In a world wide competition sponsored by Infusionsoft software. I won the Ultimate Marketer award in Arizona last week, March 14th. It was without a doubt one of the highlights of my business career. The passion and excitement I experienced at that conference brought my energy to entirely new levels, and I think that contributed to my win.

Infusionsoft is truly a unique company, everyone I met conveyed a passion that they really have a mission to help the small business entrepreneur. I’m proud to be a part of that community.

I’m honored to be ‘The Ultimate Marketer 2010′ and look forward to next years competition.

When I’m working with clients, I often hear the comment ‘ I don’t have time to get all this done! ‘

Well I’m here to tell you that with a little bit of ingenuity and work, you can use computer systems to automate many of the mundane tasks that take up our valuable time and resources during a busy work week.

I’m constantly looking for ways to minimize the ‘tedious’ work I have to do and putting instead automated systems in place to handle the tasks.

Let me give you an example. Every month as part of our marketing efforts, we send a three step letter series to people who recently moved into my business area.

We buy the list from a list broker company, and they e-mail us the list each month. We as a manual process, someone (probably me) would have to get the e-mail, save the attachment, upload the names into our marketing software and then queue the letters up to be sent.

Instead I hired a developer to write me a small script that checks for the e-mail from the list broker house, and when it finds it, it automatically downloads the attachment, and then uploads all the names it contains into our marketing database. At the same time it tags these new contacts as prospects, and starts them on the 3 step mailing sequence – all automatically.

Now this mundane task requires no effort what so ever to get done, and another important marketing system is working for my business WITHOUT my involvement.

That’s the power of automation, and I love it!

Use it in your business – and set yourself free.

- Bob Britton

You can easily compare it to your Auto Repair store front. What are the things that you do, day in and day out, to get people to come into your Auto Repair Shop?

It’s likely that you do some advertising, Penny saver or yellow pages, maybe even flyers. You’ll get some “walk-in” traffic, some repeat clients who have re-booked, you might even do some service reminder postcards, maybe even direct mail to your client list.

Now let’s take this ONLINE and list things you should do to get website “traffic” or visitors to your website.

1. Advertising – we might do some PPC (pay-per-click) and run some ads on ad networks like Google Adwords.

2. “Walk-in” traffic – that would be people who found you in the search engines. This is FREE traffic (no cost) that results from good search engine rankings based on keywords eg. “Auto Repair, Rochester NY”. (FREE traffic is the holy grail of the internet)

3. Direct mail – When we’re talking on-line this referrers to email marketing direct to your email list (check out this great resource for profitable Auto Repair Email Marketing)

So using direct response marketing ONLINE is pretty much the same as OFFLINE Repair Shop Marketing.

So why is that too many Auto Repair Shop Owners spend very little time and effort marketing their business website?

I know the answer to that! It’s because many Auto Shop Owners(or any small business owners for that matter) do not understand how to market their Auto Repair Shop period. They simply have no idea where to start!

That’s why I called this article “Increase Auto Repair Website Traffic – Part 1″. Because there are many parts, different strategies, to getting more traffic to your website. Like an old wagon wheel, you need lots of spokes in the wheel to make it work well, and marketing your shop either on-line or off-line takes the same effort (lots of spokes).

Here’s the exciting part! Marketing your shop online, is a whole lot cheaper and the results are lightning quick when you do it ONLINE… the right way!

So right now, I’m going to talk a little about PPC (pay-per-click) strategies… in particular Google Adwords.

If I said to you, that you could DOUBLE the TRAFFIC to your Auto Repair website in 30 minutes or less… would YOU believe me!

I bet you don’t, but stay with me here.

Remember that I told you I had been doing some research on how to get more traffic to your Auto Repair website?  The fact is, I discovered this great resource that explained to me how to use Google Adwords.

Put simply, Google Adwords is a system that allows you to create an Ad, and have that ad appear in front of people who are specifically searching for your services, and you only pay for the Ad when somebody clicks on it and comes to your website. The amount you pay for the “click thru” can vary from as little as a few cents to a dollar or two.

