Losing Pounds & Gaining Profits: Why Weight Loss and Auto Shop Coaching Are the Same [E228]
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This is the aftermarket radio network. It's your weekly blitz with Chris keeping you in the game. Are you ready to supercharge your auto per business? This is Coach Chris Cotton from Auto Fix Auto Shop Coaching. The weekly blitz is where industry expertise and business innovation collide, revving your engines for the week ahead. Every episode
has game changing insights up to the minute industry updates and practical tips to shift your business into high gear. We're talking about stuff you didn't even know you didn't know, folks. This episode is brought to you by shop marketing pros, the experts and marketing for top-tier auto repair shops. If you're running a successful shop and want to take you to the next level, shop marketing pros is without a doubt your best option. From websites and SEO to social media and digital ads, shop marketing pros help shop owners just like you and me
fill our bays, grow our revenue and build the lives we've been looking for. If you're ready to take the guesswork out of your marketing, I want you to visit shopmarkeningpros.com forward slash Chris and get a free digital marketing inspection and start building the shop of your dreams today. Hey everybody, sometimes these episodes just hit me like lightning bolts. I think I was shaving when I first asked Siri to text me the notes for this one. We're calling it losing pounds and gaining profits, while weight loss and auto shop coaching are the same,
you know, I'm energized and honestly, I'm celebrating a big personal milestone this past weekend, Kimberly had her bird day and I had cake and was working out watching everything and managed to cross the 30 pounds loss threshold. So, 30 pounds and 60 days, I wasn't really planning to do it so fast, but that's the way it's been happening and let me tell you the journey of losing weight has opened my eyes to just how many similarities there are between
weight loss and auto shop coaching. Today, we're going to talk about what those parallels are, why they matter and how the lessons I've learned on my personal weight loss journey, connect directly with the lessons we teach shop owners every day, spoiler alert, in both cases, the magic isn't in the big flashy changes. It's in the ounces and the single percentage points. That's where the gains are made. People always want to know what does a win look like in weight loss, a lot of folks measure wins by big numbers.
Losing 10 pounds, dropping four pants sizes. I think that's all great, but the real wins, I think they come in the ounces, losing half a pound this week or even just holding steady while making better choices. The small, consistent wins add up to the big transformation, and it's exactly the same in auto shop coaching. Sure, it feels amazing when a shop doubles its revenue in a year, but the real wins, they come by increasing your average repair order by $20.
By bumping your closing percentage from 52% to 55%, and by adding just one tenth of a build labor hour per repair order, those sound small and they are small, but over time they snowball into massive financial change.
I'm going to take this one step further and compare it to football. Sure, the ADR touchdown pass is fun, but they're few and far between. The battles are won by getting first downs and moving down the field.
Here's the truth, wins aren't giant leaps, they're ounces and inches and they're small steps forward.
Let's talk about getting started. The thing that hit me like a bolt of lightning is in both weight loss and auto shop coaching, there's this phase where you feel like you're just spending money and energy and not seeing results yet.
When I started my weight loss program, I had to buy a new scale, I had to buy a scaled away food on, I did supplements, I bought weights, a weight bench, a stand up desk, a treadmill to put under the stand up desk, blood work, the Lisbon on and on, and it felt like I was investing in everything but results.
I did all that, ordered it before I even started anything. And this is the same for shop owners. When you come into coaching, we may recommend a new shop management system, a new website, updated marketing campaigns or tools for digital vehicle inspections.
At first, it feels like a huge burden and for some of you, it is. I know everybody's thinking, why am I buying all this stuff when I'm not even seeing any profits yet, like we haven't moved the needle.
But here's the mindset shift. These aren't expenses, their investments. You've got to lay the foundation before you can build results and just like buying weights doesn't automatically make you fit.
Buying a new DVI system doesn't automatically make your shop profitable. You've got to use them consistently and you've got to let the process guide you.
This is where trust comes in. When I signed up for my program, I had to trust that my coach knew what they were doing.
They've guided hundreds of people through this before me. They know the shortcuts. They know pitfalls. They know the milestones. All I had to do was follow the process even when it was uncomfortable.
It's exactly the same thing in auto shop coaching. You hire me or hire another coach because we've walked hundreds of shops through these changes before.
We know the roadblocks. We know the plateaus and we know how to get you past them. In both cases, the success comes when you swallow your pride, let go of the already know this on the best server was and you just trust the process.
