Car counts and inbound phone calls are at an all time low and cash for clunkers is taking maintenance business off the road. How then, is it possible that shop owners just like you are not only surviving in this down economy, but their shops are thriving? The answer is simpler than you think. They’ve decided to embrace two next-generation technologies that are allowing them to increase their weekly car count, have a higher average repair order, and get more regular maintenance business into their shop. The technologies we are talking about are ProfitBoost’s PIF Pro System and Demandforce’s D3 platform.

Demandforce and ProfitBoost recently partnered with the goal of making it easy and cost effective for shops just like yours to communicate with their customers, market their services, and increase their bottom lines. The integration between ProfitBoost and Demandforce allows you to gather customer, vehicle, and repair order information from your ProfitBoost system and use it to automatically communicate to customers via email, postcards, and text messaging 7 days before their vehicle is due for service. Through this seamless integration, you’ll have a simple and pain-free way to leverage the data that’s already in your shop management system to get the most of your marketing and communication efforts.

Richie Sleezer of Lee Myles Transmission and Auto Care in Bohemia, NY is a great example of how these powerful technologies working together can positively impact your business – In fact, in Richie’s case it is to the tune of over $47,000 a year in additional revenue. With ProfitBoost and Demandforce working together, Richie’s shop has seen an increase of 13% in his average repair order and an 86% increase in the number of leads he’s getting from the Internet.

The integration has also allowed Richie to provide better service to his customers.After implementing Demandforce and ProfitBoost together, one of Richie’s oldest customers who had not been in for some time, received a communication about his vehicle’s maintenance needs. Richie’s customer responded and let him know that his previous experience with his shop was less than satisfactory. By simply opening up the lines of communication, Richie was able to address the customer’s issue and bring him back into his shop. The individual is once again a happy customer and he’s made Richie’s shop more attractive to prospective clients by writing a positive online review about his experience.

We’ll talk more about your online reputation next month. In the meantime, if you’re ready to get out of survival mode and start increasing your bottom line, call us today: 1-888-274-3776

ProfitBoost Software hosted it annual retreat in Phoenix again this year. Having 50 shop owners come together for training and support is very exciting says Scott Johnson, CEO of ProfitBoost. This is ProfitBoost Software 7th year selling and supporting web based software and even with the down turn in our economy owners attending reported solid sales and profits.

At this year’s retreat ProfitBoost unveiled new features in their software, VIN# decoding with solutions provided by CARFAX, online marketing with solutions provided by DemandForce, integrated Credit Card processing with solutions from Merchant Partners and online parts ordering with solutions from WHI, Wrenchead. Attendees were honored to have Todd Westerlund from DemandForce, Ed John from Merchant Partners, Gerald Bayer & Chris Markiewicz from CARFAX attending and present mini seminars explaining the benefits of their services and products. It was very exciting to unveil and have representatives present to answer questions and explain the benefits and the values of these new features to the ProfitBoost clients.

ProfitBoost Software is working on new features to be released at next year’s retreat, being web based and aggressive in development is exciting and plans are already being made for the 2010 retreat says Scott Johnson.

The retreat was topped off by the ProfitBoost group attending the Phoenix NASCAR Saturday night race at Phoenix.

"We use the Profit Boost software. I look at gross sales, average pif, percentage of profit on the reports. I also look at technician billed hours every week, as this seems to be a stumbling block for us. After an AWESOME profitboost seminar, where yourself, Roger Bland, Tom Gunn, Maylan and Ray&Ray from ESI, and all the gurus from Profit Boost spoke, I am going to start looking at other items also. They said to look for trends, and thats what I'm going to do. I have to say, I have seen the posts about other seminars and they do sound like people are getting a lot out of them. For our comany, the Profitboost seminar, which is free if you use their software, is untouchable. The quality of speakers, and the size and diversity of the group allows for a lot of dialogue, which is great. I know you guys all lurk in the background on the forum, so I will say THANK YOU all for the best seminar yet."
- Scott Medori
Parkland Transmission 4702-51 Ave. Red Deer,Ab.