A word of caution though… ( I see this mistake over and over again) make sure your shop’s website is ready for these people to visit, in that when they come to your website page you give them a reason to contact you. If your website is not ready then your visitor will just click somewhere else and you would have paid money for nothing. (Ouch!!) I’ve seen people literally waste thousands of dollars driving people to a website that isn’t designed correctly and won’t sell anyone on their services, what a waste!

Additionally, don’t fall victim to the advertising people that ‘will get you traffic’ for a ‘small monthly fee’. I’m going to write an article about that soon… Let me suffice to say now, don’t spend a dime with them unless you know exactly what you’re doing!

Back to the topic at hand, having a great website is like having a stellar receptionist answer the telephone and get the sale. Your website must be ready to make the sale! If you feel like your website needs a makeover then send me an email and we can make a time to discuss your needs.

Here’s what Google Adwords can do for your Auto Repair shop. It can drive a ton of traffic to your website in a very short span of time. You can create the ad, determine your budget (how much you’re prepared to spend) and your ad can be up and running just a few minutes.

But like anything… you need to have an idea how this stuff works, or you’ll be foolishly wasting money, did you ever notice throwing money at a problem rarely solves it? It’s the right knowledge that solves the problem.

The great resource I found is here “How You Can Overcome The Google Adwords Learning Curve”. If you click on that link you can get a FREE 5 Day course delivered direct to your email inbox.

If I were you, I’d go and grab it NOW… and start getting more TARGETED Traffic to your Auto Shop website. This is where I started, and it’s simply the best resource anywhere, bar none.

I’ll be posting  part 2 of getting more traffic soon.

I call these “hidden” profits… very much the “diamonds in the backyard“.

Why? Let me explain. All too often Auto Repair Shop Owners spend all their efforts and money in marketing strategies to attract a NEW client. They rarely spend the time or money “mining” in their own backyard!

You see, more profits will be made from your EXISTING clients or prospects than what can be made from NEW clients. And marketing to your existing clients or prospects, that is… your list, is untold more cheaper and far more effective.

And that’s true if your marketing online or “offline”!

Now let’s focus here on your online marketing… because that’s what I love talking about!

For the most part, email marketing is FREE! You have a list of clients and prospects on your database and to email them costs you no money. OK, there may be a cost in your internet connections, your autoresponder service, but you’re likely paying for that anyway.

Compare that to a mailout… you have to pay for the printing, the envelope and the postage.

Now imagine this… you come into your Auto Repair or Spa on a Monday and check out the bookings for the week. Business looks a little light on… the staff are wandering around trying to make themselves look busy… they’re going to get paid anyway… rather you have them busy making YOU money!

You sit yourself down, and create a special package offer, something like $290 worth of Auto Repair or Auto Repair Shop services for a special price of $127. It’s for this week only, at that price you only offer 17 packages. You write that out and then fire up your email service that can broadcast that special offer out to your list of past clients and prospects. You hit the send button on your computer and then go and get yourself a cup of coffee.

5 minutes later you are enjoying the coffee and the telephone starts to ring. Not just once but a steady stream. You’re front desk receptionist is starting to get a little busy so you put another staff member on the telephones to help her out. The people who are ringing are clients who want to book in for the special offer they just received in their email inbox. They were thinking about doing something special this week and then your email promoting your special offer prompted them to give you a call. Hey… they’re SAVING money coming in to pay you $127.

Pretty soon the 17 packages have been sold and the clients are all booked in… in fact, you’ve actually sold 25 packages… That’s not bad, let’s not tell anyone we actually sold a few more than what we said we would. Your staff are now busy for the week and you’ve just generated (25 @ $127) $3,175 from one email.

Not bad for a few minutes work!

