The Institute’s Leading Edge Podcast

The Leading Edge is a show dedicated to providing Automotive Service and Repair Shop Owners a one-on-one with The Institute‘s experienced consultants. Ask us questions regarding any aspect of your business and we‘ll answer it during the show!

The Institute’s Leading Edge Podcast is a business podcast hosted by institutesleadingedgepodcast, with 100 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

institutesleadingedgepodcast hosts The Institute’s Leading Edge Podcast, a business show with 100 episodes published.

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  Episode #221

  221 - AI Search Is Here: Is Your Auto Repair Shop Showing Up?

  Oct 1, 202655 minS2

  221 - AI Search Is Here: Is Your Auto Repair Shop Showing Up? September 30th, 2026 - 00:55:13 Show Summary: AI is changing how drivers search for automotive repair and Yelp is becoming part of that discovery process. Shop owners can improve their visibility by claiming their Yelp page and keeping business information accurate. Photos services reviews and messaging provide valuable context that can help customers find the right shop. A strong digital presence across Yelp and other platforms creates more opportunities to reach customers wherever they search. Host(s): Jimmy Lea, VP of Business Development Guest(s): Melissa Underwager, Owner/Co-founder, Merrick Marketing Alexandra Goldie, Partner Account Director, Yelp Inc Show Highlights: [00:08:00] – Yelp explains how its review system treats businesses equally. [00:13:00] – Yelp data can help inform local searches through ChatGPT. [00:18:00] – Claiming your Yelp page creates the foundation for visibility. [00:21:00] – Authentic shop photos help customers understand your business. [00:27:00] – Yelp visibility extends beyond people visiting Yelp directly. [00:34:00] – Faster lead responses can improve opportunities to book customers. [00:38:00] – Negative reviews can demonstrate how your shop handles problems. [00:43:00] – Accurate profiles help shops strengthen their AI search presence. [00:51:00] – Consistent business listings strengthen your overall marketing presence. In every business journey, there are defining moments or challenges that build resilience and milestones that fuel growth. We’d love to hear about yours! What lessons, breakthroughs, or pivotal experiences have shaped your path in the automotive industry? Share your story with us at info@wearetheinstitute.com, and you might be featured in an upcoming episode. Unlock the full experience - watch the full webinar on YouTube: https://youtu.be/kq1nrxFwW3M Don’t miss exclusive insights, expert takeaways, and real talk you won’t hear anywhere else. Hit Subscribe, drop a comment, and share it with someone who needs to hear this! Links & Resources: Want to learn more? Click Here Want a complimentary business health report? Click Here See The Institute's events list: Click Here Want access to our online classes? Click Here ________________________________________ Episode Transcript Disclaimer This transcript was generated using artificial intelligence and may contain errors. If you notice any inaccuracies, please contact us at marketing@wearetheinstitute.com . Episode Transcript: Jimmy Lea: Hello, friend. It's so good to be here with you for our conversation and our discussion today. We have some amazing guests that are gonna have some awesome conversations. And hopefully, by the end of this, love it or hate it, but hopefully by the end of this, you fall in love with some new technology, some new information that is changing us, changing our industry, changing the way people find your shop today. Jimmy Lea: My name is Jimmy Lea. I'm with the Institute for Automotive Business Excellence, and you are lead- you are listening to the Leading Edge podcast. I am so excited to be here with you. For those that are here, type into the comments your shop, your city, your state. Would love to give you a shout-out. For those who are here for the live event, and for those who are listening to the recording, this is in every Wednesday at 1:00 PM Eastern, 10:00 AM Pacific, we are putting up with the Leading Edge podcast. Jimmy Lea: So if you are out there, I will be the voice for you. Type in your questions into the comment section now that you know where that comment section is. We're live streaming on Facebook, on YouTube, and here in StreamYard. So excited for our conversation. Today we are speaking with digital footprints and we are speaking with Yelp. Jimmy Lea: So this is gonna be phenomenal. My guest is from Merrick Marketing, Melissa. Melissa is joining us from Merrick Marketing. Melissa, thank you for being here. Good afternoon. How are you? Melissa Underwager: Good afternoon. Great. Excited to be here. Jimmy Lea: Oh, good. Melissa Underwager: First time, Jimmy Lea: I'm quite excited as well. Yeah. This is gonna be so much fun. Jimmy Lea: For so many years we talk about the digital footprint, and these shops, there's things that they can do themselves, there's things that they can do with some assistance, and then there's things that they need to hire a company to do- ... for them. And Melissa, I am so glad that you're here so we can have this conversation talking about marketing and all these things that help shops in- Melissa Underwager: Yeah Jimmy Lea: their local- Our Melissa Underwager: goal today is it's very educational. So- Yes ... they can have takeaways they can do themselves. Jimmy Lea: Perfect. Perfect. This, that's exactly where we wanna be. And joining us from Yelp is Alexandra. She is joining us as the partner for account director. Thank you, Alexandra, for joining us. So excited that you're here. Alexandra Goldie: Thanks for having me, Jimmy. Super excited to be here. Jimmy Lea: Nice. And Melissa, just like we were talking, this is things that shops can do themselves. And Alexandra, thanks for joining us and having this conversation, because there is a history between the automotive industry and Yelp that hasn't been pretty. Jimmy Lea: So hopefully with recent events and recent things that have been happening, hopefully we can now have a better understanding and fall in love with the new technology. So with that, Alexandra and Melissa, I'm gonna turn it over to you. Melissa Underwager: Great. Thank you. We are gonna address some of your concerns or things we've heard, as we- Yeah Melissa Underwager: have been out there in this industry. And, we've been a big part of educating, which helps change people's minds and see it a little differently. And and Yelp is a leader right now in, paid and organic AI. And we're excited to have Alexandra here. She's a partner. She's our partner at Yelp, and she helps us navigate it. Melissa Underwager: So she's the expert, so we're gonna let her do most of the talking. Alexandra Goldie: Nice. That's- Thanks, Melissa Melissa Underwager: Yeah. Alexandra Goldie: Good afternoon, everyone. Super excited to be here. As Jimmy mentioned, I'm a partner account director at Yelp. I work on the partner team, specifically with agency partners like Merrick Marketing to help local businesses grow, and I'm super excited to be here today with you all. Alexandra Goldie: We're gonna discuss AI's impact on local search broadly, what that means for the auto repair industry, and how you can take action on Yelp to best position your business. Please ask questions, interact in the comments. We wanna hear you. Jimmy will be moderating the comments. So to kick things off here I wanna make sure everyone can see my screen first of all. Jimmy Lea: It's coming up. It's coming up. There it is, buffering. Alexandra Goldie: Awesome. Igniting Jimmy Lea: AI's ground truth. Alexandra Goldie: Awesome. All righty. To kick things off, I wanna have a really brief video intro to Yelp for anyone who might not be familiar. So here we go. Alexandra Goldie: Highlights, Yelp is everywhere. Whether you need an oil change, an AC installed, a lawyer, or a place to grab lunch. But the way people are searching both on and off Yelp has shifted. Over 50% of consumers now use AI to discover local businesses, which is especially exciting for auto repair because drivers are often on the road when they realize that they need a service. Alexandra Goldie: In the past, if my check engine light went on, I'd likely wait until I got home to do retr- research and probably take a really good amount of time searching, reviewing, and contacting businesses before making a decision. Where now, I can simply ask my dashboard or ask ChatGPT while I'm driving, so I can focus on my safety while AI does the research for me Jimmy Lea: So I have a question. Yeah. Is there a, a deeper relationship with Yelp and AI that... 'Cause usually I'm not pulling up chat to search for something while I'm driving, but I might ask Siri, "Hey, Siri, find me something." Alexandra Goldie: That is a fantastic question. So Yelp has a many faceted layers of different relationships. Alexandra Goldie: So you mentioned Siri. We have partnerships with Siri, Alexa, Apple Maps. For more broadly, we also will get into this in just a little bit, but we've recently entered into a official partnership with ChatGPT, and then we also are featured in Dash, so in the navigation systems of several large car brands, as well as in Garmin. Alexandra Goldie: So especially relevant here for auto, and we'll touch on that in a bit. But I think broadly and what this slide here really conveys is how the AI models are trained. They don't actually know if an auto re- repair shop is reliable. Their results come from how that how that training is implemented into their system. Alexandra Goldie: Yelp has over 20 years of user-rich content, which is why Yelp has been so naturally prevalent in AI results over the past year. Yelp brings the human experiences that AI models do trust, and that is why largely we're taking that step back to talk about AI because no matter what AI you're using, no matter what large learning model, Yelp has been the most cited source pretty overwhelmingly this year. Jimmy Lea: Oh, interesting. That's fascinating. Alexandra Goldie: And while there are over one billion weekly users on, say, ChatGPT alone, many consumers haven't trusted AI. So while the adoption's rising, a lot of folks haven't trusted, especially