ProfitBoost software – the makers of the PIF Pro Repair Order Writing software, announce a new credit card system that tightly integrates merchant processing from the third largest bank in World.

We have negotiated a unique agreement for our customers including the following benefits:

• Automated reconciliation including RO# and Account information are posted automatically to the gateway
• Transaction dollar amount is prefilled into the system eliminating errors.
• Free hardware, tied to the PC - don't have to share credit card terminals.
• Meet or beat your existing credit card processing fees.
• Processed securely via the internet - save on expensive dedicated phone lines.

"Ultimately this integration is about saving time, cutting costs and reducing errors while using our repair order writing software" said Scott Johnson, President of ProfitBoost Software.

For more information please call 1-888-274-3776 x820 to speak with a software consultant or visit our website for more details http://www.ProfitBoost.com/

ProfitBoost software – the makers of the PIF Pro Repair Order Writing software announce a new cross reference system to automatically match old Transtar part numbers to the new the part numbering system - increasing ordering accuracy and saving time.

Since the acquisition of Axiom, Transtar Industries has chosen to adopt the former Axiom part numbering system and phase out the legacy part numbers.

The ProfitBoost repair order writing system has the ability to load entire part catalogs into your program - saving you time, providing accurate descriptions and your specific pricing. ProfitBoost recognizes it takes time to learn new part #s and recently released a new cross reference system that automatically links the old familiar part number to the new, making it easy to look-up parts using either number saving time when adding parts to Repair Orders. In addition it improves accuracy and saves time when Ordering parts.

"Fast accurate parts ordering is important" said Scott Johnson, President of ProfitBoost Software - "We are offering this cross reference system free to our customers".

Call 1-888-274-3776 to speak with a software consultant or visit our website for more details http://www.ProfitBoost.com/

Good thoughts.....I agree with all of you........each one of us has to know what we need to be profitable.....doesn't matter what anyone else marks up.....remember back when the 440's first came out? we didn't have a problem not pricing them out because we didn't know what we needed and what parts might cost etc.. so we didn't shoot out prices..... the more comfortable we get with a transmission or a job or whatever., the more freely our mouth runs and we start picking prices out of the sky..... I am excited about the profitboost system, if we know we need x amount of dollars to make a profit, we will get it.... I do care what everyone else charges, parts, labor etc.... but I do not base my prices on them....We can explain to the majority of the people why we charge what we do and it will satisfy them.....really, most people never ask......the system I have right now marks my parts up by 67% thats profit margin not % of cost......many companies have a parts price matrix for parts as they go up in $ amount.......that's not bad either......it's hard to mark up a part that costs you 500.00 for a 67% profit...... I have tried to stick to marking up whatever I buy from a dealer, parts store etc....at least 50% ....I admit I am not real consistent on that......profit boost would help me there....I agree with kicking up the labor sometimes if we have to to achieve the profit we need for the job....... we have to make sure we don't apologize for making a living.....if we give it away, people will gladly take it..... Mike

Using the Taurus / Motor Home example is exactly why it is dangerous to use percentages as a pricing tool or a barometer when making a selling decision. Sometimes the job with lowest % of profit will have the highest dollars of profit.

The Taurus took $600 in parts cost and $400 in labor cost or $1,000 total Parts and Labor and sold for $3,000. In other words $3,000 - $1,000 = $2,000 Gross Profit, divided by 20 hours of Tech time = $100.00 Gross Profit per Hour.

The Motor Home took $7,000 in parts and $160.00 in labor cost and the job sold for $10,000. In other words $10,000 - $7,160 = $2,840 Gross Profit divided by 8 hours of tech time = $355.00 Gross Profit per Hour.

I hope we all agree that financially it is a better decision to work on a job with 28.4% gross profit and make $355.00 per hour than on a job making 65% gross profit making $100.00 per hour.