You have to give in to get ahead. Have a great testimonial by Michael Gleene on the website. I'll never forget it. He said that I just decided to say yes to whatever you said and look where we're at now. It's been an amazing process.
If we're going to be real for a minute, both these journeys, weight loss and shop coaching, they have some hard truths with them. Plateaus happen in weight loss. You step on the scale one week and nothing's moved in your shop.
You'll hit a month where sales just don't budge. It doesn't mean you failed. It means the process is working under the service and adjustments are needed. Kimberly and I are getting ready to go to Oklahoma for a week.
And for whatever reason, I know when we drive to Oklahoma, I gain two to three pounds just by driving there. I'm not changing my eating anything else. I don't know if it's the humidity. My body just sucks up the moisture.
But I also know that the minute I drive home within two days, that three pounds will be gone again. I know and trust that the process is working under the service and things are going to happen.
The other biggest thing in both programs is accountability matters. If you've got a fitness coach, ghosting them will help you lose weight and an auto shop coaching. If you stop taking calls or avoid the meetings, nothing's going to improve, nothing's going to get better.
You cannot disappear. Please don't disappear. Stay accountable and stay being held accountable.
Consistency beats intensity crash diets don't work long term and neither does making one huge change in your shop and then abandon it. It's about showing up week after week, making the small adjustments that stack up into big change.
Also celebrate the non scale victories in weight loss sometimes the win isn't pounds lost it's better sleep which mine is it's more energy which mine is it's lower blood pressure which I haven't tested it.
One of the things I'll tell you now is I had not done any blood work in two years doctor just never made me go do it so I'm like okay must be fine.
I did my blood work for this in my a once he was like 8.9 I am officially a diabetic until I go back and that has changed in shop coaching sometimes the win isn't immediate profit it's happier employees lower stress or processes that finally run smoothly.
Here's going to be one of my favorites scales versus KPIs the scales don't law and neither do your numbers you may not like what they say but it's the truth.
N squared L numbers never law if you're brave enough to step on the scale or pull the KPIs from your shop management system though then you're brave enough to start changing them.
Let's bring this back a little bit being 30 pounds down didn't happen overnight it kind of feels like it but I've been working on it for 60 days so far.
I won't say there were days I wanted to quit but there were days like really why why am I doing this.
And there were days when I stepped on the scales and my weight went up but I trusted the process I stayed consistent and here I am I'm getting ready to knock out the next 30 pounds I'm not sure I think my fitness coaches kind of crazy sometimes where they have me going.
But right now quick math I'm just 17 pounds from the goal weight I had and I'm 17 pounds from weighing what I weigh on my driver's license let's put it that way I've just always left that weight on there and so I'm just 17 pounds from hitting that number.
You know these things are the exact same experience I've seen with my shop coaching clients they come in frustrated overwhelmed sometimes even skeptical and then we start with the ounces we track the KPIs.
We make little adjustments we celebrate the non dollar wins along the way and before they know at the big change in there for me this milestone is personal proof of what I've been teaching for years small consistent wins build massive lasting transfer
nation and I'm also here to tell you that just when you get it figured out something in the shop changes or you wake up in your damn coach has another ab routine for you to do like I did this morning I was getting pretty good at the old one and then he's like oh here we go.
You know here's my challenge for you this week identify your ounce sized wins if you're working on your health maybe it's cutting out one soda or walking in extra 10 minutes a day today tomorrow the rest of the week if you're working
on your shop maybe it's tracking a KPI you've been ignoring or making sure your team just does one more complete DVI each day doesn't have to be huge in fact it really shouldn't be huge the small wins add up.
And I'm going to leave you with this thought whether it's pounds or profits the process works if you work it trust your coach trust the process and most of all trust yourself.
I want to give another shout out to our sponsor shop marketing pros they're the only marketing company I recommend and they handle all the marketing for my own shops as well.
If you're serious about growth you need strategies that actually work better websites hire Google rankings and adds that bring real customers through your doors I want you to go visit shop marketing pros dot com forward slash Chris and partner with the team that understand your business
because every great shop deserves marketing that's just as great thanks for tuning in the weekly blitz remember it's time to rise grind and keep your minds that positive till next time this coach Chris cotton signing off have a great day everybody.
You've been listening to the weekly blitz with coach Chris cotton on the aftermarket radio network dot com follow Chris on your favorite podcast listening out let him know what you'd like him to cover his email is in the show notes Chris is all for advancing the after markets.
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