early on. And so while these models are certainly impressive, like I said, they don't really know that th- it's reliable. They don't know where this comes from. Alexandra Goldie: And so some business owners, like many of you here today I'm sure have been frustrated with Yelp's review software and haven't really understood the reason for it. And many think that advertisers get preferential treatment, or that most of the reviews are negative, and that Yelp just like simply doesn't want to get you to get more reviews. Alexandra Goldie: Has anyone felt that way maybe? Jimmy Lea: Oh, yeah. I've talked to many shop owners that, that really felt like their Yelp accounts because they weren't paying Yelp some monthly fee or whatnot, that all of the negative reviews went right up to the top and all the positive reviews were hidden. That's what I... Jimmy Lea: I've heard it repeated more than 100 times in the automotive industry. Alexandra Goldie: And that is completely okay. If any of you have felt this way many people and many business owners don't know that all local businesses actually receive identical treatment regardless of advertiser status, if you're paying, if you're not paying. Alexandra Goldie: And no one, not myself and not our CEO, can make any changes. So every business really is treated identically the same, and we're striving to support real experiences, whether that be good or bad. Although most reviews actually are four or five stars. And while it is true that Yelp doesn't allow review solicitation, it isn't because we don't want businesses to get more reviews. Alexandra Goldie: It's because we want neutrality. And Yelp does reach out when we think someone's used a local business, which is, I think, something that a lot of people also don't realize. So something along the lines of in an email of, "Did you visit Mike's Auto Repair Shop? How was your experience?" And so all of these factors are what has made our software so trusted and has allowed Yelp to have the advantage in AI. Alexandra Goldie: So while I hear you and I know that there has been some misconceptions and some concerns, we're also going to be linking we can share this after the session, but a link to our trust and safety where there's a lot more information on our recommendation software. And Melissa and I are also always open to further discussion on your business or any questions that you have regarding recommendations further reviews. Jimmy Lea: Here's a question for you. Yeah. With Yelp and reviews, usually, here we are in the automotive industry, it's either a five-star review or it's a one-star review, where they either love us or they hate us, and they hate us because we left a smudge on the hood or something like that. Yes, there are catastrophic and there's the badge that we earned, but there, it's usually a, a one or a five. Jimmy Lea: If there's one-star reviews that we didn't earn it's not a client, is there a way of challenging those one-star reviews on Yelp? Alexandra Goldie: Absolutely. So if it was not a client or if the review is inappropriate in any way and violates our guidelines, there is a channel where you can escalate the review. So while the software generally, so what's recommended versus not recommended, and most of that does have to do, I think in my experience, we'll never truly know 'cause it's out of our hands, but a lot of it has to do with solicitations. Alexandra Goldie: When I talk to clients of businesses and they say, I had five reviews come in today and they're all not recommended," typically it's because maybe they were using a software that reached out and asked for those reviews. And while I understand how that seems harmless to them because those were real folks with real experiences, we again just wanna keep that neutrality and Yelp's gonna be the one to reach out. Alexandra Goldie: But if you have any reviews that you feel should be reviewed by a person like I said, if it wasn't a client or if it's inappropriate in any way or there's any legal matter involved, there is a way to report those reviews. Great question. Jimmy Lea: Nice. And can a client leave more than one re- Yelp review? Alexandra Goldie: If they have multiple experiences, Jimmy Lea: Yeah ... Alexandra Goldie: we, they can edit reviews. So they can make an update on a review. Jimmy Lea: Updates, okay. So similar to Google reviews in that aspect, a client can have a single review, but they can update and add additional information. Here's the family fleet, I brought in my truck last month, and this month it's this, the family station wagon, and next month it's the minivan, and then it's the kid's car and... Jimmy Lea: So they can put in updates. Okay. Alexandra Goldie: Definitely. And we always encourage business owners to respond to those reviews, whether they're positive or negative. Jimmy Lea: Okay. Beautiful. Beautiful. Alexandra Goldie: Awesome. So like I said, this is really why Yelp's had the advantage in AI, because these AI models know that they can trust that the experiences from Yelp, they're real, they're true. Alexandra Goldie: There a- is no way to gamify it. Everyone's treated exactly the same, and it's the best way to train models to be helpful in those inform- pieces of information that they wouldn't know. If I'm asking ChatGPT, if I'm on the road and I'm asking my in car dash, it's midnight or 1:00 AM and I want to find an auto repair shop that's open late, those are the type of attributes that are being pulled in, or reliable service, that's coming in from reviews. Alexandra Goldie: And so when you're responding that also helps with the content that's being pulled in. Jimmy Lea: Okay. Alexandra Goldie: And I alluded to Yelp's partnership with ChatGPT a little bit earlier, but I wanted to just quickly touch on that. We do have a direct relationship with OpenAI, which is to utilize Yelp's content-rich data within ChatGPT, and also to integrate request a quote messaging, which is really a huge breakthrough for organic traffic and organic lead flow off of Yelp. Alexandra Goldie: So now users can actually reach out via message without leaving ChatGPT. They don't have to be on Yelp. They're in ChatGPT, they ask ChatGPT for a reliable auto shop near them. Chat gives them some great recommendations based on, they said near me and reliable. Chat pulled that in, and then they're able to request a quote. Alexandra Goldie: So on your side, on the business owner side, this would go into your normal Yelp inbox. But on the user side, they're actually not a Yelp user at this time. They're in ChatGPT Alexandra Goldie: Any questions on that? Jimmy Lea: No that's interesting. So even if I'm in my ChatGPT asking questions about automotive repair shop near me- Yes ... the information that I'm seeing in chat is coming from Yelp? Alexandra Goldie: That is correct. Jimmy Lea: Okay. Melissa Underwager: Often. Maybe not all, but often, yeah. Alexandra Goldie: Oh, yeah, not always. Not 100% of the time, of course. Alexandra Goldie: Yes. But it's utilizing Yelp's data, so it's using things, like I said, your business hours, your service attributes, the type of jobs you do, if you specialize in certain types of vehicles. Those are attributes that would potentially pull in if someone says, "I have a BMW, I'm looking for someone who really specializes in, you know, my car brand." Alexandra Goldie: Or if you have a more specialized request, and then all of the reviews, the photos, all of that content is being utilized to inform these results for ChatGPT. Jimmy Lea: Okay, so Alexandra, Melissa here, the question for both of you. How much of this does the shop owner need to optimize on their website or how much of this needs to be optimized on their Yelp profile? Alexandra Goldie: Fantastic question. So this is all coming from optimizations on your Yelp profile, and in just a couple of minutes, we're gonna run through actions that you can take today to optimize your Yelp profile and best position your business for success and visibility within AI, whether that be on Yelp or off of Yelp. Jimmy Lea: Okay. Melissa Underwager: Yeah. You still wanna optimize your website, though. Alexandra Goldie: Yes, agreed. Yeah, yes, of course. And Melissa has probably the expertise there on how to best optimize your website. But today we're more focused on your Yelp presence and how that flows- Yeah ... into AI results. Melissa Underwager: Okay. Alexandra Goldie: And so what we've put into other kind of what we've discussed thus far, users generate the content, Yelp verifies that content, which is then used to train AI models and results in high intent leads for your business. Now, you might be thinking, this is all great, but how does this really impact auto specifically? Alexandra Goldie: Historically, when you hear Yelp, you might have thought of restaurants or home service categories, but how does Yelp differentiate for your shops? And so I wanted to take a brief overview of Yelp's focus on the auto repair category. Yelp has integrations, like I mentioned earlier, in Dash with major car brands, as well as with Garmin, Apple Maps, Siri. Alexandra Goldie: And like I said, when someone's on the road, they can easily find an auto repair shop with Yelp's help without having to pull over, without having to wait till they get home to do research. Yelp also has recently acquired RepairPal to further support investment in the auto repair category. Jimmy Lea: Huh. Jimmy Lea: That's very interesting Alexandra Goldie: Any questions on any of these integrations or the acquisition? Jimmy Lea: I'm even seeing DuckDuckGo in there. That's quite interesting. It, does Yelp own that as well? Alexandra Goldie: So Yelp has partnerships and integrations, but Yelp does not own DuckDuckGo. Jimmy Lea: Okay. But a- and you just recently bought RepairPal. Alexandra Goldie: That is correct, yeah. And so Yelp's using the verified data from RepairPal to help inform things like reliability it, to build out a trust architecture to really be a s- to specialize in auto repair. What makes a good auto repair shop, Yelp wants to know. And part of that was what led to the acquisition of RepairPal, and then also informing things like pricing and things like that, which is especially relevant when it comes to request a quote messaging. Jimmy Lea: Ok