If it was that easy it would be simple to make money, But, in reality what happens we need to work on all, or most of the jobs that we have an opportunity too and at the end of the week make sure we sold enough hours, of our inventory of hours of technician time at the right price so that ON AVERAGE you have created enough revenue to cover your expenses and make a profit.

Doing this mathematically could be possible, but in reality almost impossible, that is why Sam say he has a computer program and not a formula. Now if you know your exact overhead and fixed expenses and your average revenue, you can mathematically determine how many dollars you need to pay the bills and then back into what percentage of profit you need to achieve those dollars.That may be the reason some owners say they have X% as a goal or target. If they don't know those exact number they are probably guessing.

Again, it is the job mix, the shops throughput and capacity, overhead and fixed expenses compared to revenue generated that determines what percentages a shop owner needs to succeed.

I hope this was helpful.......
--

Scott Johnson
ProfitBoost, LLC
scott@profitboost.com
1-888-274-3776 x820
http://www.ProfitBoost.com/

Last week I had my dishwasher quit working, actually it was a month ago and we washed by hand for 3 weeks before I got enough heat from my wife to get it fixed. In those 3 weeks I stopped by the Appliance Parts supply and asked for a reference, they would not give me one, didn't want to show any favoritism. I asked some friends for a referral and didn't get any results.So to the yellow pages I went, I got answering machines, nobody available..please call back, Hello..hold on, we're to busy..can't get to you for a while. So I asked for a reference from the one of the shops to busy and finally got referral to a business that answered the phone properly, the scheduler made a mobile call while I was on the phone to one of the technicians in his mobile van and I had service within 1 hour, the tech was clean, good communication skills, good diagnostic skills, in and out in an hour. He had to order the parts and was out the next day and fixed my dishwasher.

The similarity to my dishwasher problem and the average guy or gal with a transmission problem was so parallel that it got me to thinking.of the similarities.

1. I first asked for referrals from friends then from businesses, nothing felt good.
2. I then went to the phone book and experienced very poor phone skills, but got a referral.
3. I made a buying decision based upon good phone skills and immediate service.
4. It took about 10 calls to get someone I felt I could TRUST.

Now, after the repair the person answering the phone and scheduling the work has called me, checked on the repairs, and she remembered a bit of personal information and asked me about that. Then she asked about my other appliances, how old they were, and suggested I have them all checked for operation. Well I want my stuff in perfect condition so I scheduled a visit to have the Refrig moved and cleaned underneath, the washer and dryer serviced and cleaned. Bottom line, I got my problem fixed and then allowed preventative maintenance services to be sold to me.

It's all about answering the phone, do the work quickly, physically looking good, being professional, proper easy to read paper work, and following up after the sale.

Now if the dishwasher doesn't leak ATF in the driveway I'll be very happy.

Scott Johnson
ProfitBoost Software LLC

I have to agree with Scott,  It was my first profit boost Seminar , All I can say is WOW!! .....  The best of the best .

By the way, good to meet you Scott and all the others  on this forum that attended.

I hope you did not get in to hot of water with the wife over the golf clubs!

Andy Lundsted
Owner: Certified Transmission
"Where our customers send their friends"

Yes, John is great. We started with Summit back in the late 80's early 90's with a dos program. I loved it and was so used to working it. Then it became necessary to upgrade or change to another program. He gave me such a great offer/upgrade since I was with him so many years, that I couldnt refuse! However, its a whole new learning experience. If I did not have such a long history with them, I think I would go to Profitboost now.

Brad Benrud
Allen Automatic Transmission

I am new to this forum but I have a general question for anybody.  I am researching Shop Management programs and trying to figure which one is best to use.  We are a transmssion shop but do a lot of general repair as well.  We also work on a lot of medium duty trucks (F800, C6500, etc) as well as a fair amount of fleet work.   What software management program does everyone use & what is good or bad about it?  Any suggestions on what to watch out for?

I have been manually keeping a database but with the amount of work we do, it is starting to get tedious.  Any suggestions, comments, warnings would be appreciated.  In other words, what's working for you guys?

Toni
Bill's Transmissions