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The Digital Front Door For Auto Repair: SEO, Google, and Website Marketing [THA 471]
The Digital Front Door For Auto Repair: SEO, Google, and Website Marketing [THA 471]
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About this episode
Exploring the vital role of SEO and website marketing in the automotive repair industry, this episode features insights from shop owner Megan Dinov and marketing expert Dan Vance. They discuss how a well-optimized website serves as a digital front door, shaping customer perceptions before they even reach out. The conversation highlights the importance of showcasing a shop's unique character online, effective tracking of customer inquiries, and adapting to evolving digital trends. Listeners will gain practical advice on enhancing their online presence to attract and retain customers.
Topics:
diagnostic fee
Cars:
Toyota Prius
Thanks to our Partners, NAPA TRACS, Today's Class, KUKUI, and Pit Crew Loyalty
Watch Full Video Episode
Megan Dineff of Ervine’s Auto Repair and Grand Rapids Hybrid and EV joins marketing specialist Dan Vance of Shop Dog Marketing to explore the evolving relationship between websites and the future of search.
They explore why a website remains the digital “front door” of a business, where customers decide whether to call. From using real photos to build credibility, to protecting leads through better phone protocols, to preparing for AI-driven search, this episode delivers practical insights for modern shop owners.
Key takeaways:
Building Trust Through Authenticity: Megan explains why the shop's website avoids stock photos and instead highlights their real team. Showing familiar faces builds instant comfort and credibility. A great website should “ooze trust” and reflect the shop’s personality, so prospects feel like they’ve found their “forever home.”
The 70% Rule: Studies show that nearly 70% of callers have already decided to do business before picking up the phone. The group discusses how poor phone handling can “put water on the candles."
AI and the Return of Content: Dan explains why content matters more than ever in the age of AI. Search models now “race to your website” to gather information. Shops must create clear, helpful content, not just for people, but for the algorithms that determine future visibility.
The Power of Partnership: Megan shares a cautionary story about accidentally shutting down the shop's Google Business Profile and the importance of having a trusted expert to resolve “black box” marketing issues. The group agrees: owners should focus on culture and leadership while relying on skilled partners to navigate the digital landscape.
Megan Dineff, Ervine’s Auto Repair and Grand Rapids Hybrid and EV, Grand Rapids, MI
Dan Vance, Shop Dog Marketing.com
Thanks to our Partner, NAPA TRACS NAPA TRACS will move your shop into the SMS fast lane with onsite training and six days a week of support and local representation. Find NAPA TRACS on the Web at http://napatracs.com/ Thanks to our Partner, Today's Class Optimize training with Today's Class: In just 5 minutes daily, boost knowledge retention and improve team performance. Find Today's Class on the web at https://www.todaysclass.com/ Thanks to our Partner, KUKUI Stop juggling multiple marketing tools. KUKUI’s integrated platform delivers 4x better website conversions, automated follow-up, and real-time ROI tracking. Get industry-leading customer support with KUKUI at
Filter:
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Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Car
Toyota Prius
"...little gal with the Prius she's like I don't know what's wrong with my car he says we'll bring it by we'll look at it and she's like great I can bring it by right now..."
The Toyota Prius is a car that uses both a gasoline engine and an electric motor to save fuel and reduce emissions. It's well-known for being very efficient and is often chosen by people who want to be more environmentally friendly.
The Toyota Prius is a hybrid electric vehicle known for its fuel efficiency and eco-friendly design. It has been a popular choice for environmentally conscious drivers since its introduction in the late 1990s.
Term
diagnostic fee
"...by the way we have a diagnostic fee and it was like 200 bucks you could just hear her degrade she's like oh okay all right sounds good I'll bring it by..."
A diagnostic fee is what a mechanic charges to check out your car and figure out what’s wrong with it. It’s like paying for their time and knowledge to find the problem before fixing it.
A diagnostic fee is a charge that auto repair shops impose for evaluating a vehicle's issues. This fee covers the time and expertise needed to identify problems before any repairs are made.
Select text to request an explanation
This is the Automotive Repair podcast network.
Hey everybody, welcome.
Carm Capriotto, remarkable results radio in another town hall academy.
Good to have you here.
We're recording this at the beginning of the year and I do believe it's going to
come out, I think sometime in January, that would be great.
This is going to be an incredible episode.
I'll tell you all about it in a second.
We are going to TST down in New York city area, the TST seminar.org.