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  Episode #220

  220 - Your Marketing Worked. Don’t Lose Them on the Phone.

  Sep 23, 202651 minS2

  220 - Your Marketing Worked. Don’t Lose Them on the Phone. September 23, 2026 - 00:50:41 Show Summary: Strong marketing gets the phone ringing but the customer experience determines what happens next. Every inbound call is an opportunity to build trust and turn customer needs into appointments. Shops can improve results by answering consistently and following a clear call flow that keeps the advisor focused on solutions. Tracking missed calls and appointment conversions reveals where revenue is being lost. Regular coaching supported by call data and AI analysis can strengthen advisor performance. Better phone habits can increase car count and revenue while building lasting customer relationships. Host(s): Wayne Marshall, CEO & Industry Coach Guest(s): David Boyd, Founder & CEO of Callinbound Show Highlights: [00:02:00] – The phone serves as the front door to your shop. [00:05:00] – Fast callbacks can recover missed customer opportunities. [00:08:00] – Answering more calls can dramatically increase car count. [00:12:00] – Learn the customer’s name and guide them toward an appointment. [00:16:00] – A call flow creates structure without sounding robotic. [00:22:00] – Clear expectations and regular measurement improve advisor performance. [00:25:00] – Assume the appointment and offer customers specific scheduling options. [00:30:00] – Track call volume sources response times and appointment opportunities. [00:36:00] – Ten additional appointments can create significant annual revenue. [00:40:00] – Consistent coaching turns phone calls into stronger customer relationships. In every business journey, there are defining moments or challenges that build resilience and milestones that fuel growth. We’d love to hear about yours! What lessons, breakthroughs, or pivotal experiences have shaped your path in the automotive industry? Share your story with us at info@wearetheinstitute.com, and you might be featured in an upcoming episode. Unlock the full experience - watch the full webinar on YouTube: https://youtu.be/GemSNtnPXuc Don’t miss exclusive insights, expert takeaways, and real talk you won’t hear anywhere else. Hit Subscribe, drop a comment, and share it with someone who needs to hear this! Links & Resources: Want to learn more? Click Here Want a complimentary business health report? Click Here See The Institute's events list: Click Here Want access to our online classes? Click Here ________________________________________ Episode Transcript Disclaimer This transcript was generated using artificial intelligence and may contain errors. If you notice any inaccuracies, please contact us at marketing@wearetheinstitute.com . Episode Transcript: Wayne Marshall: Welcome. Glad to have you here today for this podcast that we've put together. Today we're gonna be talking about your marketing work, so let's not lose 'em on the phone. Today we wanna welcome in David Boyd, who is the owner of Call Inbound, who is gonna be with us as we talk a little bit about some of the things that we need to be mindful of when we're dealing with those inbound calls, setting those appointments, some best practices. Wayne Marshall: And also, as we will do and what their company does, is taking advantage of some of that technology, and the things that are going on that can and make us more effective when it comes to the phone calls. David, welcome to our podcast today. David Boyd: Thank you, Wayne. Always great to see you. I realize this as you're introducing here, I'm jealous of your studio. David Boyd: I think I need to up my game. So I I appreciate the institute. Of course we go way back and I, I love what you guys do. It's great to be a part of it. Wayne Marshall: Today we're just gonna kick it off because we know as many shops and many owners out there, and managers of, we work hard. Work really hard to have good marketing. Wayne Marshall: We want our name to be recognized, we want people to see us, think about us, be top of mind, so that when that service is needed, obviously they call us first before they call anybody else. But we also know that with that process, and before anybody can have the great customer experience that as shop owners everybody wants to deliver, we gotta answer the phone. Wayne Marshall: We gotta get the appointment. So I'm gonna jump right in, and you talk about it. I know in your business when you talk to many people who are clients, customers of Call Inbound, you start off with the importance of why people even call. And what are some of the reasons or what are some of the things that happen on those first calls that come in, and your front desk people, service advisor, or might even be a receptionist, are answering the phone. Wayne Marshall: So let's just set the stage. Why is this important? What are we doing? David Boyd: Wayne it's a great question and I don't know that we talk about that with owners often enough. The, the phone is your front door in at least 80% of your interactions with customers. So what is, what does your welcome mat look like? David Boyd: And the way that we deal with customers on the phone says a lot about our business, our trustworthiness, our credibility, and how are we building trust and confidence with that customer to really set the stage for not just that particular moment that they're calling about a need with their vehicle, but for the next visit and the visit after that. Wayne Marshall: Very true. With that, and that phone rings- ... Wayne Marshall: What are some of the things that you've seen? 'Cause again, I know with your company a lot of calls are recorded. You, along with owners, listen to some of those, recordings or what those calls are g- or what's happening with them. What's one of the biggest common mistakes that you see that happens when that phone rings for the first time? David Boyd: The biggest thing that, that really catches my attention immediately is distractedness by the service advisor or the call handler. Maybe it's the manager, maybe it's the, the customer service rep if you have one of those in your shop. Maybe it's the service advisor. But the, the distractedness is the most obvious thing. David Boyd: Distractedness comes through on the other end of the phone and speaks loudly about what's going on in the shop. So distractedness sounds like they, the, the, the phone gets, it's picked up and I'm still finishing- Yeah ... a conversation somewhere else, and then it's "Oh, yeah. A- ABC Auto." And that distractedness is overwhelming in many cases and can really be off-putting for the customer Wayne Marshall: Yeah, I know. Wayne Marshall: I have my own pet peeve, and I know what... And it could be any service industry that we work within. And we've all called different people, and they answer, they identify who they are. "Thank you for calling. Will you hold please?" And before I can say yes, no, or anything else, it's, you hear yourself going on hold. Wayne Marshall: Bam. And I'm like wait a minute. And that hold, I don't know if that's gonna be a few minutes or I shouldn't say minutes. I don't know if that's gonna be 20, 30 seconds or that's gonna be two or three minutes. David Boyd: Yeah. Wayne Marshall: And you know what it feels like. Two, three minutes can feel like an eternity anymore because we're so used to that instant gratification. Wayne Marshall: And you're right. And the other thing that we see when we coach and talk to people is if you can't answer the phone, obviously it's gonna go to a voicemail. How do you manage those voicemails? How do you... What's the timeliness of? What are some things that you're seeing when it comes to that and how people are responding? David Boyd: We do at Call Inbound we do a fair amount with voicemail to try to drive efficiency and effective contact points back to the customer. One, being aware that a call was missed is super important. So we may we may flag or trigger that to the team at the shop and say, "Hey, there was a missed call." David Boyd: And because the other thing that happens often that can be pretty detrimental to our car count and our cash flow is customers that don't leave a message. Overwhelmingly, customers won't leave a message, so we need to know that they have called and identify that a call was missed, and then proactively notify the team. David Boyd: That gives us a good opportunity to contact them back. Typically, if we have the ability to get back to a customer within 5 to 15 minutes, we can we can salvage that, so to speak. If we are not aware and and/or responsive to a voicemail message, then we're likely to lose that customer, which is important. David Boyd: Even if they're a return or a repeat customer, if we're not responding- Yes ... to them it's true that we can't always answer every call. And when I talk to an owner that says we answer the phone every time." Do you? Wayne Marshall: Yeah. David Boyd: We answer the phone every time that I'm aware we answer the phone. David Boyd: The, the fact of the matter is we do miss calls. It happens. And while it might not happen very often, we wanna be aware that the call occurred, we wanna be aware that the call is missed. If the customer left a message understand that message. So what we do is we'll send that out to you as an email with an audio file and a transcription. David Boyd: What I find is driving, the efficiency and effectiveness for customer communication in the shop is when we send that email message with the voicemail the service advisor can read through it or the owner can see it and that's- Yep ... also used after hours. They... You can see it, scan through the transcript really quick and make a determination, what do I need to do with this, right? David Boyd: So we can manage workflow Wayne Marshall: Yeah, I, we had I, and it's always nice to be able to share stories and examples. But we had a coaching client and I was working with the young man and this was, I don't know, probably five, six months ago. We just started and we, he started telling me about his car counts. Wayne Marshall: He just wasn't getting car counts. He wasn't getting appointments. And we started analyzing. I said let's talk about this." Is it the questions that are being asked, the conversation that the advisor's having? And when we finally dug in and looked at the data, 40% of his inbound calls were not being answered. David Boyd: That sounds Wayne Marshall: like a problem. 40%. And I told the gentleman, I said, "First off, you've gotta start answering the phone. If my car's broken and you don't answer the phone..." You just said it, and I love it 'cause I, he noticed this too. They weren't leaving voicemails. Wayne Marshall: If my car's broken, I'm going to number two and number three. Wayne Marshall: I'm finding somebody who can get me in the next 48 hours, get my car looked at, get it fixed, get it back so I can go to work, take the kids to their events, whatever it is. He worked on this and he fixed that, and all of a sudden he started answering his phone with consistency- Sure ... and changed up, if the first person can't, it had a rollover after three rings, it goes to the next person. Wayne Marshall: Car count went up dramatically. Revenue went up dramatically. Success, and he's maintained that over the simplest of things. He never was looking at the KPIs or the data of how many calls weren't being answered. David Boyd: There's a lot to unpack- And so he- ... in what you just said. The knowing that the call is happening, where is it coming from, who's handling these calls, how quickly are we answering the phone. David Boyd: These are all pretty important metrics and, there's a lot kinda gets back to that front door idea, right? W- if we don't answer the, the phone it's like somebody's knocking on the front door and we just ignore it, right? Or we might be in the back- Yes ... and not even hear that somebody's knocking at the front door. David Boyd: It's not these delivery services these days that they'll ring your doorbell and your package is sitting at the front door and they've turned around and left. Customers don't do that with a bag of cash, right? Saying, "Knock, knock. Here's my bag of cash. Take care of my needs." David Boyd: Yeah. They might drop their vehicle off, but we still have to interact with them. So this is the important part. Be ready. Be capable of answering the phone. Make sure that we've got the process understood and the expectation's been communicated to our call handlers. It needs to be a priority. David Boyd: In, in so many cases historically, Wayne the, the phone has just been a commodity. And it's been, in some cases, dare I say, it's been a nuisance, where it's like, "Oh, that phone just never stops ringing." That's money calling. And once we- Yeah ... once we take that from, the annoying little noise maker that sits over on the counter, and the commodity service provider in days gone by, and we transfer our way of thinking into a workflow, and process, and marketing, now it becomes so much more relevant. David Boyd: And it's actually, it's exciting and it's entertaining to see how we can drive the performance of our shop just by simply what we're doing on that phone Wayne Marshall: We at the Institute, we have a lot of conversations of what happens, from the time that customer arrives. And there's a lot of just delivering a high level of experience. Wayne Marshall: So one of the things, and we've worked with many customers, clients, and we can have all this conversation of having a beautiful intake process. Wayne Marshall: We greet the customer, we get the keys, we understand what's going on. We get their RO written up. We get everything so they're just... The, the expectation is being delivered at a high level so that at that point you can go and give it to the tech, who the tech can now do a great inspection. Wayne Marshall: And with that inspection, we can write up a awesome estimate because no one can buy anything if they don't know what it's gonna cost. And we do all that, but we fail to, going back to the gentleman I talked to, 40% of the phone calls weren't even being answered. You'll never even be able to do the intake if you don't get the appointment. Wayne Marshall: And I say all that to say this, 'cause I'm sure and I'd be curious of what you observed. I've listened to calls with coaching clients, and it's amazing how many people call up and ask, "Hey, do you do front end alignments?" "Yeah, we do front end alignments." And they go, "Okay, thanks. Okay, thanks. Goodbye." Wayne Marshall: And they hang up. And it's like, why didn't you ask, "Yeah, we do front end alignments. When can we get you in?" Simple things like this that get missed. I'm sure and listen to that, and that's probably also part of your conversations. David Boyd: It very much is. And I do wanna clarify. We don't we don't do call coaching. David Boyd: The institute, your team over there does. I know. You guys have a phenomenal program for call coaching. That said, I'm still part of a lot of calls- Yes, you are ... that are looking at service advisor behavior, call handling, the process behind this. So I definitely hear all of these pieces, and there are certain, moments that can really grate my process engineering mindset. David Boyd: One is what you just said. Yes. How can I very quickly move into creating a relationship establishing trust, and getting a commitment from this customer to come in and see us? "Hey, do you guys do front end alignments?" "Hey, I can help you with that. My name's David. What's your name? Wayne. Great. David Boyd: How did you-" Yes ... "how did you get to familiar with ABC Auto? Perfect. What's going on with your car that y- that you wanna have us help you look at it?" We're now we're talking about we're working on this iss- issue together. I know your name, and if there's any one thing you're gonna love to hear from me in our conversation is your name. David Boyd: We don't wanna overuse it, but I it's important- ... that I know who you are. And this is the other thing, it's not just answering that simple question on the front end and never asking for the appointment, but not even knowing who this, this person is. I might have a two-minute conversation as a service advisor with somebody and never even know their name. David Boyd: Maybe I've not asked them for the appointment, I've not asked them for their name. These are two important things that really help establish trust and really equity in the marketplace Wayne Marshall: Yeah, and I appreciate what you just said about what we do here at the institute and our coaching and training, advisor training programs when it comes to the coaching up of phone skills. Wayne Marshall: But at the same time, I do know, and this is the beauty of our partnership and relationship that we have with you, you can have all the best tools and technology, and we talk about this. You can have the best lift, best tools, but if you don't have people that know what to say, what to do, and how to use the tools- Yeah Wayne Marshall: you're not gonna get the revenue. You're not gonna have the success that you wanna have. With that, and I know you talk about it, so we can install the technology and have the things that you want, but it's also knowing how, and we talk about a lot, is phone scripts. Wayne Marshall: And it's not that... Look, I don't want... Wayne Marshall: And, I've got notes here. Yeah. And you've seen me glance. It's not, "Hey, let me read this and give you things" We're not making robots here, David Boyd: Wayne. Wayne Marshall: No but it is so important, and we talk about it a lot, and I know you talk about you can have all the great technology now and the best equipment, but if the people haven't practiced with a script of kinda knowing what to say and how to do. Wayne Marshall: Going right back, I answered your question. "Sure, we have an alignment rack. David, tell me about your car. Why are you asking if we do alignments?" "Oh, it pulls to the right." Let's make sure there's not suspension issues or other problems-" Yeah "... besides it's just out of alignment. Why do you think it's out of alignment?" Wayne Marshall: "Oh I hit a curb." You maybe did some damage." "It didn't just-" Yeah, right "... knock it out. We got other things to consider." Yeah. That helps us now do a better intake, better inspection, and a better estimate. Yeah. All the things that helps us move it forward to get to a good RO and a good experience for you as a customer. Wayne Marshall: So I tell people all the time, and I'm sure you do, too, but develop some type of a script. Wayne Marshall: Have a- have people practice it. Have people do things that when they feel comfortable and it comes off as being very genuine. Every one of us have had an experience where we've called into one of our other providers or a retail store, whatever, and you know you get into a call center, and it just sounds so scripted. Wayne Marshall: And it's like this person on the other line doesn't have a clue. They're just reading- ... canned answers- Yeah ... canned responses, and you don't feel the trust or genuine connection that you wanna get. David Boyd: It almost has the opposite effect, wouldn't you say? Wayne Marshall: I think it does. David Boyd: Yeah. Wayne Marshall: I know it does for me. David Boyd: Yeah. So I, Wayne Marshall: I can't speak for others David Boyd: I agree with you that, you know establishing the script. I'll tell you, I I've, in the last couple years, started to use a nuance of that term. I would refer to it as a call flow Scripting can feel a little robotic, and it's kinda that example you used in some national call center, right? David Boyd: You call your internet company and, you can tell they're reading bullet one, bullet two, bullet three, and they're following this decision tree. That's a script. When we empower our advisors and train them well, like what you guys do with the institute and your serv

