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How much should an auto repair shop spend on marketing?

Someone told you 5% of sales. You're not sure if that's too much or too little. Here's how Nolavi works through it, the same way a good mechanic works on a car: find the concern, the cause, the correction, then verify the fix.

1

The concern

Nate didn't know if $2,400 a month on marketing was smart or a waste.

Nolavi calculation of what a new auto repair customer is worth over two years from the shop own repair orders
Worked out from your own repair orders.
2

The cause

Nolavi worked out what a new customer is worth to his shop: about $1,140 over two years, from his own repair orders. Each new customer was costing him $63.

Nolavi idea to raise an auto repair marketing budget on the sources that pay back best
More budget only where it pays back.
3

The correction

With that math, we raised the budget on the two sources that were paying back best, and capped the rest.

4

The verification

Marketing went to $2,900 a month and new customer sales went up $6,800 a month. The Monday report shows the payback every week.

Auto repair marketing budget results showing higher sales from a small budget increase
Checked every Monday.

How we work. We make changes like this for shops all the time, using each shop's own data. The numbers shown are examples.

Auto repair shop marketing. Nolavi runs your ads, pages and posts, and follows every job from the ad to the bank. See how it works

Questions

Quick answers.

What percent of sales should a repair shop spend on marketing?

Many shops land between 3% and 7%, but the right answer is whatever your numbers show pays back. Start with what a customer is worth to you.

What is a customer worth to a repair shop?

Add up what a typical customer spends with you over two or three years, then subtract parts and labor. That's what you can afford to pay to get one.

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See it for yourself.

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