.
 
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