I was near the end of a two-hour drive to pick up our daughter at college. It had been an intentionally quiet drive. I had been texting a bit, but hadn’t talked to anyone for the whole time. When my phone buzzed twice, I realized it was a call, not a text. I looked at the number. I knew it was from near my office, but I didn’t recognize it.
“Mr Swanson, this is Scott from Jim’s Auto Care. Is it okay to talk?”
My heart started to beat a bit faster and my mind started trying to make sense of why Scott might be calling.
See, I didn’t have a car in the shop.
“I was working on a car today, and it had a problem like yours. It made me start wondering if yours was okay.”
I told him that it was fine.
A couple weeks ago, Scott had worked on our car, the one I was driving right now. A light had been coming on briefly every morning. Scott looked at it and we talked. It was a problem not with the cooling system itself but with a sensor. The system wasn’t leaking but needed to be flushed. The sensor had some corrosion, but cleaning out the system should solve the problem and without the additional cost of replacing the sensor. He left it to me to decide. I picked the cleaning. He said to let him know if it didn’t work.
“If I remember, the light was coming on every morning. So it’s not anymore?”
Nope.
“Good. Take care.”
I was amazed. His records were in his head. He was concerned about the effectiveness of his work. I’m guessing he wasn’t calling with some programmed system of followup (I’ve seen the shop, remember?). He just wanted to be sure.
I’ve been there several times in the past year, looking for a new garage.
I think I found one.
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Jon has been a regular reader and occasional contributor around here since 2006. Jon works as a pastor, but he understands business better than many so-called business people. He gets that it is about people, relationships, service, and yes, even love.
Nice article, Customer Relationships are the key to your marketing success.