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  Episode #219

  219 - Turning Shop Phone Calls Into Customers for Life

  Sep 23, 202651 minS2

  219 - Turning Shop Phone Calls Into Customers for Life September 16th, 2026 - 00:50:47 Show Summary: Every phone call is an opportunity to earn trust and build a lasting customer relationship. A clear call process gives service advisors the confidence to connect with customers and secure appointments. Call recording and AI analysis make it easier to identify coaching opportunities and reinforce strong habits. Consistent communication and proactive updates create a better customer experience that keeps people coming back. Host(s): Jimmy Lea, VP of Business Development Guest(s): Jeannie Light, Owner of Lighthouse Automotive David Boyd, Founder & CEO of Callinbound Show Highlights: [00:03:00] – Understand what happens when customers call your shop. [00:06:00] – Use real calls and AI to strengthen advisor training. [00:09:00] – Build confidence then guide callers toward an appointment. [00:13:00] – AI finds coaching opportunities without hours of call reviews. [00:17:00] – Reinforce strong behaviors instead of focusing only on mistakes. [00:25:00] – Status calls can expose broken communication processes. [00:29:00] – Proactive updates keep customers informed and reduce uncertainty. [00:34:00] – Advisors need a moment to reset before answering calls. [00:42:00] – Focus on what your shop can do for customers. [00:46:00] – Consistent call reviews create stronger habits and better service. In every business journey, there are defining moments or challenges that build resilience and milestones that fuel growth. We’d love to hear about yours! What lessons, breakthroughs, or pivotal experiences have shaped your path in the automotive industry? Share your story with us at info@wearetheinstitute.com, and you might be featured in an upcoming episode. Unlock the full experience - watch the full webinar on YouTube: https://youtu.be/5TRFwwOYABE Don’t miss exclusive insights, expert takeaways, and real talk you won’t hear anywhere else. Hit Subscribe, drop a comment, and share it with someone who needs to hear this! Links & Resources: Want to learn more? Click Here Want a complimentary business health report? Click Here See The Institute's events list: Click Here Want access to our online classes? Click Here ________________________________________ Episode Transcript Disclaimer This transcript was generated using artificial intelligence and may contain errors. If you notice any inaccuracies, please contact us at marketing@wearetheinstitute.com . Episode Transcript: Jimmy Lea: Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, or good night, depending on when and where you're joining us from today. You can choose your greeting. Hello, friend, it's good to be here with you. We are gonna have a great conversation here today as we talk about communication. Isn't it... It's so important. It's so important that we communicate. Jimmy Lea: So excited to be here with you. Those of you who are here with us live, go ahead and drop in the comment section where it is you're joining us from. Give us your shop name and a city and state. Love to give you a shout-out and say hello. Joining us today as our panel of experts is David Boyd. David is with Call Inbound. Jimmy Lea: I was waiting for the Call Inbound. I was like, "Wait, no, he's got a logo." Is that a new logo? David Boyd: It's Jimmy Lea: good. David Boyd: Thanks, Jimmy. Yeah, great to be here. You know, I love your, uh, your intro, your greeting. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, or good night. It's kinda like, uh, the, uh, the Choose Your Adventure books we used to read as kids, right? David Boyd: Yeah, yep. And it's, it- it's very much in line with what we're gonna talk about today with, uh, phone calls and training. It's very much, uh, choose your adventure. I'm looking forward to our time today. Jimmy Lea: Yeah, it's gonna be fun. Uh, e- 'cause, you know, we spend so much money on our marketing. We spend so much money to get the phone to ring. David Boyd: Right. Jimmy Lea: Man, we gotta make sure we optimize that phone and make sure we're taking care of business. TCB, Elvis Presley, taking care of business. And joining us today as our, uh, boots on the ground, our owner with, uh, the most, uh, is Jeannie Light. Jeannie owns a couple of shops out in North Carolina in the Outer Banks, Light House Automotive. Jimmy Lea: She is at the second floor on the original OG location. Jeannie, th- thank you for joining. Glad you're here. Jeannie Light: Thank you for having me. Jimmy Lea: Oh, super awesome. I, I was able to do a webinar once upon a time from Jeannie's HQ there- Yeah ... at the home office. That was super fun. Jeannie Light: You sat right here where I'm sitting right now. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Uh, and I probably used that same microphone, the Yeti. Pro- Jeannie Light: yep. Jimmy Lea: Oh, so much fun. So if ever you are in North Carolina and you are out in the Outer Banks, y- uh, y- if you've seen the show, you'll know that it wasn't filmed there in North Carolina. It was filmed somewhere else, right, Jeannie? Was it in Virginia or something like that? Jeannie Light: Which one? Jimmy Lea: The Outer Banks show. Jeannie Light: Oh, yeah, yeah. Jeannie Light: The OG. It's filmed in South Carolina. Jimmy Lea: South Carolina. Yes. Well, go there. Visit Jeannie at her two different shops, and she'll take you to the OGs of all of those original Fisher fisherman boats and, uh, ex- Expedition people. Uh, my, my son still has a sweater. Um, and in fact- ... I need to get another one from you here this next time. Jimmy Lea: So we'll talk about that in a minute. Jeannie Light: Yep. Jimmy Lea: Super excited that you're here. Thank you, Jeannie. Thank you, David. And, and let's talk about communication. Let's talk about what we can do to help answer that phone and be better on the phone. What do we wanna talk about first here, David, with communication? David Boyd: Yeah, I think so, I mean, you, you, you bring up a good point. David Boyd: I, you know, how, how do we answer the phone? Do we know if we're answering the phone? There's so much that goes along, you know, it... Running a shop anymore isn't so much about, uh, just making the phone ring. The phone rings a lot. And I think, you know, Jeannie and I have had conversations about what's going on in the shop, what do we know about what's going on, do I have any line of sight to whether we're answering the phone. David Boyd: So, you know, most owners are spending a lot of time and energy to make the phone ring. And if, if it gets to s- be slow, the, then, you know, owners, uh, Jeannie, I'm sure you've never done this, but, you know, if it gets to be, like, a slow week, it's always, it's always introspection. Like, what am I doing wrong? Am I over pricing? David Boyd: Am I marketing properly? Am I doing all this stuff? So what do I even know about my call activity? And I think- Yep ... you know, one of the things that is important is to have line of sight to that, uh, to understand, um, you know, how, how many calls are we getting? Are we answering the phone? If we're not answering the phone, what's happening with those? David Boyd: What kind of technology can we use? And Jeannie, I'd love to hear your perspective about some of the things that are important to you as a shop owner. Um- Jeannie Light: Yeah, I mean- Go for it ... I think the cust- I mean, the, um, service advisor answering that call with the right greetings, using the customer's name, you know, that's the most important thing we can do, is really respect the customer and their time and just, you know, get through it as quickly as we can. David Boyd: How difficult would you say it is for you to know what is happening on the front line? If we talk about what's going on in the front office, how historically, maybe not so much now, 'cause I know some of the technology you're using through, through Call Inbound, but how, you know, what, how hard is it to know, uh, what's happening on the front line, those points that you made? David Boyd: Are we answering the phone? Are we using the customer's name? Are we asking for the appointment is another big one. How hard is that? Jeannie Light: It, if you don't, I will say, if you don't have the right equipment and the right provider, whatever, whatever you wanna call it, the right equipment, if your phone calls are not recorded, I think you don't know. Jeannie Light: You don't have a clue. Jimmy Lea: I- I- even more to that, Jeannie, uh, with coaching and training, when it comes to finding a phone call, even if your calls are recorded I can spend two to three hours trying to find a phone call that is coachable. So having it recorded is certainly half the battle, but the other 90% is finding that phone call. Jimmy Lea: Mm-hmm. And I, this isn't a commercial for Inbound, but let me tell you what, Inbound is what we use at the institute. I know it's what you're using as well, Jeannie. Yep. A- and the, the, the ability to have these calls sorted by missed opportunities, these are your really good calls, this is an angry or upset customer. Jimmy Lea: Oh my gosh, it makes it so much quicker and easier- Jeannie Light: Yeah ... Jimmy Lea: to get to those coachable calls. Are you... What do you do as a, a team with your service advisors in coaching phone calls with them, Jeannie? Jeannie Light: Well, we have, um, we have phone scripts. And actually, I sat down with, um, AI and there's, I know there's been a lot of talk about AI in the news lately, you know, it's gonna kill us all, but, um, Jimmy Lea: We have three years. Jimmy Lea: Three David Boyd: years down the road. Jeannie Light: Yeah. Three. Jimmy Lea: Three years, Terminator. Three years. Jeannie Light: Yeah. Jimmy Lea: Nine years according to iRobot, but carry on. Jeannie Light: But anyway, um, no, I, you can take those calls, you can take anything and run it through AI and create phone