What I’ve just described to you is not fantasy. There are a very small number of Auto Repairs and Spas who are doing this time and time again, continually profiting from the power of Auto Repair Email Marketing. In fact, one Spa owner I know credits in excess of 10’s of Thousands of Dollars in profits to simple email marketing.

Now… why do you think there are very few Auto Repairs or Spas using this strategy? Here’s my take on it. Very few understand or know how to do it!

That’s why I’ve created a brand new product called “Email Marketing For Auto Repairs & Spas – Email Success Strategies To Explode Your Auto Repair and Spa Profits”. I recommend you check out this great resource now. It’s not expensive, just $67 USD. PLUS, there are some great bonuses, worth far more than the entire cost of the product. Just click here to discover more information.

To your Auto Repair Marketing Success

Now, before I get into that strategy let’s just go back a little and touch on something I’ve talked about before.

What’s the main purpose of communicating with your clients? To me, it’s about building the relationship part of your business with your client base. It’s a well known fact… the better the relationship, the easier it is to sell… and the more profits for your business.

And when you get it right, you don’t actually have to try to sell!

Let me explain. When you work on building a relationship with your clients, you create trust in what you say… your clients will listen to your advice and buy on your recommendation.

When you say buy this product because you believe it to be the best, they will! And when you explain that the value in this service is far more than how much it’s going to cost them, your client will buy!

All you need to do is continue to communicate with your clients. And what’s the best way to do that… through your website.

I’m not talking about the traditional style of website. You know, the glossy, static type of website where the content stays the same for months, possibly even years. I’m talking about the Web 2.0 style of Auto Repair website, where the content is updated regularly, maybe even daily… through the use of a Blog!

Can your website do that? Allow you to regularly update it through a Blog that can automatically get sent out to your client list?

Very few Auto Repair websites can! Those who have a Auto Repair Success Website solution can.

Now, let’s get back to the “Customer of The Day” strategy.

Imagine this. Each day you select someone as your “Customer of The Day”. You take their photo, you describe who they are, where their from and the type of treatment / service they get in your Auto Repair each time they visit. Now get this right! Of course you tell them that their photo is going on your website for a week or so and you’re going to have it up there for all your clients to see.

Some may not want you to do that… many will! Respect that, and only do those that approve of you doing it.

Does it have to be each day? I would… but you may want to do it each week. As long as it’s regular and consistent.

How powerful a tool is that? It’s a great strategy. It builds a relationship with your client base. They enjoy reading and seeing that stuff. And it’s very easy content to create.

And I bet that the first Auto Repairs to start using this strategy will get a great response form their client base. Plus you will continue to get great traffic coming to your website each day to see who the “Customer of The Day” is. And this traffic will be exposed to your offers displayed on your website.

I got the idea for this strategy from an email I received today from another marketer. OK, it’s not original… but many great marketing strategies aren’t. Figure out what’s working somewhere else and apply it to your business today.

And that’s how easy it is to apply a proven marketing strategy to your Auto Repair website.

Go do it now… and let me know how it goes.

Fact is though… many of you just don’t get it! Maybe you think it’s too difficult. Or maybe you’re just too busy being a hairdresser or a beauty therapist along with the other “time sucking” challenges of being a Auto Repair Owner.

So first up, let me tell you what you’re missing out on by not setting up your own Auto Repair Blog.

The more you “talk” to your clients the better the relationship you will have and the more money you will make. It’s true… those Auto Repairs that continue to communicate with their clients will make more money!

So, what can you talk about.

Well… I just spent 10 minutes searching the internet and and I found a hairdresser in Washington USA who that has set up a Blog, separate from their Auto Repair website (which by the way is pretty ordinary).

What has she got on this blog? One of the things is that she has a weekly article that shows “Last Week’s Interesting Hair”. She puts up a before and after photo, straight from her digital camera (so there’s no special photography) of how her Auto Repair has transformed someone’s “bad hair” into a great looking healthy, modern hair style.

It might highlight colour, a particular cut or how they fixed badly damaged hair.