Saturday, March 28th in Tarleton, New York.
Andrew Fisher is going to be there.
Ken Zanders, Adam Roberts in the keynote from this woman that I know.
Her name is Tracy Capriotto.
That would be really kind of cool.
And don't forget about our great app that we have out.
Automotive Repair podcast network.com forward slash app.
It's the ultimate playlist.
You got to get it.
Apple or Google Play.
Hey, look, thank you so much to our great, great partners that are with us all the time.
Hey, for over 30 years, Napa Tracks has made selecting the right shop management
system easy by offering the best, most comprehensive SMS in the industry.
We'll prove to you that Tracks is the single best shop management system in the business.
Find Napa Tracks on the web at NAPATRACS.com.
Ready to optimize with today's class?
Boy, listen to an episode we did with David Boy's great program.
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Get industry leading customer support with Kukui.
That's kukui.com.
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Hey, welcome back, everyone.
If you're an automotive shop owner, you've probably heard this before.
You need better SEO.
You need to fix your Google.
Oh my God, that's a noun now.
Your website isn't doing its job.
Oh, and yet very few people explain what that actually means to anyone.
Meanwhile, your customers are searching, they're comparing
and they're deciding who to call before they ever talk to you.
Google has become your new front door, long before a customer
meets your team or sees your shop.
They've already formed an opinion based on your Google presence
and your website.
Now, the problem is most shop owners don't know what really matters
to ignore who to trust SEO feels like it's a black box.
And marketing promises don't always match the results.
But here's the promise when your Google presence and your website
are dialed in the right customers find you and the phone starts to ring
with better calls and your business stops chasing work.
Today, I'm joined by a successful shop owner and a marketing website
specialist to break this down.
No jargon, no hype, just real world clarity.
Let's get into it.
Welcome, Megan.
Dinov, how are you, Megan?
I'm wonderful.
Thank you so much.
Good to hear Irvine's auto repair and Grand Rapids hybrid and EV.
Listen, I've known you guys for a long time.
I think I interviewed you with Irvine's auto repair.
Then I interviewed you guys and you were Grand Rapids hybrids.
And now you've added EV and I love this evolution that's going on in your company.
It's pretty awesome.
In 20 years ago, I think you guys jumped on hybrids.
I mean, just anyway.
I know your mom and dad, they are crazy people, a lot of fun, but really good
and smart business people because you surround yourself with great partners
like Dan Vance.
Welcome.
Well, thank you.
Happy to be here.
What a great segue.
Yeah, no doubt.
CEO and the founder of advanced local marketing that grows businesses.
Shop dog marketing.
Wow.
Okay, let's jump into this thing.
Here's my first question and let's just have a blast in this open discussion.
And it could go to Dan or Megan.
Why is a website still the primary place?
A business can truly tell its story.
Remember that question?
Now, if you ever go and you should go to Irvines.com.
And when you go to that website, you fall in love with the family, with the people.
It reeks of no like and trust.
You can't get away every time you scroll up.
There's a new, absolutely fabulous, high quality, wonderful picture of the people
that you're going to do business with.
I don't know, Megan, Dan, who come up with that?
Megan.
Well, we put the pieces on there, but they came up with that.
I think being the photo guy at their place was probably the hardest job in the
world because they're all laughing and joking the whole time.
For sure.
We do have a good time together.
It's important to us that people know who we are.
So we don't use an answering service when someone calls and we have to put someone
into a queue.
They hear, I don't remember.
It's my voice or my mom's.
We want them to always get one of us, whether it's voicemail or they're
calling to make an appointment.
So we wanted the same thing on our website.
So one of my big things with Shop Dog is on everything on like our Google
business page, on our website, on Facebook posts, I don't want strangers.
I want all my people.
I am very stern about that.
I think it's worked out really well for us.
I have to tell you, when you look at the website and the pictures that come up,
not only show a fun level of camaraderie in the business, it shows.
Number one, when I saw it, I saw professionalism.
I saw this beautiful customer greeting area.
It's just fantastic.
You guys invested a lot of money in that.
And even if people don't wait around and look at how professional it looks,
you've got those impressions that the website brings you.
And so you're inviting people from the outside into your place on purpose.
And they're just looking at the web.
Dan, are we still using automotive repair near me as a search?
It's been a kind of like an interesting thing.
I've thought about this because it's kind of like when I was growing up,
nobody my age as a teenager wanted to wear those big old fat ties from the 60s.