scripts, create, um- Dialogue between you can have role playing- Yes ... you know, between you and your service advisor to, like, how do I com- combat this, you know, s- price shoppers or, you know, "Oh, your price is too high," or da- you know. Jeannie Light: It's how you do all that. You create all these scripts and just sit down and go, "Hey," you know. Let them listen to their phone calls as well. Jimmy Lea: Y- absolutely. Absolutely. David, David Boyd: what are your- Absolutely, yeah, Jimmy, the, the, like, w- where are we? Jeannie made a great point, right? We use AI, and we hear about AI everywhere and anywhere today in all facets of what we do in the auto repair shop. David Boyd: And I think that, you know, there, there are good responsible uses and applications of AI, and there are some that are maybe questionable, to be proven yet. Um, and then, you know, particularly for the, the customer facing utilization of, of AI. So, uh, call reviews i- is important. Jeannie brought up, uh, the script. David Boyd: I think what I always like to encourage shop owners is make sure that you have a clear expectation of what you would like your service advisor to do. Yeah. It's straightforward and simple. Jeannie Light: Yep. David Boyd: And if you don't have a coach, uh, or an idea of what that call flow should look like, um, the Institute does that and can certainly help. David Boyd: Yeah, Jimmy, raise your hand again because, um, you know, I, I believe in, in what the Institute does and the program they put together. So to establish that call flow, we can call it a script. We can... You know, I, I, I usually call it a flow. Um, with, with so much AI around us, I wanna be careful about creating robots, right? David Boyd: So, uh, but tr- establishing the expectation, we're gonna have a warm greeting. We're going to, you know, identify who I am and who you've called, right? Thank them for calling us. And then we, uh, really the, kind of the next thing is, no matter what the customer says, use that as the opportunity to say, "I can help you with that." David Boyd: By, by doing something simple, like, "I can help you with that," we're establishing credibility and expertise. "I can help you with that," whatever your need is. "Hey, how'd you hear about us?" Or my, a- again, "My name's David. What's your name? Jeannie, thanks so much for calling and trusting us." Uh, let, let's move into the next step is kind of where we go with that call flow, and ultimately what we're wanting to do is ask that customer to come in and see us. David Boyd: When a customer calls with a need Uh, we want to, uh, capitalize on that, and we want to capitalize on that by telling them that we can help them with their need, and then, uh, move to an appointment and get them scheduled. Avoid diagnosing over the phone- Mm-hmm ... avoid, you know, price quotes. Uh, where possible sometimes we'll do, you know, rack rate pricing for certain services, basic services, that kind of thing. David Boyd: But, um, this is, this is where you have the flexibility as a shop owner to establish, um, you know, how you want that handled. So Jeannie, m- maybe let me toss that back to you. Um, what have you done to establish that protocol, and how have you communicated it with your service advisors? Jeannie Light: Yeah, we, um, we'll have a meeting. Jeannie Light: You know, we sat down... Well, let me backtrack just a little bit. One of our, um, 20 groups, one of our exercises was our coach called each of our shops, and our service advisors didn't know- That's a, that's a great exercise. I love it ... and, you know, talk to our service advisors to get... And it was, and then she played 'em back for us. Jeannie Light: And, you know, it's like, oh my gosh, that was horrible. Jimmy Lea: Oh, cringe. Jeannie Light: That was horrible. Yeah. Cringe. Jimmy Lea: I can feel it already. Jeannie Light: So, you know, from there we were tasked with creating the phone scripts and, and actually letting... I come back and have my service advisors at the time listen to the phone call- Mm-hmm ... and then picked a good one and let them listen to that. Jeannie Light: So you say, "Okay, what do y'all hear went wrong? What can we do to improve?" And it's, it's just training and- Holding, holding them accountable too Jimmy Lea: Oh, that's exactly right. That's exactly right. We're gonna take a minute here to give a little shout-out to the Institute and their service advisor training. Jimmy Lea: There's a three-day training program for any shop. It... You, you don't have to be a member of the Institute. Any shop that's out there that you're looking for some service advisor training, grab out your smartphone, scan this QR code. The training happens here in Ogden, Utah. It is phenomenal. It will take your service advisor to the next level, and it'll takes those service advisors that are amazing and give them the status of a, a demi-god, small G. Jimmy Lea: It, really and truly, this three-day service advisor training is off the chain amazing, phenomenal. We had 29 service advisors here at our last three-day service advisor training. It's phenomenal. Uh, you definitely wanna be there. So if you can, get into it. The, the scripts are important. You've gotta know what to say. Jimmy Lea: You've gotta know how to say it right. I, I totally agree. And David, you've got some technology now that you're running in the background that helps us as coaches get to those calls quicker. Also helps Jeanie get to those calls quicker, so those conversations with the service advisor becomes about phone calls that happened this week. Jimmy Lea: Oh, maybe it happened yesterday. Oh, maybe it happened this morning. And by getting back with that phone call to the service advisor that much faster, that much quicker, the feedback is so much more relevant as opposed to, "Oh, you know what? This was a call from a month ago." David Boyd: Right. " Jimmy Lea: Oh, man, I, I don't answer phones like that anymore. Jimmy Lea: Yeah, that was a month ago." Okay. But you David Boyd: still do- Re- relevance is important. Yeah. So, uh, you're right. We, we have been, uh, doing, you know, call analysis for three and a half, over three and a half years now. And, um, you know, I'm happy to say that we were really at the, the front end of how we've begun to leverage AI and, you know, LLMs and, and c- you know, these types of, uh, tools in the industry. David Boyd: Um, we've revised our use of that over the years, but Jeanie leverages a product of ours called, um, Insights. So our, our, uh, ShopTalk Insights is the AI call analysis We, uh, try to take, you know, we talked about that time, right? So listening the old way was go listen, if you had calls recorded, you'd just go listen to call after call after call, and- Mm. David Boyd: Yep ... you'd bang your head against the wall trying to figure out which, which one of these am I gonna beat up my service advisor about today. Um, and it was really that kind of mentality. But, uh, we have a force multiplier now. Uh, we can automatically transcribe calls. We can use that now, uh, to, to put into a custom model and go through the call analysis. David Boyd: And then additionally beyond that, we are, um, identifying teaching, training, and coaching opportunities that are consistent with the shop owner's needs. So, um, this, this is what falls back in line with a coachable opportunity. And Jeannie, you brought up a great point, which is we don't only wanna, uh, coach We wanna coach, of course, but not just like, "Hey, this is, this is something that didn't go well. David Boyd: How can we do it differently?" No matter how that's presented, it always feels like a, um, a, a weight, right? We're piling the weights on top of our advisors. If it's just, do it differently, do it better, let's go back to the... So what they keep hearing is, you know, "This is bad. I screwed up." Uh, we, we absolutely wanna leverage good examples as well. David Boyd: So our insights, uh, emails, which is the daily email process that's sent out, is, you know, from calls from yesterday, it could be calls from today, but, um, they're relevant. Jimmy, to your point, it's something that's current. It just happened, and we're going to say, "Hey, here's, here's a top call. You can review that. David Boyd: Yeah, we hit all of the points. We can look down the list of the criteria and see, yep, we really... The call flow was good, the time was good, and then we have a coachable call. And in addition to that, we have, we have other calls if you wanna review more." And it does a few things that, one, it takes that heavy lift of time off the front end. David Boyd: We don't have to go into the system, whatever that system is, whatever you as a shop owner watching this or a manager, uh, might be using to just manually listen to, to calls. You don't have to go into that system and do that. It will, uh, do all of that call, uh, listening for you, and then it will, uh, segment them out. David Boyd: Here's a coachable opportunity. This is a top call, and, uh, feed it to you, and then you can sit down with your advisor and review that, and it might be three to five minutes a few times a week or twice a week. Compare that to your old model, which you might have every few months listened to a call because somebody called and had an issue or whatever, so now we listen to that call. David Boyd: Lastly, my, kinda my last comment and observation about what this change is for owners, uh, uh, Jimmy, is the, the idea that this isn't me going and picking something, uh, to rate or review you, Mr. or Mrs. Service Advisor. This is, "Hey, the, the, the, the AI picked this up," or, "The AI reviewed this." And now it puts you in a, in a different position as the shop owner because you can come alongside your service advisor, even on your phone, and just say, "Hey, let's look at what the AI picked up today on this top call. David Boyd: Great. I, I would agree with that. I mean, may... Would you change anything about that call?" "Uh, I could have maybe asked him to co

