How to satisfy the customers you want

In the fast-paced world of automotive service, trust and timeliness are two keys to customer satisfaction, an industry coach emphasized.

Those were just a couple of key items a customer wants out of their automotive service experience, Greg Bunch, a trainer with Transformers Institute and a multi-shop owner explained at the recent Worldpac Supplier and Training Expo. During the session, Superior Service Advising: The Art of Trust-Based Selling, he outlined that service centres need to focus on trust, timeliness and quality of service when a customer enters the shop.

Bunch stressed the importance of defect-free service.

“Service with no defects,” he explained, highlighting the anxiety customers feel about the quality of repairs.

“When they bring the car into a shop, they have anxiety that their car is not going to be fixed right. Most of them have had a bad experience somewhere,” Bunch said, adding that simply getting the job done right is an expectation, not a bonus to the customer.

Bunch underscored the role of service advisors as project managers once a sale is made.

“Service advisors, are we not the project manager once that sale was made? Now I know some shops have a dispatch person. [But] at the end of the day, if I’m promising Miss Jones that the car’s fixed correctly, I’m owning that. When that car is not fixed right, who is she going to blame: The guy in the back or you?” he asked, stressing the importance of accountability.

Timeliness, Bunch noted, is both a perception and a reality that needs careful management. Customers who drop their cars off early often expect immediate attention. In their mind, being at the shop right when it opens at 8 a.m. means their vehicle is being pulled through the bay doors at 8:05 a.m.

“Unless you ask them what their expectation is — and then manage it with what the reality of the situation is — you may have an irked customer on your hands,” he observed. “It’s on the shop to set the expectations of timeliness.”

Bunch further pointed out that the perception of how long tasks should take has been skewed, with many customers conditioned to expect very short wait times for an oil changes thanks to quick-job facilities.

To manage these expectations, Bunch advised clear communication.

“Now if I reset that expectation and say, ‘Hey, Mr. Jones, we think [the job will take] an hour, an hour 15 minutes, but here’s why we do it: We have an ASE certified technician inspect your vehicle from bumper to bumper. We’re going to give you a complete health report. We are not just a place to change his oil. We look at the whole car.’”

This approach allows customers to decide if the service fits their needs and if they are willing to wait, he added.

Another critical aspect Bunch highlighted was the importance of customer service: Someone who is nice to them.

“Can you believe that? The gall of some people — they want people to be nice to them. Unbelievable,” he said tongue-in-cheek, underlining that being personable and kind is a top priority for customers.

“People buy from people that they know like and trust,” he added.

Bunch also emphasized the value of building long-term relationships with customers.

“People that know you are going to come back to you. They’re going to give you repeat business. Hopefully, nobody here works in a shop where their policy [calls for] a one-hit-wonder — cars come in, hit them as hard as they can and we don’t care if they ever come back,” he said.