You know, they were like this wide.
And we wanted the little skinny ties.
Now I look around and I see men wearing again those big fat ties.
And so stuff that was popular, unpopular, popular.
That's kind of the way the search engines work.
And but websites have always been constant.
They provide a data source for both search engines and consumers.
They're the best source for people to know about your business.
And they play a central role to this thing called the internet.
We want to always make sure that that's the one place that we put a lot of focus
and energy into.
I love what Dan just said, Megan, about how trends just come and go.
And I have to tell you, Dan, I was praying that the high-waisted pants would come back.
Why not?
And I kept saying to myself, it's got to happen.
It's got to happen.
Now, it took a few more years than I expected.
And of course, you remember the small glasses.
Mine are back to the size that I wore in the, I think, 70s and early 80s.
It is amazing how those trends happen.
But when I think about our business, Dan, it has moved so into high technology
that you can't do what you did even just five years ago on your website.
That is true.
And we saw this evolution of where everybody came to the website.
They wanted to read about you.
They wanted to read about break repair.
And then cell phones came out and we had this thing called Google Maps
and consumers didn't want to come to your website anymore.
And we're kind of in that place still, but that's changing too with AI.
So what I think really is happening is the website's been content.
It's been either the source for Google to be able to bring you up
in a Google Maps listing or it's been a source for people to go to you
to learn more about you.
There's definitely been some changes.
There's going to be more changes.
But I think the website's always going to be the one solid cornerpiece to your business.
Megan, are people calling you off of your website?
Do you have a call us button?
I do. Yep. Happens often.
When that phone rings, can you tell is it a separate phone number?
Are you learning where that incoming opportunity is coming from?
Yeah. So we have phone numbers that track where phone calls are coming from.
We have a phone number that is for Google.
We have one on our website.
I think when we did some mailers, those had another phone number that tracked.
So, yeah, we always know where people are coming from, but we also ask,
like, how did you find us?
Typically, it's Google.
Even if they were on our website, they'll tell us that they found us on Google.
But yeah, we can see where people come from.
Dan, how does a relationship between a shop owner and you work?
Who's the are you saying, oh, my God, any ideas of later?
I have an idea for you or there's trends happening.
Megan, are you an individual who just sits there and just the ideas pour out
and then you just bombard Dan with stuff and ideas and content?
Actually, I guess what I'm asking is, Dan, describe a really good relationship
between the webmaster.
I think my role in all of this is what I give is how the search engines work.
It really resonates with me and it just is really clear.
Like, I get them and I'm able to, I have this sense it's like an undercurrent.
Like, I just have a gut feeling like this is what it takes to be able to perform
in search engine.
And, you know, as good as our websites are, we still depend on search engines
because that's usually where people start first.
And so my role is to help the auto shop owner realize like we can do things
with your website to give you more visibility and search.
That's my role.
The role of the owner of the shop is to help me understand this is who we are.
This is our personality.
This is the character of our business.
These are the things that are important to us.
And then we can bring those two worlds together.
I can't do that for shops.
Otherwise, it would be very generic because, you know, we're essentially just
telling Google, hey, they do break repair and they're really good.
You know what I find so interesting is I know so many people in the industry.
I'm on everyone's website.
Whoever comes on our show and even the ones that have been on our show before
I go and see, hey, what are they doing?
And to see the uniquenesses that happen.
I mean, the challenge is, is, oh my God, I've just created a wonderful website
for Irvine's and how do I make Charlie's service different and unique?
That stress of creativity, Dan, has got to weigh on you.
But the reality is that we're all different.
Like we like different things.
Not everybody likes vanilla ice cream.
And so, you know, there's character in that too.
And not everybody has the same kind of personalities.
And that's really what we have to build into that homepage is that character
and that style or that level of sophistication or that like we're just
an easygoing shop and whatever those things are, that's the piece.
And it's the only place in the digital world that you can really
illustrate that in a place that most people will see.
I'm loving this conversation.
And we were only how many minutes in a dozen minutes in and there's so much to learn.
So if you're listening to this, I'm sure it's going to get even heavier
as we go down the line, but if and just take away this word character right now,
ask yourself as a shop owner who's listening, does my website have character?
Can it ooze who we are?
Can it engage an individual to look back at us and say, this could be my forever home?
I could be a loyal client of this company because they look professional.
They exude. I'm sorry.