So they post the article and photo’s to the Auto Repair blog and invite people to comment. Many people actually leave comments, it creates discussion, and I bet that it gets people into the Auto Repair to have the same thing done to their hair.

A perfect strategy! Create some interest, communicate with their clients and make money for the Auto Repair with more business.

Also on the blog are articles like “What happened to formal hair?”, “Hair colour trends”, “Hair Straightener Test”, “So You Want To Be A Hair Model”… all items of interest that attract a lot of discussion on the Auto Repair blog.

This is a pretty basic looking blog, regularly updated by the Auto Repair owner.

Now you do need to have a little bit of skill to set this sort of thing up… but it can be quickly learned, can be inexpensive if you do it yourself, and can be simply started and maintained.

Here’s where the power of the internet comes in!

Just because it’s a blog and setup with blog software, the articles and content are quickly spread around the internet without you really having to do that much.

In fact, I found this website using a “social media search engine” called WhosTalkin. I simply went and did a keyword search on that website and found a lot of website discussion about Auto Repairs. The search engine scans the internet and finds blog articles about that particular topic.

That’s not something that can be done by an old outdated “static website” that many Auto Repairs have. You must have a website using blogging software, much the Auto Repair Success Website solution.

I plan to continue this topic in future articles so stay tuned. My goal is to have Auto Repair Shop Owners well informed on how to use the Internet for increased Auto Repair profits.

I just love Google… has all the answers… well, to most things anyway!

I came across this article from Gary Bourgeault at the thealphamarketer.com titled “10 Great Strategic Benefits of Blogging“. It had some great points so let me go through them and explain them from a Auto Repair owners perspective.

1. Search Engine Marketing

Blogs give you an increased presence on major search engines, like Yahoo! and Google. It’s surprising to me that many Auto Repair websites aren’t “optimized” for search engines in their particular market. Let’s say you have a beauty Auto Repair in the suburb of South Yarra, Melbourne.

If I go to Google and type in “Beauty Auto Repair South Yarra” will I find your website? I’m finding many Auto Repair websites are not appearing in the search engine at all.

Here’s where the power of blogging comes in. Just yesterday I published a blog post “10 Quick Tips for Auto Repair Website Success“. Within 24 hours that article was ranked number 1 in Google for the search term “Auto Repair website tips“. And that was out of 307,000 competing website pages that included those search words.

2. Direct Communications

Blogs allow you to speak directly, openly and honestly with your client. That’s a great point! Many Auto Repair websites I look at are what I call “library” websites with each page full of technical stuff about their service. They rarely promote offers, or interesting information.

Blog posts (blogging articles) are ideal for that purpose.

3. Brand Building

The more information and content you provide will build your brand in your marketplace. Your client wants to know what you know! The more you directly communicate with them the more your Auto Repair will stay in their mind.

4. Competitive Differentiation

I could just about guarantee… your competition is not using blogging as a marketing tool. Learn about it and start now and you will be dominating your market ONLINE very quickly.

5. Relational Marketing

Blogging allows you to build a personal, long lasting relationship, online, with your clients. And that leads to more money in your cash register!

6. Exploit the Niches

Most Auto Repairs provide a wide range of services and products… each one a different, unique, niche. Let’s say you start a new service eg. paramedical skin treatments. Write a keyword rich blog article, outline the benefits and I bet you will have a search engine presence within that niche within 48 hours. You might even rank number 1.

7. Media and Public Relations

Use your blog to create great content and you will soon become an authority in that niche. Who knows… the media may contact you!

8. Position You as An Expert

You got that right! You will be the ONLINE authority articulating your views and opinions and become the source of knowledge in your niche.

9. Reputation Management

You will be building a reputation online for informative discussion within your niche.

10. Low Cost

Great point… blogs are inexpensive to setup, operate and maintain.

11. It’s Easy to Blog

I know I said there were 10 points, but I always want to provide you with a little added value! You don’t need to be a computer geek to start blogging. The learning curve is small and you could do it all yourself without having to get a web firm to do it for you. Simply log on, write an article and Publish it… DONE!