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  Episode #218

  218 - What Your Opt-Outs Reveal: Your CRM Isn't Broken. It's Being Misused

  Sep 9, 202655 minS2

  218 - What Your Opt-Outs Reveal: Your CRM Isn't Broken. It's Being Misused September 9th, 2026 - 00:55:22 Show Summary: Most CRM systems are capable of producing results but the way shops use them can weaken customer relationships. Mass messages often focus on filling bays instead of delivering value customers actually want. Strong retention starts by understanding communication preferences and earning permission before sending messages. Shops can build stronger relationships by creating meaningful reasons for customers to stay connected. Automation can support that process but it should never replace genuine human communication. Returning customers should become a primary measure of success because lifetime value matters far more than a single repair order. A retention focused culture can create steadier car count and stronger long term growth. Host(s): Jimmy Lea, VP of Business Development Guest(s): Craig O'Neill, VP of Training Autoflow Show Highlights: [00:02:45] – CRM systems work but shops often misuse their capabilities. [00:06:32] – Mass text blasts can create opt outs instead of appointments. [00:12:10] – Effective communication must focus on what matters to customers. [00:18:18] – Customer retention should create meaningful relationships built on trust. [00:21:08] – Customers should understand why your messages provide real value. [00:27:36] – Promotional mass texts require proper permission before being sent. [00:33:28] – Retention should become a goal across the entire organization. [00:35:02] – Returning customers can reveal more than traditional sales metrics. [00:41:12] – Give customers a compelling reason to return after every visit. [00:45:35] – Safe reliable vehicles provide a powerful purpose for follow up. In every business journey, there are defining moments or challenges that build resilience and milestones that fuel growth. We’d love to hear about yours! What lessons, breakthroughs, or pivotal experiences have shaped your path in the automotive industry? Share your story with us at info@wearetheinstitute.com, and you might be featured in an upcoming episode. Unlock the full experience - watch the full webinar on YouTube: https://youtu.be/10RC8L1nKhM Don’t miss exclusive insights, expert takeaways, and real talk you won’t hear anywhere else. Hit Subscribe, drop a comment, and share it with someone who needs to hear this! Links & Resources: Want to learn more? Click Here Want a complimentary business health report? Click Here See The Institute's events list: Click Here Want access to our online classes? Click Here ________________________________________ Episode Transcript Disclaimer This transcript was generated using artificial intelligence and may contain errors. If you notice any inaccuracies, please contact us at marketing@wearetheinstitute.com . Episode Transcript: Jimmy Lea: Hello, welcome. Glad to be with you today. It is Wednesday, so excited for Webinar Wednesday. Coming to you live from the road. I'm in Eugene, Oregon, here at Brian Slater's shop in Eugene, Oregon. This is the North Eugene Auto Repair in in Eugene, and so coming to you from the road. Thank you, Brian. Jimmy Lea: Appreciate you letting me use your office today as we're out and about visiting shops. It's just an awesome, gorgeous weather here in northern U- northern... no. I was gonna say northern Utah. I'm not in northern Utah. I'm in Eugene, Oregon, and this is not northern Utah, but it is gorgeous weather. Jimmy Lea: So if you don't have gorgeous weather where you are, you wish you were here. We're gonna have a great conversation today. Those of you who have comments, questions, comments, put them into the chat section. That chat section comments allows us to have this conversation back and forth. I will be the voice for You've got questions, comments, concerns for our guest, want to make sure that those are voiced for you, put them in the comments section. Jimmy Lea: My guest with us today is ever-present, ever-linguist, Mr. Craig O'Neill of AutoFlow. Craig, how the heck are you, brother? Craig O'Neill: I'm really good, Jimmy. Really good. I was actually thinking northern Utah, as you mentioned Utah, even though it was Oregon. Both places are beautiful. I can't blame you for the distinction issue there. Craig O'Neill: That was- that's all right. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Yeah. No it is absolutely gorgeous up here. Now, I will tell you that there is a large lack of mountains in Eugene, Oregon- ... Jimmy Lea: That northern Utah does have, is bounteous mountains. Craig O'Neill: Yeah. A lot of them. Yeah. I can't wait. Ogden, a couple, next month. Next month now is October. Jimmy Lea: Yes. October for the Mars Conference. Craig O'Neill: Yep. Jimmy Lea: Yes. Yes. Speaking of Mars Conferences we're gonna put up a QR code for the Mars Conference. If you scan this QR code, it will get you right onto our registration page, and those sticking around to the very end, there is this very special, very unique offer for anybody who wants to attend the Mars Conference. Jimmy Lea: So stick around, scan the QR code. Save that in your smartphones. We are gonna have a great conversation about marketing. Craig is one of our presenters at the Mars Conference, and super excited for Craig to be here. Craig and I have known each other for a couple of years now, and worked together at a couple of companies, and- Jimmy Lea: glad that we are able to still be friends here in this wonderful industry that we call home. Craig, what are we talking about today? Craig O'Neill: Jimmy, this is the, one of my favorite topics to go into. We're talking about CRM systems, of course. Now I have some opinions about CRM systems. Both of us come from a background that deals in these systems. Craig O'Neill: You have opinions as well, and you have some observations, and my observation is simply this: the systems themselves are capable of some pretty cool things- Jimmy Lea: Yeah ... Craig O'Neill: but we aren't using them very well. The it's not broken, they're being misused, is the title of our conversation today. Your CRM isn't broken, it's being misused. Craig O'Neill: And I don't like to walk into a conversation with "Oh, you're doing something wrong", or on the opposite side of it, I don't like to walk into a conversation as you guys are doing it right. You're just fine, but other people are doing it..." Like I, I've used stuff wrong. I've made mistakes in how I leverage the different systems and tools that are available, and I just believe, and I hope you just go along with us today, there might be a better way than our way that we're approaching it now. Craig O'Neill: Be open to that. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Be open to it, because what they're, what you as a shop may be doing today is working. Craig O'Neill: Yeah. It's not even a debate. It is getting results of a certain level and type that are appearing to be adequate. Jimmy Lea: Adequate for today. And hopefully with this conversation that you and I are gonna have as we talk about the customer relationship management software Hopefully there's something we can expose shops to that might say, "Hey, maybe there is a different way of doing this." Craig O'Neill: Yeah. Jimmy Lea: So what are these ways? What are the five mistakes that shops make the most, or not the mistakes. What, how can we help these shops improve? Sure. I would call Craig O'Neill: them hurdles that we have to get over, right? Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Yeah. This one it's an opportunity for us to make it better. It's an opportunity to make it better. Jimmy Lea: This is what it is. It's not a mistake. You're not doing it wrong. Consider this. Craig O'Neill: Yeah. We're gonna talk about a lot of things on this, and I think before we even get into those hurdles, let's talk about the nature of communication today. Yeah. People's attention span today, because I think that there's a couple of different things that we need to understand. Craig O'Neill: And first off, let's talk about why we even wanna leverage a CRM system. And for many shops, you might have a sustainable s- sort of automatic practice here, but when you're a busy shop, you feel very successful, and then all of a sudden things are not as busy as they are. This happens to all of us. All the time. Craig O'Neill: We've ... shop, Jimmy, our transmission shop, family business that I came up, down into grew up in, and like we never had a slow spell. The shops around us always had those little slow spells, and we're like, "Yeah, we don't." And that was a good feeling until it happened to us, too. So we're all vulnerable to it, and the knee-jerk reaction that I see is this. Craig O'Neill: People as eventually hit that slow spell. They check, see if other people are experiencing it, too. We comfort ourselves with the fact that others are doing it, defining it as a, a market-wide symptom of broader events that we have no control over. And so then we can just comfort ourselves with another idea. Craig O'Neill: It's like, "Ah, it'll come back around." And I heard this over, and over again from my family who is owner of the business, my, my dad and my grandpa, because that has been the experience. It always comes back around. Why would we ever be okay with the fact that a slow spell also technically always comes back around? Craig O'Neill: And if our knee-jerk reaction to those moments is then to go into a, a degree of marketing or a degree of follow-up or a mass blast text strategy, like I see a lot of people fall into is like, "Huh, the work needs to be drummed up. We'll turn to our CRM system. We'll construct the perfect message and send it out, and then people will make appointments and fill our bays." Craig O'Neill: Sound familiar? Jimmy Lea: Oh, it does. It does. And if we know those, those times are gonna come back around because it's cyclical, what are we doing? We... It- Yeah ... is preventable. What are we doing that we can prevent this from happening and being that cyclical item? Because- Craig O'Neill: This is, this goes straight into it, because what I see people doing with the knee-jerk response is they're actually crippling their ability to handle the cycles of this. Craig O'Neill: When you do a knee-jerk text blast response, what's the number one reaction that you get to it every single time? Opt-outs. They are the most common reaction to this, and that's what I... If you go on the socials and you look on comment threads of shop owners experiencing a slow spell, they're asking each other "What's the perfect message that you can type out that gets fewer opt-outs and more appointments?" Craig O'Neill: There isn't one. There is no perfect message that gets X number of people. The ratio will never be the same in two demographics with unique people being the customers or clients in every one of the unique repair facilities that we have. There is no perfect message. Jimmy Lea: No. They're not. They're looking for that silver bullet, Craig. Craig O'Neill: Yes. It's silver bullet is the right term for this, and I discussed this on my podcast in an early episode of the podcast Speak Up: Effective Communication on the Automotive Repair Podcast Network. It was episode 14. I said, "What your opt-outs are really telling you," and I think that what they are telling us is something we need to listen to. Craig O'Neill: So now on that, let's move into the attention span of the people in the world today versus the past. And Jimmy, I love to read. I love deep thoughts, and we're gonna get philosophical for a second. I know you don't mind. Love it. We love this. Yeah. Let's Jimmy Lea: go. Craig O'Neill: Signature classic, C.S. Lewis. One of my favorites, Screwtape Letters. Craig O'Neill: In the early chapters in that book it's describing... I won't go into the details of Screwtape Letters, but the way that you distract someone if you're trying to distract them from serious thoughts in C.S. Lewis' time period was, and I'll quote here from the book that- Got the guy to think he was hungry, and then I showed him a newsboy shouting, "The midday paper," and the number 73 bus going past, and before he reached the bottom of the steps, I had him into an unalterable conviction that whatever odd ideas might come into the man's head when he was shut up alone with his books, a healthy dose of real life, which he meant by the bus and the newsboy, was enough to show him that all that sort of thing just couldn't be true. Craig O'Neill: He knew he had a narrow escape, and then years later was fond of talking about it. I w- I'll skip ahead. But thanks to the process which we set at work in them centuries ago, they find it all but impossible to believe in the unfamiliar while the familiar is before their eyes. So this is hard to digest 'cause it's C.S. Craig O'Neill: Lewis. You... It's like a tough piece of wonderful, awesome, the best flavor steak in the world that you gotta chew on a whole lot of times before you can actually get to digesting it. But the point is, C.S. Lewis's era, the distraction was you wanted to get them into this stream of events and that's your business is to fix his attention on the stream. Craig O'Neill: Teach it to call it real life, and don't let him ask what it means by real. And that stream is exactly what people are having today. This is a word used by C.S. Lewis before streaming like we are on a webinar, streaming across the web even existed. What distracted a man? Just being on the street with a bus and a newsboy shouting. Craig O'Neill: That's yesterday. That's 1940s United Kingdom, actually, in C.S. Lewis' time. Let's fast-forward Johann Hari's book, Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention and How to Think Deeply Again, absolutely nails the same point in the modern age and puts a name to it with this term called the f- this frenetic digital interruption, and he says, "Is pulling our attention away from our thoughts and suppressing your default mode network," cool term. Craig O'Neill: I think we're almost in this constant stimulus-driven, stimulus-bound environment, moving from one distraction to the next, and if you don't remove yourself from that, it will suppress whatever train of thought you had, right? And I think that frenetic digital distraction really i- it's just, we have to acknowledge this is the reality we're in today, and there's people that are struggling with notifications and attention, and bombarded with media messages. Craig O'Neill: Every news article you read has the pop-up ads. Are we in that same zone like C.S. Lewis, where a newsboy and the sign on a bus is the only thing that could distract our attention? No. We are under a constant 24/7 assault for our attention span today. That's where we're communicating from, and when your shop gets a little slow and you decide you're gonna have a knee-jerk reaction to the slowness, and you expect a message to land that leads to action with a population that's drowning in this reality, would it be any surprise that it only sees marginal results? Jimmy Lea: Is there any irony that it is called streaming? Is there any irony that it's called a reel? No. Craig O'Neill: Jimmy, it's like the oldest problems are always resurfaced again in our lifetimes today- Yep ... with different technology. Jimmy Lea: Oh, it's totally different. And now it's 17-second blurbs about it's a seven-second commercial, it's a 17-second commercial. Jimmy Lea: We're being bombarded with this instant stimuli to totally distract us from what is actually real- Yes ... and consequential, and you're being bombarded by things that are momentary blurbs of Jimmy Lea: Endorphins Craig O'Neill: Yeah. It, and it just- It's a Jimmy Lea: temporary- Craig O'Neill: You're competing with that- Yeah ... tendency too, to escape with these things. You're spot on. This, this topic is why I lead into these five barriers to that are causing us, like the things that we're misusing in our CRMs, right? Yeah. I consider them barriers or hurdles because we can get over them. Craig O'Neill: Yeah ... and we can decide to lever it right. And number one and we have a slide for this, so I put it up there. I know some people like to read and some people can listen. I wanted to put this quote on there because... And I'm gonna, fatal sin of speakers, I'm gonna read the quote. I know it's on the slide, but I know some of you can't see it, and I know some of you are only listening. Craig O'Neill: Yes. I can't read it. Oh, Jimmy, I'm sorry. It's too small. Too small? Oh, that's okay. That's why I'm here. Yeah. So- You can Jimmy Lea: read all of them. Read all of Craig O'Neill: them ... it's a big meaty slide. Problem number one though is we're not communicating to people on what matters to them. That's the problem. And to reference this point the, a great read, and please write this down, pick up this book, How to Win Friends and Influence People in the Digital Age. Craig O'Neill: Amen. If you're interested in this topic at all, read that book. It's from the Dale Carnegie and Associates. So updated for the digital age. There's so many profoundly good things in this, and this is a quote I pulled straight from the book, and I wanna make sure it gets its proper reference there. Craig O'Neill: But it says, "When it comes to mattering to others, you must discuss what matters to them. Assume all else will fall on deaf, or in this case, dull ears. This is an interesting principle to consider given the spirit in which the vast majority of people are communicating today. Most messages are primarily meant to educate others about our lives, our products, to reveal compelling portions of ourselves we think others would be attracted to. Craig O'Neill: While this appears to be an assertive strategy, it is actually a passive strategy in that it requires others to connect with us." "The trouble is that's marketing monologue, not relational dialogue. It's assumption, not assimilation. When assumption guides our efforts to befriend or influence others, the results end up on the wrong side of memorable." Craig O'Neill: Okay. End quote. That is that's another, like I'm giving you solid food to digest today. That's, that's- ... we don't have time to go this layer of depth in our presentation at Mars, so that's why I'm really happy to have this conversation today. It's a primer. If you walk in primed with some of these thoughts, you're gonna be able to get a lot more out of it. Craig O'Neill: But here's where I go with this. We are communicating from a position of our interests most of the time in the auto repair shop. When it slows down, we're interested in filling our bay. If we were really interested in having those customers come in, we would have done the harder work of relating and documenting and managing the data, all sorts of things differently to have a sustained conversation that they understood the value in, because we understand what's important to them. Craig O'Neill: And that's a whole different thing, and that's gonna come up again as we move into these, these other hurdles. But I think that's the thing, first and foremost, remember what messages right now are you pushing out there that are not memorable? I didn't give this in the slide, but I have an example recently, Jimmy very recently. Craig O'Neill: I turned 43 earlier in August, and I'm not on social media these days. The one thing that was fun is getting all those birthday harvests. You know how you get all the happy birthday thing. It's actually a lot of work. Yeah. Then you gotta go like everything and all that stuff too. But don't worry, I don't miss that entirely because I have been a patron in local businesses that have CRM systems in my neighborhood chiefly my Subaru dealership where we have a, a vehicle leased presently. Craig O'Neill: And I got three happy birthday emails from three separate people in that organization. Two of them were identical emails automatically constructed, and there was a neat little quote in the bottom of one of those emai

