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Neal Maier is the Co-Founder of Tread Partners, a digital marketing agency that helps auto repair and tire shops drive success through coordinated marketing strategies. He is a skilled negotiator, salesperson, and business planner with expertise in Search Engine Optimization and Customer Relationship Management. Tread Partners has designed a full-scale re-engagement program called ReTread that brings old customers back into auto repair and tire shops.
In this episode…
Are you an owner or manager of a tire and auto repair shop that could benefit from seeing more customers walk through your doors? Or maybe you’d like to reconnect with some great customers you haven’t seen in a while? While you may be an expert in tire and auto repair, finding people willing to pay for your expertise can be tricky. Luckily, Neal Maier and his colleagues at Tread Partners have expertise in doing just that — he shares his insights with Rise25’s Chad Franzen in this episode of Gain Traction!
In this episode of Gain Traction, Chad interviews Neal about all things related to marketing your tire and auto repair shop. Neal establishes his marketing and industry knowledge before discussing strategies tire and auto repair shops can use to reach new customers and reconnect with existing customers. If you’re interested in increasing the customer base for your shop, tune in!
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- Neal Maier explains why Tread Partners knows the tire and auto repair industry better than anyone else
- What Neal finds so enjoyable about marketing for tire and auto repair shops
- How Tread Partners’ new ‘ReTread’ program helps tire and auto repair shops reconnect with lost customers
- The number one question Tread Partners receives about effective marketing
- How Tread Partners helped take one client from a state of marketing chaos to a position of marketing success
- The work that makes Neal most proud of Tread Partners
Resources mentioned in this episode:
Transcript
Announcer:
Welcome to the Gain Traction podcast, where we feature top automotive entrepreneurs and experts and share their inspiring stories. Now let’s get started with the show.
Neil Maier:
Hi, this is Neal Maier; I’m the host of Gain Traction, where I talk with top automotive business leaders about their journeys. I have Chad Franzen here of Rise25. We’ll do something a little different today. Chad, who’s done hundreds of interviews with successful entrepreneurs and CEOs, he’s going to interview me; so little change from our normal format, but I’m excited to see what Chad can ask.
Chad Franzen:
Hey, thanks so much, Neil. I look forward to talking to you. Before we get started, I’ll let everybody know that this episode is brought to you by Tread Partners. At Tread Partners, they provide digital marketing for multi-location tire dealers and auto repair shops. By using their strategy, branding, and marketing services, they help shops sell more tires and put more cars in bays. What are you waiting for? Visit them now at treadpartners.com, or email them at [email protected] to learn more.
Chad Franzen:
Hey, Neil, thanks so much for letting me be here today. As we get started here, tell me, I was looking at your website, and on there, it says that you guys at Tread Partners know the industry better than anyone else. Why do you guys say that, and can you give me a little insight as to what’s in your background?
Neil Maier:
Absolutely. Chad, years ago, I was fresh out of college, and I decided to take a year off, thinking I would eventually go to law school. I did not; I’m happy to say. And I took a job in a tire shop and was working for a tire dealer as a service advisor. Fast forward 20 years later, I’ve spent my career in the tire business. I’ve owned and operated a couple of stores here in North Carolina, and I’ve marketed for a couple of hundred shops along the way. My business partner, David Christopher, actually just recently exited his family autobody business, which he grew up in. Between Dave and I, we’ve got quite an extensive history.
Chad Franzen:
What attracts you to the marketing aspect, with somebody with such an extensive background in the automotive industry, what about the marketing aspect is so attractive to you?
Neil Maier:
The two shops I ran here in North Carolina were bigger footprint shops. One was 17 bays, the other was 10 bays and marketing played a key role in our success. We had to drive business, we couldn’t just sit by and wait on it to come to us. Through years of frustrations, worked with several different agencies who just didn’t fully understand us. I became more and more involved in marketing and eventually decided this is where I want to spend the rest of my career. I love tires, I love working with the public and love working with tire dealers, so why not combine the two?
Chad Franzen:
Tread Partners does marketing for shops across the country, have you guys been focusing on anything specific lately?
Neil Maier:
We’ve developed a new program, which we’ve named Retread that focuses on the forgotten, the lost customer. Years ago we’d sit around at the counter when it was quiet and say, “You know what, it’s been so long since I’ve heard from Mr. Smith. We haven’t seen him.” And we’d look in our point of sale system and lo and behold, he hadn’t been in an 18 months. Of course we’d pick up the phone and call him, and sometimes it’s just as simple as he got busy. He got busy, he went to a QuickLube shop and just forgot about us. The majority of the time, that was the case. Either that, or maybe they bought a new car or had moved, but they’re almost always really happy that we thought of them and called. Well, we can do that digitally, we can go back and drive your best lost customers back into your shops.
Chad Franzen:
What’s a reason why a customer may lose touch with his or her auto repair shop?
Neil Maier:
It’s as simple as. Life gets in the way. And suddenly, I’m way overdoing an oil change and it’s Sunday afternoon and my typical tire shop, my typical auto repair shop isn’t open. I’m just going to run down the street and have this other guy do a state inspection or do oil change. And it’s as simple as that, they break the cycle, break the habit of coming in, and now someone else’s oil change reminder sticker’s up on the windshield and you’ve lost them just like that.