I use this word professional, Dan, more and more and more.
Everything I'm doing and saying in the industry because I'm trying to move
people away from being marginal hobbyists that they don't know what they're doing.
And to say, if I'm earning my career in this industry,
I've got to be more professional, period, in everything.
You know why that's so important, at least from my perspective,
the reason that's so important is because it's a factor of trust.
And that's really the weakness in the industry is trust.
There's lots of reasons for that.
It's not a place here to debate what those are, but it's real.
It exists and we're learning a lot more about how to tell the story of like
how you can trust us through a digital experience.
I think shops have first they have to come to this reality like
what we do is sophisticated.
OK, I don't know what your education level is.
It doesn't matter what you're doing is highly sophisticated.
It takes tools, it takes experience, it takes ongoing training.
Your people should have titles that represent that level of sophistication.
They should feel really, really good about telling people, this is what I do.
This is how I serve the community in a weird way.
That's also like a marketing piece.
That's how you build your brand.
You kind of like build your brand all the way through.
This is an experience to see on our website, but it's also the experience
when you're in the shop with us, people feel really good about what they're doing
because they recognize we are professionals and that just oozes trust.
So powerful.
And that's one thing about love about the turbines.
You cannot avoid that sense whenever you interact with them.
Be in their shop, be around their people.
I'm sure that's consistent.
That's part of their culture 100 percent.
Hey, let's face it.
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You know, most shop owners feel trapped spending on ads while half their first
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Megan, percentage of new business that comes in from the website versus word of mouth.
I don't know, of course you're going to ask hard questions.
Wait a minute, you are so good on your feet, I have to tell you.
50%, I honestly don't know, I would ask Dan.
How about guests, what's your feel for that?
When we get new customers, they come from Google and the way Dan and I talk about Google,
they're all combined because I just take whatever Dan does and put it in a basket.
One of the things about me is I'm good at like a lot of things, okay?
But SEO and websites and tracking what the heck Google is doing today, that's Dan.
And I think part of running a successful shop is knowing when to put the right people in place
to help. And my parents did a great job with that when they met Dan.
And I'm very thankful he's a fantastic partner to work with.
But that's where our customers come from, Google and the website and online.
Makes a lot of sense, Dan, and Google and the website.
So let's walk through this for anyone who is not really getting the vibe of how Google and
the website and everything works together, auto repair near me, it comes up.
And if you're investing in Google and you're paying attention to it,
and maybe you're doing some Google ads, you're trying to get up top.
Are they just clicking on call how much?
Or are they actually then visiting the website, Dan?
We know that most people that are coming to you are starting with their cell phone and
they're going to do some kind of search. It'll be either the browser on their phone,
or they'll use an app like a Google app or an Apple Maps app.
And they're going to be looking for local businesses.
Those search engines have profiled your business in a way that helps people make decisions about
whether they're going to call you. It has pictures, it has your reviews,
it has other information in there that's helpful to them.
And they're shopping, they're researching, that's their research.
And it's all there and they can compare, people love to compare so they can compare your shop
with other shops. And they usually go with high performers, lots of reviews, been in business
for a while, really nice pictures, those are all influencers.
But if somebody doesn't know your brand and they're kind of shopping,
they are going to go to your website. From Google Maps, as an example,
Google will track that, it'll show you how many people leave Google's search engine to come to
your website. And when that happens, that's a good indication, those people don't know your brand
and they're on the edge of calling you, they just need a little bit more of a sense of like,
this is the right place to call. I just saw a study about this, I'm just going to put it out
there because I think this is just validates like how important all of these pieces are together.
And that is the set. Somebody took 100 cell phones and they put in a shop's address
into it and they put all the phones in their car and they drove to the shop.
Now, nobody's going to do this except somebody that just doesn't have any time and is just curious
about what happens. And the very next day, that shop ranked number one for auto repair near me.
And so the feedback is that Google is watching how many people go from search engine to your
website because that's a high level of engagement and likely to become a customer.
It's really, really important to know like they're coming to you on a mobile phone,
they're going to do different search platforms and if they come to your website
and you see those numbers month by month by month consistently improving then you know,
hey, we're on to something here. We're getting more and more leads every single month
and Google is ranking us better because they are coming from searching into our website.
Is that crazy? No, it's scary. It's not crazy. It's scary. It's scary first. It's crazy second.