All the best for 2009.

Goals are great… looking at your market, seeing where it’s going, how you need to adapt will keep you ahead of your competition.

And what about your Auto Repair website? Is it time to give it a bit of a tidy up, maybe even a total Auto Repair website makeover?

Let me give you a heads up on what you should be thinking about… what you should be doing with your website!

It’s all about Content! Great content will put money into your bank account!

Auto Repair website content that sellsContent is the currency of the internet. Your web page is simply storage Auto Repair Shopce for your content – audio, video, text, images. People visit your website to consume the content you’ve placed there. And more often than not, she who has the most content wins; it simply gives your internet visitor more chances to interact with you.

That’s a simple concept. But why is it so hard to execute?

There are a few reasons for this… most of all I see a real fancy looking Auto Repair website that cost a small fortune to create that stays exactly the same for years and years. With no new content being added!

Having provided individual, one on one coaching (no longer available) to many Auto Repair owners on how to grow their business, I have a fair idea on what holds you back from creating content.

1. you have no idea how to do it nor does your website have the ability for a complete internet novice (as most Auto Repair owners are) to add content, or
2. it’s fear.

Fear of looking dumb in front of the HUGE audience that is the web.

I get it. I’ve been there.

As a business owner myself, I had the same basic looking website for years. I had no idea how to change anything, when I tried to do it everything broke and then it cost me a fortune to get it fixed!

But then… well… I got over myself.

And within a few short months I turned that website into a money making machine! It started to generate about 20% of my total revenue and it worked for me 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Creating content – and selling it – can be scary. It’s putting a bit of you out there for people to judge. So if you feel like your writing, your videos, your audios aren’t “good enough” you absolutely need to know that you are not alone with that fear!

So to start creating content, here’s a few ideas… and I rarely see Auto Repair owners doing this stuff, so here’s how you could blow your competition out of the water.

1. Have a new product or service? Then write a short article about the benefits of it, put it on your website, make an offer to your web visitors and tell them what they have to do to take advantage of it!
2. Get some video testimonials from happy clients, put it up on YouTube and then feed it into your website.
3. Have a new promotion… Again, write a short article and put it on your website.
4. Interview some of your clients about why they have certain treatments and what they like about it. Record it on a small digital voice recorder and then upload the MP3 recording to your website.

How often should you be adding content? Once a week would be great, once a month will probably be OK. Are the tips above difficult to do… maybe for you, right now, it could be challenging… but it’s easy to learn and apply!

And get away from creating the “library” style of website. That’s the one where you create a page for all of your services and it’s full of technical “rubbish”, mostly all about YOU!

Create content that is benefit driven, is not about you but directed at your clients, and tell the web visitor what they have to do next. You’ll benefit from increased sales, improved search engine rankings and you’ll be way ahead of your competition.

It’s Web Content That Sells… the type of content that will put money into your cash register!

And it made me stop what I was doing and write this!

She was really having a problem with the way her website looked after the makeover… in fact she tells me she would rather “have it looking more appropriate for a Auto Repair!”

Auto Repair Website SuccessNow… don’t be offended by what I’m about to say. I value this client dearly but there is a very important lesson here and it’s worth sharing.

I reckon that’s her EGO talking… and maybe even her friends, family and staff… telling her that her website is not very pretty… and besides, in their minds, hers’ is a very upmarket Auto Repair and the website should show that!

That pretty well tells me that her EGO is getting in the way of making her RICH!

But that’s OK… many Auto Repair Shop Owners think the same thing when they start out being introduced to this type of marketing on their website…. It’s called Direct Response Marketing.

And many take a while to work out what really is the main goal of their Auto Repair Website

But consider what has happened in the very short time of her Auto Repair website makeover. To me, this is the ULTIMATE SUCCESS!… and worth far more money in the bank than her EGO!

