CollisionCast

Grant Sunday, owner of Don’s Body Shop in Olathe, Kansas, has excelled in an area many business owners struggle finding the time to fill: philanthropy and grassroots marketing. And while any bit of philanthropy can benefit a business, Sunday is showing there are ways to get creative with your local efforts, from hosting Cub Scouts for building pinewood derby cars, to providing internships for local deaf students, to donating cars to the local fire academy. Sunday is proving that thinking outside the box isn’t just good exposure—it’s good for shop culture, and it's good for business.

Matt McDonnell, owner of Big Sky Collision and A&D Auto Body in Montana, discusses why his shop began performing routine vehicle scans, the challenges he's faced—and the victories. 

2016 FenderBender Award Winner Kyle Wharff, owner of Ace Sullins CARSTAR, boasts industry-leading customer service numbers. His shop owns a 100 percent Net Promoter Score, 97 percent of customers come from repeat customers or referrals, 100 percent of customers report felt they were kept informed and received their vehicles on time, and there have been zero comebacks in 2016. And because Ace Sullins owned the top performing CSI scores at CARSTAR so many years in a row, Wharff was awarded the Esurance Lifetime Achievement Award. He details his customer-focused repair process and what sets him apart from other shops.

It’s become both an important marketing component and a source of frustration for many small business owners: online reviews. While word of mouth referrals are of utmost importance, it’s getting to the point where you can no longer ignore online reviews, which, as surveys show, are becoming more and more important to consumers. Kevin Dean, president of Internet marketing agency WSI Net Advantage, breaks down strategies for building your online presence and how to turn any review—even a negative one—into a marketing opportunity for your shop.

Only 57 percent of single-location, independent repair shops routinely routinely track key performance indicators (KPIs), according to the just released 2016 FenderBender KPI Survey. And that’s compared to 89 percent of all other shops. MSOs, dealerships, franchises—they all track at a significantly higher rate. So, where, and why, are independent shops falling behind? What are the numbers that all shops, regardless of size or scale, should track? What can shop operators do to use these numbers to drive success? FenderBender columnist Mike Anderson answers these questions and more in this episode of CollisionCast.

As the largest rental car provider in North America, Enterprise Rent-A-Car publishes its quarterly length of rental (LOR) data for the collision repair industry as a tool to help repair businesses increase operating efficiencies, enhance customer service and streamline communications with insurance companies and customers. Dan Friedman, assistant vice president of collision repair industry relations and sales at Enterprise, discusses the latest length-of-rental trends, what’s impacting those numbers and how shops can take advantage of length-of-rental reporting to increase efficiency and boost customer service.

Only two years after launching

Kevin Rains, a FenderBender columnist, Cincinnati shop operator and collision industry consultant, offers a sneak peek into two sessions he’ll be leading at the FenderBender Management Conference Sept. 19–21 near Chicago. Both topics are areas of expertise for Rains, and areas in which he is always striving to improve: social media marketing and leadership. Hear what social media strategies stick for shops today, as well as what makes leaders effective.  

A common gripe in the collision industry is that insurance companies are difficult to deal with. Wayne Griffin, a former quality assurance reinspector for Safeco, discusses how he plans to manage DRP relationships as the new director of operations for Walker’s Collision Repair, and how both sides can work together to improve relations overall.

Roughly one year after the aluminum-bodied 2015 Ford F-150 hit the streets, the collision repair industry is still scrambling to become aluminum ready. Aaron Clark, vice president of technical compliance for Assured Performance Network, describes the industry’s status and what shops need to do to prepare for the future of vehicle design.