Servassist Online's founder shows how a Google tool can increase the sum of your parts and services department and gives other tips for expanding your definition of local marketing efforts.

For dealerships and service chains, the best strategy for promoting your parts and service business may be to think locally but act globally. When your objective is to maximize your local presence and expand your geographic footprint, the web offers a world of opportunity.

The same characteristics of the internet that allows businesses to market products around the world can be used to advertise a service to potential customers right around the corner. Automotive service is an inherently local business, but by distinguishing yourself from your competitors and expanding your view of the local market even slightly to include neighboring communities, you can greatly affect your bottom line.

Don't discount the power of the discount
One way this can be done is by promoting parts and service coupons on the web. The use of coupons by automotive dealerships and service chains has always been a very effective tool for generating visits from local customers, but this marketing tactic has only recently made its way online.

Traditionally, coupons have been delivered via hardcopy formats such as a postcard or mailer, attached to service invoices or sent by email. With the expansion of automotive-related content online and the evolution of Web 2.0, additional opportunities exist to deliver more effective coupons and targeted specials directly where your customers are already researching and viewing vehicle information. There's a shift from push marketing efforts to pull marketing. Consumers can now be led to coupon information by way of contextually relevant site content.

Besides keeping current and relevant coupons on your own website, some placement options include enthusiast forums, online communities and third-party automotive resource sites. Many brand-specific forums and message boards, for example, feature a marketplace as well as regional classifieds section where dealers are encouraged to place posts about their current parts and service specials.

The more (and longer) you interact with consumers on such a site, the more credibility and acceptance you will command. Additionally, it's often more compelling for consumers to come across a local coupon or service special while actively researching objective, third-party automotive information than receiving it by email, when they may not be in-market for such an offer.

Google: beyond paid search
While many dealerships are already using paid search advertising to market new and used car sales (the progressive ones are even incorporating service and maintenance keywords into their campaigns), there are several additional opportunities to cast a wider net on Google.

Google Base, a products and services database, features a section devoted entirely to vehicles that can be used for car sales, but also includes a services category in which you can post service and repair-related offers. Auto service providers can specify the nature of their service, location and even forms of payment they accept, as well as include attributes (descriptive keywords and phrases) that will help consumers locate their listing.

Potential customers can search the database by keyword as well as location to pull up information on available local services, and can even specify the distance they are willing to travel for them. Submissions to Google Base can appear on Google, Froogle or Google Maps.

As Google Base is relatively new, you will likely be one of the few in your area with a parts and service presence there. Best of all, posting to Google Base is entirely free.

Google Maps, meanwhile, allows dealerships and service centers to attach printable coupons to their business listing, also free of charge. Coupons for parts and services can be created online with such specifications as expiration date, offer code and the location where the coupon is valid (currently U.S. only).

Because Google Maps provides a geographic reference for consumers and encourages them to actively seek out relevant businesses, taking advantage of this service removes one of the inherent barriers of conquest sales. As automotive service success relies largely on the convenience of your location, making your business more visible online increases your chances of gaining consumer market share and trumping the competition. 

While the reach and benefits of the web may be worldwide, the same principles and strategies employed to reach customers in Frankfurt, Germany can be utilized to target those in Frankfort, Kentucky. By diversifying your presence to as many touchpoints as possible online you can reach customers in your own backyard and beyond.

Grant W. Repsher is the founder of Servassist Online, an automotive service and maintenance resource and dealership marketing tool. Read full bio.