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  Episode #217

  217 - AMA: How the Best Shops are Confident in their Pricing

  Sep 3, 20261h 4mS2

  217 - AMA: How the Best Shops are Confident in their Pricing September 3, 2026 - 01:03:32 Show Summary: Profitable auto repair shops build pricing around financial data instead of fear or competitor rates. Rising technician pay and rapidly advancing vehicle technology make strong margins essential for investing in people training and equipment. Confidence comes from understanding the true cost of doing business and recognizing the value a skilled independent shop provides. Customers are often willing to pay more when they trust the quality and experience behind the service. Strong systems and productive teams also give owners the foundation needed to grow without sacrificing profitability. Long term success requires clean financials clear value and the willingness to charge what the business needs to thrive. Host(s): Lucas Underwood, Shop Owner of L&N Performance Auto Repair and Changing the Industry Podcast Cecil Bullard, Founder of The Institute Show Highlights: [00:01:00] – Rising technician pay makes accurate pricing more important than ever. [00:07:00] – Setting prices based on competitors leaves shop owners flying blind. [00:12:00] – Great technicians use diagnostic data but often ignore business data. [00:19:00] – Confidence means explaining why quality automotive repair costs more. [00:27:00] – Low prices can actually make customers question service quality. [00:31:00] – Build operating reserves before expanding into another shop. [00:37:00] – Create a shared vision to earn staff support for pricing changes. [00:44:00] – Automotive pricing has failed to keep pace with rising costs. [00:53:00] – Independent technicians bring valuable diagnostic skills to complex repairs. [00:59:00] – Clean financials create confidence in what your shop must charge. In every business journey, there are defining moments or challenges that build resilience and milestones that fuel growth. We’d love to hear about yours! What lessons, breakthroughs, or pivotal experiences have shaped your path in the automotive industry? Share your story with us at info@wearetheinstitute.com, and you might be featured in an upcoming episode. Unlock the full experience - watch the full webinar on YouTube: https://youtu.be/bk5g3FjpoEo Don’t miss exclusive insights, expert takeaways, and real talk you won’t hear anywhere else. Hit Subscribe, drop a comment, and share it with someone who needs to hear this! Links & Resources: Want to learn more? Click Here Want a complimentary business health report? Click Here See The Institute's events list: Click Here Want access to our online classes? Click Here ________________________________________ Episode Transcript Disclaimer This transcript was generated using artificial intelligence and may contain errors. If you notice any inaccuracies, please contact us at marketing@wearetheinstitute.com . Episode Transcript: Lucas Underwood: Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Lucas Underwood from Changing the Industry podcast. I'm a shop owner here in Blowing Rock, North Carolina, own LNN Performance Automotive Repair, and today I have the honor to be joined by Cecil J. Bullard, and we are talking pricing here, uh, on today's show, and we're talking about confidence in pricing. Cecil, buddy, how are you? Cecil Bullard: I'm great. I'm Lucas Underwood: great. You're not a has-been yet? Cecil Bullard: Not yet, brother. I'm a still-was, I think, or maybe never was. I don't know, man. Lucas Underwood: I'm a something, right? Cecil Bullard: I'm something. Somebody knows who I am. Lucas Underwood: Man, I love it, and, and listen, we're talking pricing today, and it's really interesting. I'm, I'm headed up to Kentucky, uh, for the Survive or Thrive Thoroughbred Diesel event in October, and I was working on a presentation for them, and it's really about my story as a shop owner. And for those who don't know, I, I started in diesel performance. I was selling diesel performance parts, and one of the things that we faced in the diesel performance world is they had these MAP prices, and all of these online vendors were selling their parts for MAP prices, and I thought I had to compete with that. And one of the biggest challenges I ever faced as a shop owner was overcoming that fear of charging what I needed to charge. So Cecil, how do we get these shop owners who are listening, these shop owners who are gonna view this later, to the place that they're confident in their pricing? Cecil Bullard: It, it's, it's a, a combination of multiple things obviously. I mean, we, uh, I think if you understand, um ... So let's ... See, this is gonna jump around like it always does. Uh, you keep me on focus. Um- Bet. I'll Lucas Underwood: do what I can. No promises. Cecil Bullard: Right, right now we, we have this, this, uh, techs coming in. Uh, had one yesterday, uh, you know, uh, one of my clients is interviewing a tech, and the guy's saying, "I want 100 grand guaranteed." And, uh, you know, I would tell you two years ago that was probably 65 or 70 maybe. Yeah. And so now it's 100,000. And so we have this, um, uh, you know, the, the, the shortage, right? Lucas Underwood: Yeah. Cecil Bullard: And, uh, we have a demand, and we have, uh, a necessity of probably paying more. So if I understand, you know, what I'm paying and why I'm paying it and what I need to pay, then I also have to relate that to my pricing. Because- Yeah ... um, if I don't charge enough, I don't get paid enough to pay the person that I need to enough to buy the equipment, to buy the training. And y- you know, when I, uh, was, was working as a tech, which is a long time ago, um- Lucas Underwood: Yeah ... Cecil Bullard: and, and people will go, "Oh, wow, did the cars have wooden tires?" Yeah. "Or were they rubber?" I was Lucas Underwood: gonna say, I, I Cecil Bullard: can't believe- They, they were rubber, man ... we had Lucas Underwood: cars that long ago, you Cecil Bullard: know? They were, they were rubber, yeah. But, but, um, you know, classes were, uh, few and far between frankly. Mm-hmm. Uh, mainly manufacturers had classes. We didn't have a lot of the aftermarket stuff like Asta that's coming up where we could get great tech training there or- Yeah you know, great management training. Um, and it wasn't ... But it also was very inexpensive in comparison maybe to what training is today. And the cars, of course, were a lot simpler. So there's this idea that, okay, what I'm doing ... Uh, and I think this might be one of the core problems we have with shop owners. They do not understand the value of what they do- For sure ... their knowledge, right? Yeah. Most of them, you know, uh, we still have a, probably a higher percentage of people in our industry that were not ... You know, they don't have a college degree. They didn't, uh, you know, have a master's degree in, in automotive technology or- Yeah or, you know, engineering or whatever that is. Um, and many of these guys, I had a, again, a conversation, uh, Sunday with one of the clients that, um, you know, he's like, "I, I didn't even graduate high school," right? "I, I, uh, I got into drugs. I went to, I went to prison. Uh, I got out of prison. I started to be a mechanic 'cause I, that's, I could do that." And now he owns a shop, and a pretty successful shop. Now he owns a couple pieces of property. And, but- Lucas Underwood: Yeah ... Cecil Bullard: I think if we don't value what we do- Or we don't see the value in what we do. And I also think that, that we have blinders on as, uh- Mm ... shop owners because all we really see, uh, we, and, and how we interpret what we see is probably, uh, very limited. So I drive down- Lucas Underwood: Yeah, through our lens. Yeah ... Cecil Bullard: I drive down these five streets to get to work, and there are three shops, and I drive by, you know, Billy Bob's shop, who is the cheapest guy in town, and I know that, and man, he's got a lot of cars parked outside that shop. He's always got a lot of cars. And then my phone doesn't seem to be ringing, and it's- Yeah a real, it's a natural leap to go, "Well, my price must be too high," right? Lucas Underwood: For sure. For Cecil Bullard: sure. Uh, as opposed, uh, as opposed to, number one, I don't know what Billy Bob's costs are. Yeah. I don't know if Billy Bob, uh, is paying rent, you know, how much rent. Uh, I don't know what Billy Bob's- Yeah ... paying his technicians. Don't Lucas Underwood: even know if he's doing any marketing. Right? And frankly- Those could all be comebacks, right? Yeah, and, and- Like, we don't know Cecil Bullard: Yeah, and frankly, I don't even know if he's making any money at all, right? He might be losing three grand a month, and- Lucas Underwood: That, that's a- But- That's a great point, right? Because I, I've been- Right there, done that, right? Because I, I, I was the guy riding by the other shops, looking at the other shops saying, "Oh, look how busy they are. Look at what they've got going on," not realizing that some of those cars had been sitting there for weeks. They hadn't- Yeah, for months ... got anything done. Yeah. Right. And, and a, as I dug in and I started talking to these guys, I'm going and talking to them, I'm realizing, hey, listen, they're doing twice the amount of work for the same amount of money. I'd rather have an empty parking lot and make the amount of money I'm making as I would- Cecil Bullard: Oh, yeah, yeah. If I'm not gonna make any money, I'd rather not work. I mean- Lucas Underwood: Exactly ... holy smokes, right? Exactly, and look, here, here's what I keep seeing, and I talk to shop owner after shop owner, and this- You know, David gets frustrated because we keep having this discussion over and over again. And he said- Yeah ... "Why do we keep having this discussion?" I said, "Because all of these techs leave shops and decide to start their own mobile mechanic business. They decide to start their own shop. They go out on their own and they do their own thing. And so we have to continue to teach them because they were uninterested in this when they were technicians. They didn't care." And eventually what happens is we have these new folks coming in, they get burnt, they're trying to figure out, "Why can't I pay my bills? This isn't working for me. What's going on? Why doesn't this work?" And Cecil Bullard: so then we- And by the way, they- when- Go ahead ... when people see this or, or people that are watching, many of them will be barely making a living. You know? Yeah. They, what they have is a bad job that doesn't- Yeah ... pay well. So I work- Lucas Underwood: Exactly. 