My wife and I can have a casual conversation at dinner and then all of a sudden you're scrolling
and something comes up that we discussed. I don't know how that works,
but it goes back to the big brother theory. You know, that's too much for right now.
It is. Oh, all right. This idea of privacy has been gone for a long time, I think. Oh,
jeez, I know. Dan, you had sent me a talking point. Studies indicate that 70% of all callers
to local businesses have already decided on doing business with whom they call. Do our service
advisors, our owners, this person wants us and so let's do everything that we can not to let
something get in the way, right, Megan? Absolutely. Yeah, that's why we have ongoing training in our
shop for service advisors, for our customer service scale. I still have training because we
want to make sure that everything that Irvine says and does matches. So from Google, the website,
when they call, they are getting the same people, the same experience that we are putting out there
so that customers feel comfortable when they get to us and they know what to expect. So a calm
environment when they see the pictures of our website, they get someone competent on the phone,
a smiling face and a cup of coffee, and then when they get to the service advisor,
someone else who knows what they're talking about and gets all the pictures with their
work order and when they pick up their car, it's clean, it's a calm experience. So from start to
finish, we are showing people that we are just consistent and we are the people that can take
care of them best. It's all about having a good process in place that's consistent. It's like
any other kind of like thing that you want to do. When those are solid, then you have better
performance. But the other thing about that calm is think about when I talk to most shops,
most of them tell me that their conversion rate for new customers is, they'll say 45, 50%, some
will say 60%, but 70% represents a thousand people than the shops telling you they only converted
500 of them. That means people that were ready to do business with you, half of them got chased away.
That's the world that I live in. And I don't understand necessarily what those elements are
except process and systems that the shops using that devaluate any kind of trust that's been
built up to the phone call. I like their shop and they've got great reviews and they're close to me
and I want to go to them. So that's the essence of that phone call and then for some reason it
breaks down and I think that's a big part of it is because the processes internally are chasing
people away. Hey Dan, I want to throw something at you. That's a real wild thought. I'm going to go
left here for a quick moment. I wrote a blog yesterday in my email, my weekly email, to change
from the word processes to protocol. So think about this. What's our protocol on not losing
customers, not what our process is because I think process is laboring. It's got all these steps to
it and the protocol would be almost hovering over all of these different processes but we have
protocols engaging. We have protocols on bringing clients in and we have protocols when the client
calls. Yeah, we have a process and it hit me so hard and I looked up the definition of protocol,
how it's considered in the government and how it so closely integrates with the word process and
again I've been in this big language shift and my mind is how do we get people to rethink the
critically important things that have to happen in our industry. Moving on, if we could do a survey
at our counters, if 70% are ready and we don't convert 70% then we need to do a survey as to
why we didn't and was it the how much problem that we had in convincing an individual that maybe
we just can't give you that price on the phone. We really need to see the vehicle because if they
have that confidence and you choose to let it go then you need to fix it internally. I know that
goes back to a further education. It may not necessarily be what Dan can do for you but if
Dan's delivering 70 and your website, your professionalism, your image in the industry,
how you rank, you can't let what your website and social media and Google's doing for you,
you cannot waste that money. Right, well and it's not cheap let's be honest and I mean marketing
is not cheap period but we have to spend somewhere and I think that's what's been great for us with
Dan in our relationship is he really knows us, he knows our processes, he knows our protocol
and he knows how we treat people and how we want to be portrayed and so that comes out very clearly
in all of the marketing that his team does for us. They jumped on board with us and ran with it
which is fantastic. I love that word protocol because it's easier to wrap your mind around
like how do I really build this functioning thing and where do I fix things along the way?
You know things that happened to like I had a shop owner he called me and he basically said
we're not getting phone calls so he and I listened to phone calls they are getting.
