Joel Gurvine started Joel’s Mobile Detailing in 1990 with an old GMC pickup truck and some equipment purchased on credit while still attending college.  Today, his company has grown to a large team of detailers with four trucks and offers a full line of detailing services for automobiles, RV’s, watercraft and planes.   

Gurvine’s key challenge came several years after he launched his detailing business when he began to experiment with different marketing strategies.  For a period covering about three years, Gurvine spent a considerable amount of time and money, focusing on two primary mediums – television and direct mail.  He chose two different channels and ran ads for about 6 months each.  The direct mail vehicles he chose were mostly coupon-based direct mail circulars and packaged postcards.  He tried several of them over this period of time, also varying the copy and offers periodically in each.

Over time, Gurvine began to notice several trends emerging.  First, while the number of leads and subsequent new detailing customers increased, profit began deteriorating as compared to previous years.  The discounts he had offered, combined with the cost of the advertising mediums, inflicted a major dent into his profit margins.  

Second, he also noticed that the much of the new customer base he had attracted were not his ideal clients.  While the incentives offered in his advertising approach made phone call volume surge, many of these calls were individuals who certainly were not in his desired target market.  This was evident by the fact that once many of them were informed of the pricing range for detailing services, the call ended fairly quickly!  In addition, the customers who did end up purchasing detailing services were very discount-oriented and ultimately proved not to be the kind of repeat business Gurvine truly wanted.  Unfortunately, Gurvine’s good intentions led to a completely unexpected and undesired outcome.  

This marketing mistake is common among businesses owners who fail to invest the necessary time up front in analyzing and planning the marketing programs they are choosing to carry out.  Many times they are approached by advertising representatives who are promoting a great offer and making certain claims and promises about their respective advertising vehicle.  It doesn’t mean that particular advertising medium doesn’t work; it’s just simply that the business owner doesn’t invest the necessary time to really think through what they’re doing and if it will get them the desired results.

The first essential step is to truly define your ideal target market.  Questions such as age, education, geographic location, gender and income need to be answered before you can effectively choose an advertising medium that will best reach them.  It’s also important to follow guidelines for building effective ads such as creating effective, compelling headlines, benefit-driven copy and offers.  There are a number of great books out there with excellent information on this area, including “Instant Advertising”, by Bradley Sugars and “Tested Advertising Methods”, by John Caples.

Another important consideration is to take a look at your customer based and rank them A, B, C or D.  “A’s” are your awesome customers – your raving fans.  “B’s” are not A’s, but still bring you good business and refer people occasionally to you and, with some work, may be promoted to “A” level customers.  “C’s” are customers that may pay late, want more discounts, be more demanding, etc.  “D’s” are the customers that ideally you want to refer to your best competitor!  They drain your profits and your time and simply don’t value the products/services you provide.  The wrong advertising approach may produce the wrong effect by attracting more C & D customers, who ultimately may refer more of their C & D friends, family, etc. to your business – something you don’t want.

After experiencing this painful marketing result, it became the catalyst for Gurvine doing a thorough review of his clientele and really honing in on his ideal clients.  He then changed his marketing efforts to focus on building a strong referral-based business from his best and most loyal clients - busy professionals.  Through them, he was much more successful at attracting other busy professionals who have since become great clients.  This new approach ultimately proved successful for growing his business, especially his bottom line.

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