Years of negative stereotypes of blue collar careers have done irreparable damage to this field. Most young people don’t realize that these jobs take serious technical know-how and can even pull down a six-figure income – and schools and dealerships have not been on top of marketing and portraying technician jobs accordingly.
But it’s not just that there aren’t enough techs to go around – it’s that the field becomes increasingly complex with each passing year. In addition to understanding the standard vehicle workings, auto technicians must now have detailed knowledge of diagnostics and telematics systems.
In the midst of this decline, dealers are struggling to keep their after-sales revenue coming in, as service bays stack up and waits get longer.
The Burden on Dealers
Fixed ops departments draw in the most consistent revenue for dealerships. One study performed by DealerSocket indicated that after-sales accounted for 60% of dealerships’ net profits. Thus, for every service bay that is not in use, dealerships stand to lose a significant source of revenue.
Unfortunately, many dealerships across the country are experiencing this first hand.
Dealers struggle to find and keep technicians with the right training, which leads to less availability to provide services. Business owners can’t afford to let their vehicles wait for service, so when necessary, they will go wherever there is an open spot available.
When your customer retention depends entirely on your ability to provide services, finding the right technicians becomes of the utmost importance. As a result, dealers have started taking the matter into their own hands.
The Dealer Solution
Although in the past dealers have invested time in training up lower-tier techs that are already employed through the dealership, this solution is shortterm at best and does not solve the chronic issue. Eventually, these trained mechanics will leave or retire, and dealers will be back to square one.
Instead, some forward-thinking OEMs and dealers are implementing large-scale recruitment programs to stem the shortage. These programs offer financial incentives for potential candidates to get vocational certificates in the automotive technician field, which in turn allows dealers to hire freshly trained and highly skilled techs while providing program graduates immediate employment.
The New York Times recently reported on one of the longest-standing programs, initiated in the 1980s by Fiat Chrysler.
This program, known as Mopar Career Automotive Program, partners with trade schools and community colleges to offer paid internships to automotive tech students during their schooling. This gives the students the opportunity to develop their expertise while earning an income, and they may even be hired on by a Fiat Chrysler dealership once their schooling is complete.
BMW offers their own program known as STEP (Service Technician Education Program), but instead of providing paid internships to students within a local trade school, they actually developed their own BMW-specific training course, which is free for the students. Tuition is paid by the dealership that hires the graduates – a fair trade-off as the dealerships gain technicians that are skilled not only in the automotive field in general, but in the specific brand with all its nuances.
Even dealerships that do not wish to enact nationwide programs could do so at a community level by partnering with a local trade school. Dealers may be able to arrange an exchange – the dealership provides tools or vehicles that students can work on, and the institution could allow the dealership to post employment or internship opportunities directly to the students.
Though these types of programs have been implemented mainly for passenger vehicles, dealers and OEMs of commercial or heavy-duty vehicles could stand to take a cue from these campaigns and implement their own technician training. This would fill a niche that is currently wide open and would provide enormous benefits to the commercial vehicle industry as a whole.
Solving the Recruitment Problem
Yet, even with programs and incentives, we’re still left with the challenge of finding recruits to join these programs. This is where strategic marketing and targeting come into play.
First, special attention needs to be paid to the messages being sent when marketing these positions. The goal should be to dispel myths about technician jobs, while considering what younger generations want out of their job and appealing to those aspects.
For example, Millennials are known for valuing jobs that are engaging and goal-oriented. A career as an auto technician provides fastpaced, ongoing work with heavy emphasis on problem-solving: in short, high-speed engagement with daily goals. Additionally, such careers should appeal to this frugally-minded generation, as they don’t require a bachelor’s degree and can pull down a hefty income. Emphasizing these points can be the key to drawing in this hard-to-reach target.
Once you have solid messaging in place, the next challenge is disseminating it to the proper targets. One way to do this is to have representatives from your dealership attend local high school and college career fairs, armed with material that provides detailed information about what auto techs do, the technology they work with, and the earning and growth potential. This allows you to reach your ideal demographic and give them hard facts about the industry, while developing a personal connection with these potential recruits.
But face-to-face marketing should never stand alone – it needs to be supported by smart and strategic digital campaigns.
Paid search and display, in addition to social media marketing, are highly effective ways to target the right people. These tactics allow you to reach your ideal demographic based on what they search for. For this situation, you want to target people who are researching career options or college choices, since they are prime candidates for drawing into an auto tech career path.
At the end of the day, these strategies are here to help you gain new recruits, but more importantly, to help change the way people think of auto technician jobs. By re-branding the technician field as one of advanced skill, technical ability and career growth, you achieve the long-term goal of casting this field as an exciting career opportunity – one that offers fulfillment even to younger generations.
Investing in the Future
The social and economic shifts that led to the decline in automotive technicians can be overcome if dealers and OEMs alike are willing to invest in the upcoming generations. Though it will require significant time, effort, and patience, this investment will be invaluable in its return – bringing stability back to the dealership model, and to the technician field as a whole.
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