Little gal with the Prius she's like I don't know what's wrong with my car he says we'll bring
it by we'll look at it and she's like great I can bring it by right now and then he added
by the way we have a diagnostic fee and it was like 200 bucks you could just hear her degrade
she's like oh okay all right sounds good I'll bring it by and the phone call was over
and I said to the shop owner I says what happened there and he says that's part of their compensation
so I said well you're getting a really good phone call that was a week that person was going to
drive their car over in the next five minutes but you lost them with that and so you have to
decide how important is our protocol and business about how we compensate and how we take care of
our shop people with the balancing of like how do we get customers in and that was all trust
isn't that true the whole undercurrent of that was trust he was earning her trust enough she's
like I'm bringing my car by right now and then he lost it in a moment he put water on the candles
he just put it out and the owner blamed it on the fact that part of their compensation program
was to sell this he essentially said part of the compensation of our people is based on whether
they get diagnostics done so that's an internal thing I don't care if they do that okay yeah
it shouldn't be part of an introductory meeting with a client you have a chance once they come in
to say hey by the way we're going to send this into bay four to our technology specialist
it's going to be a couple hundred bucks yeah get them there or the other thing is like hey we popped
the hood we're going to have to put some tools on this to really know what's going on and there's
a little bit to that right so it's just helping them along the way you're standing side by side
that's trust factor versus oh and by the way bring your wallet because it's 200 bucks before
we even get started Dan I got to stop you for a moment tools on this this is another great takeaway
to have an individual be explained not over the phone I think that's the wrong time but once they
come in and you recognize that you know the wheels like this you know it's 90 degrees in the car
there's so many things wrong this is we're going to have to get not only eyes on this but tools on
this I think it's a fabulous phrase I tell that story all the time and the reason I love that story
is because it illustrates she was ready to go somewhere she was just looking for some validation
that said they've got my back they're going to help me find out what's going on with my little
friends and she was looking for who's got my back not my wallet yes exactly but I think we can learn
a lot from that Megan is AI factoring in what you and Dan are doing together and are you paying
attention to it well I mean I asked you at GPT all the time about the best shops around it knows me
well enough to tell me that Irvine's is fantastic watch it a buy the premium version yes well I
already have it it already knows me but you know I asked Dan like what do I need to do on here and
that's he doesn't even explain it all to me which I think is lovely that's probably not a great idea
for everybody we've been working with Dan for a long time so when we started off it was just SEO
and then Google and then our website so like we have evolved this relationship over five or so years
so we have a lot of trust and I'm like Dan just do it figure it out so as far as AI goes we have
not had people say like I looked it up on chat GPT and I think this is what's wrong with my car
there are people finding us using AI so Dan has given me some hints about like where we need to
make sure that we're you know responding to reviews and making blog posts and other things so that the
AI computer things that use all the water in the world are pulling information from so we have been
working on that but as far as like dealing with them with customers and diagnosing their own cars
thankfully we haven't really dealt with that yet most of our customers are just like take my car and
and deal with it please kind of like me and Dan you know that's a very very smart I love so many
things you said but I let Dan do his thing and my clients let me do my thing and with that confidence
that you have in your partners and your clients that are going to become loyal if you will clients or
slash not necessarily partners but you're looking to build that they want to trust in you and you've
got the trust in Dan I mean that's how business should be done period no one's an expert in anything
that's why we have people helping us well and I got myself in the shop into some really hot water
a few years ago like I'm surprised I didn't get fired well mom and dad were sitting in the corner
wondering who was going to fire you and they couldn't make the decision I do work with my parents
that we have a really great relationship but I changed the name on Google to Irvine's auto repair
and Grand Rapids I did something with our name on Google and they shut down our entire account
like they just shut it off and I called Dan freaking out and it took about a month I think but
when all of your customers come from the internet and you all of a sudden don't have a Google page
you could see the dip I mean if Dan pulled it up it was October
no maybe 2021 or 2022 like you could see a dip in our business and it came directly from the
fact that I had Google turned off and thankfully Dan has people and he has contacts and it came
back and nothing was deleted my mom has been building our Google presence since very early 2000s
it has been great to have a partner that it has other contacts that can say hey um
she just tried to change the name and it wasn't a good idea Dan's now like don't change the name
don't do anything so I don't touch the Google anymore which is fair I am grounded from the
Google and I did not get fired but he is the expert on things and he has ideas and plans and
yes it's fantastic yeah we all have those kind of crazy experiences that's for sure but AI is
going to play a bigger bigger role in how people shop and research because it's so easy and AI is
a great place it'll do all the work for you and it just pulls mammoth amount of data and then
it personalizes it around you because it becomes more and more aware of like who you are and what
you like it'll know like you're driving a Ford truck and it'll have recommendations based on that
and the crazy thing is when I see like in a model like Chad GBT it will recommend one or two shops
mind you no reviews it'll just say these two shops are recognized as the best two shops that
service Ford pickups or whatever it is you're looking at and I believe that's really where
it's going like it's going to become more and more like that it's going to have high influence over
people then they call then we're talking about a different story so the strategies between AI and
Google search are going to be different Dan and AI is going to look at a different level of content
or web presence or reviews or stars versus Google's almost it's almost like Google has
been around so long it's like this you know got these bookends here and but but Google does change
their stuff occasionally right just to make it interesting they probably change two or three
times every single day that's definitely happening but this idea of the retro like the old ties and
the new ties and it's all coming back you know content used to be really important on your website
because people went to your website and read it but today they don't do that and they're still not
doing that they're not going to do that in the future but they will use AI and AI will race to
your website and read it and it's looking for information to bring back to that highly personalized
highly influential situation where they're going to influence people related to auto repair so
content is more important than ever on your website and as we learn more about how AI is
functioning we're changing content strategy to help our clients rank better in AI because we
understand better what AI is looking for to help their customer which is that user doing prompts
so what was out the door is now back and it's a biggest play in you know our modern day-to-day
and like right now really solid content that establishes trust and transparency that's on
your website not because people will come to your website and read it but because AI will grab it
and put it on a silver platter and serve it up to somebody that you don't know and that's all they
need for them to call and they're going to call you that's this new place we're going.