100% ... Cecil Bullard: I work 70, 80 hours a week, and I, I can't go to my daughter's play and I can't do this and I can't do that, um, because I'm trying to get this car fixed so I have the money to go in the bank to pay the bills. And, and they're- They're payrolls we- ... trapped in this, they're- Yeah ... trapped in this thing, and, uh, they don't understand that, that you don't have to be trapped in that thing. Lucas Underwood: For sure. Right? And, and here's the thing, is, is over and over and over again, I have this discussion. Right? I talk to, to hundreds of shop owners and techs becoming shop owners through the span of a given month, right? Talk to- Yeah ... tons of them. Get a message every single hour throughout every single day- Yeah, every day ... from somebody, right? Cecil Bullard: I'm glad I'm not you, baby. Lucas Underwood: And so what I'm noticing is, is they're all going out and they're setting their prices, and they're using what I like to call the Oreo pricing method. Cecil Bullard: Yeah. Lucas Underwood: So they've got, you know, shop over here's on the high end, shop over here's on the low end, I'm gonna be somewhere in the middle. And I talk to them and I say, "Guys, hey, listen. I don't know if you know this, but you should probably be using data to set your prices. And that data comes from your financials, and otherwise you're flying blind because you don't know if you're pricing yourself correctly or not because you're not using the data. Now yeah, we can give you some numbers that the industry standard is, and we can get you 90% of the way there," but they all panic when you give them those numbers, Cecil. Cecil Bullard: But I'm also- They have a- I'm also, I'm also not sure there's an industry standard because- That's true ... you know, we still have shops, you know, uh, that are probably under $100 an hour in the industry. Yeah. I mean, there's that mobile guy that's out there for 80 bucks an hour. Lucas Underwood: Yeah, yeah. Cecil Bullard: And, uh, I've got shops that are- And thinks he's Lucas Underwood: doing them favors. Thinks he's doing- Yeah, Cecil Bullard: and I've Lucas Underwood: got- ... the guest a favor, man. Come on now. Cecil Bullard: I've got shops that are in the same- General location that are 250 an hour. Yeah. So I don't, I don't know that there's an industry standard. I don't think there is a standard. But- In fact... Yeah. Lucas Underwood: Here, here's the problem though, is that it- standard or no standard, the reality is, is they're setting their price- Survive ... based on feel. Yeah. They're setting their price based on what the market looks like around them and what they suspect the market will bear. And, and I'm telling you, would you go out and say, "I feel like this car needs a $4,000 control module"? No, you wouldn't do that because that's asinine. That's stupid. Why would you take your business, which has the potential to generate hundreds of thousands of dollars of revenue every single year, every single month in some cases- Cecil Bullard: Yeah Lucas Underwood: and take a gamble with it? Why would you do that? You wouldn't do that with a client's car. It just makes Cecil Bullard: no sense to me. Well, you know, we, we don't like... I, I wouldn't go to a doctor that didn't have a degree, and I don't mean this in the sense that mechanic-wise. I'm just saying if I knew the guy was a quack, I wouldn't go there because I don't want somebody- Yeah guessing about my health, right? Lucas Underwood: Yeah. Cecil Bullard: And yet I have this business, and, and my business has done everything for me, right? Lucas Underwood: Yeah. Cecil Bullard: Don't get me wrong, I've also done everything for my business, right? Yeah. But, but my business provides the money that allows me to live the lifestyle, that allows me to help the industry, that allows me to drive a nice truck, that allows me to, you know, have a, a nice coat- Yeah if I want it, that feeds my family. You know, and we can eat steak and, you know, all that. The, the business is the engine that runs your life- Yeah ... in a way, okay? And so I've got this thing that literally can create generational wealth- Mm-hmm ... or it can be a bad job where I work too hard too long and don't, and don't get paid for it. Be a burden take away from Lucas Underwood: my family. Yeah. Cecil Bullard: So, like, I, I'm talking to, uh, another shop a couple of days ago and, and we're talking about, uh, they're gonna- they wanna hire this guy who wants $100,000. And I'm like, "Okay, we can do that," right? Yeah. And I'm like, "Uh, so that's," whatever, it's 50 bucks an hour basically. And, and so, uh, what's our effective labor rate? Well, our effective labor rate's probably not what our po- Our, I think the posted labor rate was between 155 and 175, depending on the kind of car and the job we're doing and- Lucas Underwood: Yeah ... Cecil Bullard: and but the effective labor rate was probably 130, 140. And, and so now you're... I'm doing math saying, "Okay, it's $50." Then I've got 30% load, so it's really 65. And then if the guy comes in and he's only, say, 80% productive, then my cost goes from, say, 65 probably all the way up into the high 80s. Lucas Underwood: Yeah. Cecil Bullard: And now I'm paying out 55% of the labor I brought in- Instead of 40%. And so that difference of that 15% is the difference in my profit, right? Yeah. And it means I don't make money in most shops. Exactly. Yeah. Many shops are, are not even making 5% profit. Lucas Underwood: Hey. Cecil Bullard: And, and so if you're gonna lose 15% because you hired the wrong guy or you didn't price yourself correctly- Yeah ... or you didn't hold the line or you didn't build value, um, and you're gonna end up losing that 15% and only make 4%, then you have a terrible job with terrible hours and terrible pay. Um- Lucas Underwood: With no return on investment. Yeah. And, and he- here's on top of all of that, like when we look at this and we think about the whole strategy here behind setting our pricing and everything else, like profit doesn't happen by accident, okay? Cecil Bullard: No. Lucas Underwood: You're not gonna just walk into your shop one day and say, "I think the number needs to be X", and set that number and be profitable. Now, you might get lucky. Yeah. You might actually become profitable. But without clean books, without good data, without the ability to look and, and dig into the information- It's very unlikely you're gonna be Cecil Bullard: wrong Well, that's the other thing. That's the other thing that makes me a, a little bit crazy. We have these guys that are really great technicians. And- Lucas Underwood: Yeah ... Cecil Bullard: they're great technicians because of, they have the education, they have the hands-on experience, they have the right tools, the right equipment, and they also know how to read the data. Yeah. So, you know, I hook up the car, I get the, this from the scanner. It tr- I track down to the oxygen sensor. I know how to test the oxygen sensor. I know what good is, I know what bad is. I know how to look at a, a wave, uh, uh, form for a injector, and I know what good is and I know what bad is. Yeah. And so they, they do that in their job every day in their life because they think that's important and because it is, but they don't do the same thing in their business. Yeah. They, they literally pull stuff out of the air, or they listen to somebody like me, and they go, "Well, that guy's crazy 'cause he's saying we should be $220 an hour- Yeah. Yeah ... and there's no way we could be... We, every one of our clients- And let emotion drive it ... would run away. Um, you were, you were talking about the, um, the event that's coming up, the diesel event, Thoroughbred. Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, I was at, at Thoroughbred, uh, last year and the previous year. And so the previous year, uh, you know, I did a thing and, and talked about the numbers and all of that. And so the next year I'm there and I, I said, uh, "Is anyone here that joined up with the institute or became a client in the la- you know, from the last meeting?" Yeah. And there's a guy, uh, raised his hand a- and I said, "Okay. Um, if you don't mind me asking, and if you're willing to share, what is your labor rate, uh, when we started a year ago? When you joined the institute, what was your labor rate when you first came to this?" And he said, s- uh, he was like, "$79 an hour." Lucas Underwood: Yeah. Cecil Bullard: Right? And I was like, "Okay. And so I'm assuming that you walked away and you said, 'I'm gonna raise my labor rate.'" And he said, "Yeah." And, and I said, "Okay. If you don't mind me asking, what did you raise it to?" Right? He said, "Well, today we're at $180 an hour." Yeah. A year. Yeah. He went up over $100 an hour a year. Now he was- Didn't lose Lucas Underwood: all of his clients. Cecil Bullard: A- no. And I said, "Okay. A- and so how many clients realistically, just, just be as honest as you can, how many clients did you lose? Did you lose any?" And he went, "Yeah, we lost a few." Right? Yeah. And I said, "Okay. And, and who were they?" He said, "They were the people who would never pay us to do the work." I mean- Yep ... he lost maybe 3% of his clients. Yeah. And at, at 3%, so what? I mean- Exactly ... his labor rate- Lucas Underwood: 100%. Cecil Bullard: Thi

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