Let’s face it: your car wash company is not going to fare any better in the long run unless you employ some radical tactics to get you ahead of the competition. Fortunately, the tricks that worked for other industries can be adapted to the needs of the car wash business. That means that you can launch an aggressive online marketing strategy that can truly work wonders for your sales conversion. To this end, you have to learn a few email marketing basics before you embark on a new branding campaign online.

Car wash companies rely heavily on two factors for their continued growth and success: convenience and quality. These days, very few car owners have the time and the wherewithal to haul out their hoses, rags, and car shampoo to attack the dirt that has accumulated on their once-shiny vehicles. It’s just so much easier to pick up the phone or go online and schedule a full detailing appointment with your trusted auto shop. Moreover, unless you wish to invest in the very same cleaning equipment and materials that your professional detailer uses, you won’t achieve the same level of sparkling clean that you regularly get at the auto shop.

Enter email marketing

Email marketing is a lot like handing out flyers to passersby, only everything is done at lightning speed through the Internet. In the good old days of pre-Internet marketing, car wash companies had to rely on word of mouth, newspaper advertisements, and printed flyers to reach their target market. With just a few keyboard taps and mouse clicks, you can reach an audience of hundreds of people and send them a single message about your business, be it a new, cheaper package deal or an update about your cleaning process.

Email marketing is in line with the twin mottos of convenience and quality—one, you don’t have to spend too much time, money or effort in sending out your message, and two, you can reach as many people as are in your email listing and update them about the latest happenings in your company simultaneously.

Even as you engage in email marketing, you have to remember that it’s not a magic formula that can replace other channels of communication with your target market. You still have to update all your social media accounts as well as your corporate website to reflect the newest changes in your company. The biggest benefit of email marketing is that it feels a lot more personal than a simple Facebook status or Twitter tweet.

In both examples, all the site visitor has to do is to click “Like” or “Follow” to get updates from you. On the other hand, email marketing is a little more personal and deliberate. The user has to go through the simple process of signing up to your email list and provide his email details. Best of all, you get a free ticket straight into your customer’s inbox. With Facebook, Twitter, and other similar websites, the user could easily miss an update or two due to the sheer volume of posts and comments. But with email marketing, the message is delivered straight into the customer’s inbox, giving it a higher chance of being read by your intended audience.

Choose the right software

Your lesson in email marketing basics will not be complete until you have gone through the process of picking the right email marketing software to work with. Most software allows you to include the company’s logo within the body of the email and the recipient’s name in the subject line, along with a short description of the attached message. This way, you can reel in the recipient and convince him to click on your message, and maybe even read the entire thing.

Your messages are only as good as the email marketing software that supports them. As with any other software, you have to consider not just the actual purchase cost but also the ease of using the software in the long run, including updates and basic troubleshooting. Most email marketing tools are very easy to operate, so choose the one that you’re most comfortable with.

Using software to send your messages instead of adding addresses one by one allows you to schedule your messages however you want to. For example, you can cook up a start-of-winter promo and send out word about it just a few days before winter is predicted to officially set in your state. Or you can go for a Christmas time price slash, and send the message at the beginning of December. With some creative thinking and the right email marketing software, the possibilities are endless.

For car wash owners who are interested in car wash franchise, email marketing can be a tool for your target franchisee.

Enjoyed this post? Sign up for our newsletter to receive more valuable business and franchise info, ideas, and extras!