I went and counted that in the last 7 days, she has had over 30 people respond to an offer and in doing so they have provided her with their name, address and telephone contact details. And not only that, but she has not paid one cent for this website traffic… they all found her website through an internet search engine!

Let’s say that 5 of those people visit her Auto Repair as a result of downloading this offer from her website. And on average, they each spend $1,000 over the next 12 months using the services of her Auto Repair. That’s $5,000 worth of business that cost nothing in advertising to gain.

That’s not bad… what about if her Auto Repair marketing was that good that 10 of the 30 spent $1,000 over the next 12 months? That would be even better.

And what would happen if that happened each and every week! Let’s just say that it happened for 40 weeks of the year. That would be a massive…

$200,000 (5 clients @ $1,000 per year for 40 weeks) in additional business to her Auto Repair!

That’s what I call a Money Making Auto Repair Website… if you’re a Auto Repair Owner go and check if your website is doing that for YOU!

How does the fact that she didn’t quite like the look of her website, sound NOW! And what about the influence of her friends family and staff… not to mention her EGO!

Fact is… your opinion and their opinion does not put money in your cash register. The only opinion that COUNTS is that of your customer and their response will tell you if what you’re doing is working.

If you truly want your Auto Repair website to make you money then you need to understand what part of it makes you MONEY! And it’s got very little to do with how it looks! It can be downright ugly but if it’s making you money you will soon come to appreciate that it’s the prettiest thing in the world.

Not all of them are succeeding. Many are paying more money for the clicks than sales being made when they visit your Auto Repair website. Many are failing because they’re trying to do it by themselves without the proper level of knowledge or understanding how the Google Adwords system works.

Now you don’t have to do this all by yourself!

Today I want to tell you about a FREE tool that you can download right now that will massively help you in your Auto Repair marketing with Google Adwords.

How does this Google Adwords tool work? It automatically seeks out high quality sites than run Google Adwords, on the exact topics that you’re looking for. It then tells you the traffic that these sites get and gives you a list that you then enter into your google adwords campaign to be able to start advertising on those targeted sites for a fraction of what the search network costs.

Those of you who do Auto Repair marketing with Google Adwords may know that you can run your ad campaigns either on the “search” network or the “content” network. Understanding how both these networks function can considerable reduce your “costs per click” (CPCs).

This is not a black hat tool. It simply automates what would take you hours and hours and hours – if you could do it at all. Simply input your keywords into the software, and get dozens, if not hundreds, of targeted sites that will help you make money faster.

Best of all… you can get it now for FREE! It’s called “Adwords Digger”

Now, there are other products and software that claim to be able to do this… and, some might actually be able to do it… for a price. That’s right, all of “Adwords Digger” competitors expect you to pay for their product when you can get this tool for FREE.

What? You want me to repeat that last part? I said FREE. And I do mean free. 100% absolutely, completely free. No purchase required. No mail-in rebates. (Am I obsessing about this point? Perhaps. Buy that’s because it’s FREE!!) And not free*, either. No fine-print asterisk that taketh away. It’s not a demo, or a free trial. When you go to Adwords Digger and download it, you get the complete full version.

Download it NOW by clicking here.

Adwords Digger is one of a suite of tools from the PPCKahuna membership program that they have decided to make public. It only takes about 10 minutes to download, and you’ll get lower CPCs and a higher conversion rate on your Auto Repair marketing Adwords campaigns.

What else could you want? Oh, you want to know how it works? Fine. Once you select your keywords, and select how many results to check, Adwords Digger then gets the results, visits each site, and checks the site’s traffic stats. When that step is complete, it ranks the sites for you, and you just select the URLs that you want to use and save it as a text file. Copy and paste that text file into your Adwords placement targeting list and voila! your Auto Repair marketing Adwords campaign will start running on those targeted sites.

And have I mentioned that it’s free (I may have, at some point.) So really, what do you have to lose?

I’m going to be talking a lot more about PPC programs in future articles. Stay tuned.