Chad Franzen:
Hey, so you’ve been focusing on that lately, is there a number one question that you might get from clients or perspective clients as you’ve been working your way through this?
Neil Maier:
Early on when we first started Tread Partners, shifted our focus to all automotive. I asked around to different people in the industry and I got the same answer, which it’s the same question that we continue to get today, and that is, “Where should I be marketing?” There’s 101 options, there’s everything from TV to bumper stickers. And the trouble that most shop owners have is parsing through all that noise to figure out really what’s going to bring a new customer in consistently, the right kind of new customer in, and at a affordable point. Working with them to identify those core couple of pieces that every shop ought to be doing, and it’s not rocket science, it’s as simple as a really good website, paid search, SEO, being sure that you’re everywhere someone would look when they’re in need. Helping shops identify where those opportunities are and also how much should they be spending?
Chad Franzen:
Is there a different answer depending on the client or is it pretty much you start there and then go from there?
Neil Maier:
We almost always start there and then work outward. And just because the website’s the foundation, that’s the core tenant to all other marketing activities online. But the mix and the ratio and the targeting is different for every shop, is different for every market as well.
Chad Franzen:
Let’s talk about a client that you guys have helped in the past if you can think of one. If you get a chance here, think of one and then tell me how they found you.
Neil Maier:
I have a really awesome story to tell. Action Gator Tire, who’s been in a lot of our own success through the years and we’ve produced case studies around these guys, we’ve worked with for years and years, early in 2022 they had the opportunity for an acquisition. They were acquired by Mavis and something that we hate to lose Action Gator as a client, but on the other hand I’m really, really proud of our work and also can see where our work contributed to their success in ultimately selling for a higher amount.
Chad Franzen:
What was their situation when they came to you?
Neil Maier:
When we first started, and this is a really typical situation, they had a template website, and this is a big operation, at that point were 25 or so locations. Had a template website, they had an agency running their paid search who didn’t know the automotive industry and they had a separate agency running SEO for them, working on their organic placement. And it was all one, really disjointed, and number two, the cost of acquiring a new customer was off the chart, and it was because all these channels weren’t working together. We came in and helped them, one, we built a new website, but also worked to streamline those other processes so that then they could focus on the next pieces. Which in their case, we moved to social media, we moved to direct mail, but also they started building new stores. We worked a lot to help on that side too. Bringing peace of mind, I think is the big thing we delivered in that, but also giving them a consistent path to bring in new customers at a really low acceptable cost.
Chad Franzen:
Do they have any common questions or concerns at the beginning when working with you?
Neil Maier:
Oh, absolutely. Sometimes when we walk into a situation like that and look at where an agency who doesn’t fully understand automotive has been operating, the gains are tremendous there. We can say, “We may be able to cut some of these costs by seven or eight X. We can reduce a lot of waste in this.” And sometimes those numbers are so high that most shop owners push back from their desk for a second and say, “Hang on, it’s too good to be true.” And in those cases, it just takes time. It takes time to work through that process, to streamline all the different marketing channels, make sure that everything’s working together. And then over time, that number just continues to go down, to acquire a new customer.
Chad Franzen:
What was the outcome with that client? You alluded to it, but what was their situation, having worked with you for a while?
Neil Maier:
We developed a really dependable marketing program where we knew day in, day out, month after month, year after year, we had a plan, we knew exactly what to do. And when situations arose, we already had a shelf of silver bullets. We already had things on the shelf that we could pull out and deploy. When COVID first started and everything went into lockdown, we had assets, we had a plan, we had things in place where we knew what to do and how to go execute on it. Similarly, when you have a whole lot of stores, there’s always a store that struggles so we had a plan. Taking the time and working over a couple of years of working together, you start to understand the intricacies of different organizations. That’s what we built.
Chad Franzen:
Why is it important, or what would you say it’s valuable to go with one service like yours? You said this client, they had one egg in one basket, another in another basket. Why is it valuable and important and even efficient to go with one company like yours?
Neil Maier:
Could you imagine building a new custom home with no general contractor? The plumber shows up when he wants to, the electrician may not show up at all, and then the framers show up late. It doesn’t come together. And that’s exactly what we see when all of these different marketing processes, different channels, they’re all not only disorganized, but they’re not singing the same song. It’s different messaging, different offers. And it’s so disjointed it’s hard to know what works, more importantly it’s really difficult to know which pieces actually work. And pulling those things together, starting to weed out the underperforming aspects and then improving on everything else, pulling it together, the return is significant.
Chad Franzen:
Great. Hey, I have one more question for you. Over your time with Tread Partners, what would, what would you say is a moment that you look back on that you’re particularly proud of, maybe a career highlight or a big success?
Neil Maier:
Oddly enough, it’s through our clients being acquired. It’s something that I look at and can, number one, I can see, our return, but number two, that our clients, we were able to work with their clients, help them build an organization that’s so profitable and so successful that somebody else wants it. That a bigger company wants to come in and acquire it, I think that that’s a wonderful form of flattery.
Chad Franzen:
Absolutely. Hey, Neil, it’s been great to talk to you, I really appreciate your time, and I appreciate you giving me the chance to be here.
Neil Maier:
Hey, thank you, Chad, it’s a pleasure.
Chad Franzen:
Thank you. So long everybody.
Announcer:
Thanks for listening to the Gain Traction podcast. We’ll see you again next time, and be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes.
Transcript
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