May 2020

BY Chris Attewell, CEO, Search Laboratory A s the country finds its feet during the current COVID-19 pandemic and the unique challenges it poses to industries of all types, it can become far too easy for digital marketing strategy to fall to the bottom of the list. With more people staying at home and working remotely, it could prove to be a challenging time for those in the aftermarket over the coming weeks. Rather than shut shop until the pandemic is over, garages can use this downtime to perfect their digital strategy, something which is often neglected during peak periods. For many businesses in the garage sector, working with customers takes up most, if not all, of their time, meaning digital marketing can receive little to no attention. With most individuals working from home and less people needing to use their cars, it is likely you will find yourself with spare capacity over the next few weeks. This is the perfect time to fine tune your digital strategy, so that you can improve future customer acquisition and retention. To stand out from the crowd and make an impact, it’s important that your brand is well-presented online. The first port of call for many customers looking for a product or service is a brand’s social media or website, and there are a few ways which garages can look to improve their digital strategies over the coming weeks. Tidy up your social channels Having a consistent presence across all your channels builds up consumer trust. Use this time to check your social media channels for consistency, including mirroring platform handles wherever possible, using the correct logos on each, and making sure your ‘about us’ information is up to date. If you have an active social media, analyse what content is driving engagement and use these insights to develop a social strategy and tone of voice. Set up Google Analytics Google Analytics is a valuable tool which can be used to understand who your customers are, how they are finding you, and what they want from your business. Now is a great time to set up Google Analytics if you haven’t already, so you can track customer behaviour and use these insights to develop an effective marketing strategy. Join up your offline and online data Tying up online behaviour (how a user interacts with your business online) with offline behaviour (such as booking in a visit, attending a visit) helps you to see how your online marketing activity leads to new customer acquisition. If you have a CRM system, now is the time to link it up with Google Analytics so you can track how users behave across the full user journey. Build an online local presence Having a strong online local presence is crucial, as it helps to direct those looking for a garage online to your business. Creating or updating your Google My Business listing(s) and getting listed in important local directories can help to boost your online presence for location-based searches, helping to drive more footfall once restrictions are lifted. Optimise, optimise, optimise Search engines want to drive users to relevant results on high quality websites, which both answer their questions and provide a good user experience, so making sure your content is optimised is key. Using 16 AFTERMARKET MAY 2020 BUSINESS www.aftermarketonline.net IRONING OUT YOUR DIGITAL STRATEGY Now is the perfect time for garages to line up their marketing