Social Media Tips to Attract More Auto Service Customers

With such a large percentage of the adult population owning a car and being regularly active on social media it only makes sense that your auto service business uses social media marketing to attract new customers.

Marketing your auto service shop on social media allows you to attract and engage with local consumers, building brand recognition for your business. The next time they require routine maintenance or have a car repair emergency they will think of you. Social media is the best place to create top-of-mind awareness.

As your social media efforts scale and become more effective, you increase your top-of-mind awareness footprint in your local community. Positioning your auto service business as the go-to for all service and repair needs can have an explosive impact on your growth and profitability.

What are the best social media marketing strategies for a car repair business?
What type of content performs the best?
Does follower count have a direct correlation to success?
Is an organic or paid strategy better?

These are some of the most commonly asked questions, and we are going to address them and break down several tips to help you succeed. If you take the time to understand how to best approach marketing your auto service on social media the results will be well worth the effort. Social media gives you access to the majority of your local consumers, allowing you to build trust and brand loyalty that develops into long-term customer relationships.

You are going to want to be sure your business has a presence on the social media channels that your customers are active on. Since the vast majority of adults age 18 and older have a car, this provides you a much larger reach opportunity than other businesses.

If the platform is used by those 18 and older it’s an opportunity to market your auto service business using social media. You will want your social media effort to have two segments and focus areas:

Brand Awareness: Part of the reason you want your auto service and repair business to have a strong social media presence is to become the utmost authority in your area. With strong and consistent branding your business will be the option that comes to mind when service or a repair is needed. This requires casting a very wide net and coming up with fun and creative content to attract initial attention to your business.
Sales: You also want to drive local customers to your auto service shop. Customers are needed to generate revenue to keep the business running and the auto service social media marketing effort rolling.

Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and even TikTok are worth exploring. The content will differ dramatically between the platforms. Here are some quick examples.

Facebook: This is going to be the most lucrative social media platform to market your auto service business on. You can be more promotional here, and use a nice mix of information and offers.

A combination of organic posts and paid ads can deliver a higher ROI than any other social media outlet.

Instagram: Your younger customer base will be found here, so it will require fun and unique content. Find a way to convey humor to drive awareness.

Also, visual images that cause someone to do a double look work well. Posting promotional offers on Instagram will not deliver the same kind of results they do on Facebook.

Twitter: Twitter might be the least effective when it comes to attracting auto repair customers using social media, but it’s a platform you should be active on. It ranks high in Google so it helps you create brand dominance in the search results.

Also, using a social media management tool like Hootsuite allows you to schedule tweets in advance. You can load up your content calendar to post a few times a day for months in advance. When you learn how to leverage Twitter it becomes a decent source of business the requires very little work or maintenance.

TikTok: The younger demographic is hooked on this app, and it allows you to get very creative – silly, actually – and showcase a little humor. While most auto service businesses are boring, you could enlist the help of an employee that is bubbly and has a very outgoing personality to be the face of your TikTok account.

Viral TikTok’s can drive an unexpected amount of attention – and customers – to your business. It’s easy to create content from a mobile device and its users like raw content. You don’t need editing software or production teams.

Post Content More Frequently as Your Following Increases

As your following increases on social media, so does your potential customer pool. A car is an everyday necessity for most, so any time it requires service or needs to be repaired, the individual will often seek an immediate solution.

The auto service business they turn to is going to be the first one that comes to their mind. If you do a good job at maintaining a consistent presence on social media by creating fun and helpful content it will increase the chance that it’s your repair shop that comes to mind when they need service.

As your follower count increases, the more often you can post without overwhelming your audience. A single post is never going to reach everyone, so as you attempt to stay in front of more local customers on social media your frequency will need to increase.

Implement Organic Posting with Paid Retargeting Follow-Up on Facebook

Organic posting across all social channels is a great way to help position your auto service as a leading expert in the community. It’s also an effective way to drive traffic to your website, and when you have tracking pixels installed you are then able to target all of your website with advertisements in the future.

When you run paid ads on Facebook you can target a custom audience that you build through your pixel. This enables you to show ads only to those who have been to your website recently. Marketing to consumers that are already familiar with your business results in a much more successful campaign.

The pixel also allows you to market to consumers who have visited specific pages on your website. Placing an ad for exhaust replacement is going to convert much better when you only target those who were on your webpage about that specific service. The same goes for oil changes, engine repair, transmission service, etc.

Organic posting is great for education and information, as well as building consumer trust, and driving them to your website. Then they get tagged by your pixel and you now have a consumer to market to, using laser-targeting based on what they expressed interest in.

Final Thoughts

Marketing an auto repair business on social media requires an approach designed for longevity. You aren’t promoting a one-time service. A customer requires routine maintenance like oil changes and tire rotations often. Providing excellent service for the little routine jobs results in your customers returning when they have repair needs or troubleshooting.

You’re going to keep them as lifelong customers if a strong relationship exists. The tips outlined above will help you build a large following on social media, but even more importantly, an engaged and loyal one.

The automotive service and repair industry is highly competitive. There are always going to be businesses you are competing head-to-head with, so anything you can do to build a loyal customer base should be welcomed with open arms.

If you would like to learn more about our auto service social media marketing services please contact us today. Our automotive repair marketing specialists will explain the options available and provide you with a complimentary audit of your current social media presence and engagement rates. They will also be more than happy to answer any questions you may have regarding the tips and strategies discussed above.

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