We were at Apex Dan Vance from Shop Dog Marketing and we did an episode together
and I want to tell everyone it's been released it's episode 1071 Remarkable Results the title
of it you're going to love this when customers ask artificial intelligence first what shop owners
need to know I had a blast listening to you in the studio and it's a great episode I think this
lived for a long time to have people understand where AI now fits and then Dan what's next after
that well I don't know but it's going to be fun I know that and we'll adapt we'll make changes
and we still have we have you know from the level of the shop owner you know the things that you're
doing are still as important as ever like you still have to fix those cars you have to use the
right parts remember that you're not in the auto repair business you're in the people business
you got to learn how to love on people and help them and they don't always have great days and
but you've got to be the one that's solid and as long as I think shops kind of can stay focused on
that they're going to be fine with whatever the changes are having the right people around you
to help you navigate the stuff that you can't I have learned so much I think we had a blast
kind of conceptualizing all of this stuff and Dan I know you've got this thing knocked down
I mean this is you you live it every day and you know having a client like Megan who's you know
willing to just walk down that aisle with you except she may make a mistake or three one
one big one one really really big one I was thinking about getting fired thing but if
as long as I didn't disown you I guess you could have gotten fired yeah it's fine I've got enough
friends in the industry now I think I could find something else it wouldn't be nearly as fun but
you know I think it'll be okay I hope something to do is there any final word that you would
love to bring up I think with all marketing if we look at it very broadly it's going to keep
changing it will always change we found something that works for us and we know the things that
don't for us physical mailers do not work not for new customers not for people who have been here and
then like 90 days nine months out those do not work for us our customers find us online
so knowing what works and the best way to get to them is online and having someone in our corner
that can help us do that the right way is absolutely key for us so I am so thankful that my parents
met Dan and started the relationship so that you know we could move into the future and
keep people coming to us in a world that is changing constantly that I can't keep up with
it's a full-time job to keep up with what's happening in marketing so great point Megan
so everyone we were waiting for Dan to give us his final words but it's been 10 years I've been
doing this and this may be only the second time that one of my guests lost power but we sat down
and said how could we get Dan back on to have his last words and we've got him on the phone Dan
your last word oh thank you I know how to make an exit how about that yeah for sure I hope people
are encouraged and excited about what they have heard today because it's a good balance between
the relationship you should have with your agency and kind of where the marketplace is going that
the internet still is important as ever regardless of what you hear people talking about and it's
going to influence that your business you have to stay consistent on that I love talking to people
I'd love to meet you please always feel free to reach out to me I'm easy to get a hold of just
look at our website but just from my standpoint is that hopefully this has been a great experience
for you and that you're encouraged rather than discouraged there's great days ahead even better
than we've had I really really do believe that that's a great wrap up Dan thank you so much Dan
Vance CEO founder of advanced local marketing that grows businesses at shop dog marketing
Megan Dinoff Irvine's auto repair and Grand Rapids hybrids and EV Irvines.com
fun parents you guys got a great business Dan thanks for being here and we'll see you next time
thanks for being on board to listen and learn from the premier automotive repair business podcast
remarkable results radio get your episodic education on the ARPN listening app at automotive
repair podcast network.com also enjoy the podcast on our Carm Capriato youtube channel
Carm is all for advancing the professional automotive service industry until next time
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