Do you know that approximately 31 million Americans move each year? This is equivalent to 9.8% of the population. It’s no wonder moving is estimated to generate a revenue of $86 billion.
This indicates that the moving industry has a more significant impact on the economy than people could ever imagine. Well, people and businesses are always on the move. Individuals, car dealerships, and auctions moving to different states and countries need car hauling services.
So, the fact remains that people will always need car shippers. That’s why vehicle transporters find automotive shipping an opportunity worth exploring.
Private car movers are small companies or individuals that ship cars on their own using a single carrier. They often move a few vehicles at a time.
What drives the motivation in most private car transporters is the ability to be your boss. However, with the high fuel costs and other expenses, you need excellent marketing strategies. That is if you’re to make a good profit in your private vehicle shipping business.
Do you want to be your boss and enjoy success in the car moving industry? Keep reading to discover the simple digital marketing tips for private car movers.
1. Be Particular About the Service You Want to Offer
As a private car mover getting started, you must establish the exact kind of service you want to offer. Ask yourself, do you want to drive cars personally for those moving long distances? Or, do you want to haul vehicles on a trailer?
If you choose the last option, you’ll require a vehicle that can haul multiple cars. You’ll also need an open or enclosed trailer to carry your cargo. You must also register with the Department of Transportation to obtain your auto transporter DOT number.
You also require a motor carrier (MC) number if you plan to offer interstate car hauling services. Make sure you also accustom yourself and the drivers you plan to hire with long-distance driving regulations.
This will help you to comply with both federal and state rules. Don’t forget to take commercial automobile insurance for your client’s vehicle and your own hauler. This is necessary in the event of an accident or damage.
Depending on how you want to expand your business, you might want to consider purchasing either a new or used car. Generally, additional cars can significantly add to your revenue. If you lived in Florida for example, it would be smart to search for options at a car dealership in Florida.
2. Establish a Target Market
Owning several vehicles, setting up your company’s office administration, and booking customers should be the main focus of auto transport companies. But you would undoubtedly love to connect with the right customers.
It’s essential to define your target market depending on the services you plan to offer. It doesn’t help wasting time and resources targeting the wrong calls. This is where people keep asking for particular car transportation services that you don’t provide.
So, your target audience should be the potential customers who have problems that your car transport company can solve.
You should have the knowledge, equipment, and customer support that attracts potential customers to your services more than to your competitors.
Remember that these are the potential customers you want to market to and win them. This is the best way they can become loyal and repeat customers.
A target market that you can choose to work with includes mechanics and auto collectors. These are groups of people who could buy old cars and want them hauled to their garages. Some may wish to ship a car to a vehicle show.
Perhaps you may also want to offer car transport services to individuals by moving their vehicles to a new location. In such cases, ensure you find a target group of people who need vehicle transportation to other regions.
Some of the tips to get you started in establishing your target audience include:
3. Find Out Your Current Customers
Your present customers are a great target when seeking out the ideal market to direct your marketing strategies. This is a group that already has an interest in your service. Since you have often fulfilled their needs, they can quickly convert into your loyal customers.
- Discover who your competitors are targeting
Do you know that your competition can define your target niche? You’ll want to focus on the groups of people that your competitors are overlooking to bring in their new customers.
Determine the groups of potential customers your competitors don’t concentrate upon and direct your promotional and advertising strategies to them.
- Find out your target audience’s demographic and psychographic attributes
Demographic and psychographic characteristics will help you outline the particulars about your potential loyal customers. You’ll discover their traits and personalities in regards to why they desire your services.
Demographic attributes usually consist of individuals’ age, gender, location, income, occupation, education, and marital status.
On the other hand, psychographic attributes go deeper into an individual’s characteristics. Here, you’ll find out their interests, lifestyle, values, behaviors, and hobbies when seeking services.
- Work on self-promotion
People will always want to be sure that their vehicles will arrive in the perfect condition as they were when they shipped them. Thus, it helps to collect testimonials from a number of your satisfied customers.
You can then add these testimonials to your website and brochures. Ensure you include information describing how far you’re willing to transport clients’ vehicles.
If you have trailer-hauling services, boost your credibility by explaining how ideal your licenses and insurance are. You can also talk about how your employees must maintain accident-free records to be a part of your company.
Such are the things that will give customers confidence in your services. They’ll have a good reason to choose you over your competitors.
4. Be Keen at Establishing Your Cost of Service
Are you thinking of getting into the private car transportation business? It helps to consider every cost involved. By doing this, you ensure that you set yourself up for a successful venture.
If you’re not keen to establish the correct cost of service, you may end up not making any profit. At the end of it all, you may even lose your business.
Typically, you should charge transportation services for moving multiple cars by the mile. But, if you intend to move individual vehicles, you should charge a per-mile fee and expenses like flying back to your home area.
To boost your profits further, find ways to upgrade further. For example, to make more money, try marketing other transport load positions. You can give the option of enclosed vehicle transport as a premium car shipping profitability. Such classifications will make you earn more money from each car hauling trip.
How Can You Benefit From Hiring Private Car Movers to Ship Your Vehicle?
Eliminate the middleman when you choose to hire a private auto transport company to ship your vehicle. Usually, when you work with ordinary auto car transporters, you’re working with an intermediary.
Ordinary automotive shipping companies don’t own trailers; they only contact haulers to move their clients’ vehicles. But, when you book with a private car hauler, you deal directly with the car carrier owners.
The beauty about private car movers is that they’ll handle your car from the start to the end. They often place privately owned vehicles to auto trucks and entrust each vehicle to their personal drivers.
Another good thing about working directly with private car movers is that you get to have an easy experience. Whenever there’s a problem with the process of shipping a car, you know exactly who to get in touch with.
You can even negotiate to pick up your car the following day and find it in safe hands. They can also offer you an instant vehicle transportation quote that’s not computer-generated.
These private and professional car shippers will manually compute the rates and give you the best price. But, the car brokers often contact other sources for the price and then apply extra charges to the quotation.
So, you might find that the price quoted by private auto shipping transport is the most favorable price for you.
Key Takeaways
Are you an upcoming or existing private car mover looking to boost your venture further? It helps to come up with marketing strategies that focus entirely on your customers’ benefits.
It would help if you did everything you could to win individuals and groups who’ll end up becoming your loyal customers. These are the people who’ll take your business to greater heights.
The tips discussed above should help you put the best foot forward and enjoy success as a private car mover.
So, before you start publicizing that you can ship other people’s cars, ensure you set your business goals right and plan your resources accordingly.
All the best in your venture!
Author Bio
Dan is an editor in karrycar.it. Karrycar is the dedicated portal for the transport of vehicles in Italy and Europe, the result of a constant commitment to research, development and creation of portals dedicated to the logistics of the company Droop, an innovative Venetian start-up.
