Home / Industries / Mechanics and bodywork
A car that won't start on a Monday morning, an orange warning light on the dashboard, a crumpled wing in a car park: every time, the driver gets out their phone. There they first find auto centres, national chains and online quote sites. I work on your Google Business Profile and your website so your workshop is among the answers, with what you repair and the communes your customers come from.
15 years in SEO
4 books on SEO and GEO
200+ sites tracked every day
1M / month visits to my e-commerce site
They trusted me with their visibility
Darty
Eurofins
Cegid
EBP
CNP Assurances
Ingram MicroThe map, on a breakdown morning
A car won't start in Jarnac. Its owner looks for a garage on his phone. Google shows him three profiles: an auto centre, a dealership and a workshop twenty minutes away. Yours is in the same commune, in fourth place. Get it onto the map.
Fig. 1. A breakdown in Jarnac, three profiles, none in the commune. (The garage was five hundred metres away. Its profile didn't say what it repaired.)
What this means for you. I fill in on your profile what Google can't guess: your repairs, your real hours and the communes your customers come from.
SEO for a garage is the set of adjustments that make a garage or body shop show up on Google when a local driver looks for a service, a repair or bodywork after a knock. It rests on an accurate Google Business Profile, one website page per family of repairs and reviews describing real repairs. It's judged by the number of workshop bookings, not website traffic.
The problem
For “garage” followed by a town, auto centres, networks and quote comparison sites take up almost the whole page. They have budgets you don't. An independent workshop doesn't overtake them on their turf; it has to pick its own.
Every garage writes it. A driver looking to get an automatic gearbox repaired, a van serviced or a classic car back on the road doesn't know you do it. They go to whoever wrote it down.
After a claim, drivers usually follow the address they're given over the phone, without looking further. An independent body shop needs to be found before that call, with repairs to show.
An audit, for real
The site below doesn't exist, but its flaws do: they're the five I spot most often. Hover over a number.
Your all-makes specialist
Servicing, repairs and bodywork: quality at a fair price for your vehicle.
Call usFig. 2. Fictional site, reconstructed. Any resemblance to yours would be a good reason to call me.
What your customers type
Six plausible searches for a mechanics and bodywork workshop. They're examples. The audit establishes the ones for your area, with their volumes.
What works
For a garage, the map brings in a good share of calls. I check the main category, secondary categories such as bodywork, the hours and the phone number. I add photos of the lift, the paint booth and the front of the building, so people recognise the place when they arrive.
Servicing, brakes, timing belts, clutches, air conditioning, diagnostics, bodywork, paintwork: each family has its own searches. One page per family tells Google which question you answer. A single page called “Our services” ranks for none of them.
Against the chains, it's your strong point. Vans, automatic gearboxes, hybrids, classic cars, motorhomes, a brand you know well: I help you pick one or two real specialities and give each a full page.
Drivers are afraid of the bill. You don't have to publish a price for every model. Explaining your hourly rate, what a quote contains and the approval you ask for before any extra work addresses that fear. For price display, your obligations remain those of your profession and I don't rewrite them.
A “good garage” review carries little weight. A review mentioning the timing belt replaced within the day describes your work. I set up a review request at key handover, with a question that draws out that level of detail.
What costs dearly
It comes from a stock photo library and you don't repair them. A photo of your workshop, with an ordinary car on the lift, tells the truth and inspires trust.
Saturday closing, August holidays, May bank holiday weekends: the profile still shows the hours from three years ago. A customer who finds the shutter down doesn't come back.
They're two different customers, with two different worries. Each should find their own way in from the menu.
Many drivers search when the workshop is closed. A form asking for the model, year and problem lets you call back the next day with an answer.
The method
Four steps. I start with the profile, because it works without waiting for the website to be redone.
One-minute test
Five frank questions to find out whether support makes sense in your situation. Sometimes the answer is no, and I'll tell you.
What it brings in
A ranking doesn't pay a salary. What counts is what it brings: enquiries, customers, revenue. Move your page up and see what it could bring in.
Example assumptions, open to challenge: 900 searches a month for a garage in your commune, 5% of visitors send a request, one request in three is signed (this varies a lot between industries), €450 per client. Click-through rates by position are rough orders of magnitude, and they've been shifting since Google started showing AI answers above the results. Redo the maths with your own figures
Possible revenue€0
Close to home
Charente is organised around Angoulême and Cognac, with small towns like Jarnac, Barbezieux, Ruffec and Confolens. In town, people search for a garage by neighbourhood or type of repair. In a small town, they type the name of the commune and check how far away the workshop is. The Newp agency is based in the département, which I know well, and we can meet there.
In a small town, your customers already know you. A newcomer, though, searches for “garage” followed by the name of the commune. A complete profile and a page naming the neighbouring communes introduce you before their first call.
Near the retail parks of Angoulême and Cognac, people often search for a specific service, with the town's name. An independent based nearby should write down what sets them apart: the tricky fault, the gearbox, the classic car.
Tradespeople, winegrowers, farmers: a professional who drives a van or a pick-up looks for a workshop close to their work. If you service these vehicles, say so on a page for professionals, with your usual turnaround times.
Beyond Google
A driver now describes their breakdown to an AI such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude or Mistral in their own words: “my car judders when pulling away and the clutch slips on hills, is it serious, and which garage near Cognac can deal with it?”. They get an explanation of the likely fault, an idea of the work involved and sometimes the names of two or three workshops.
Those names come from what the AI has been able to read: your website, your Google Business Profile, your reviews, drivers' forums, directories. A workshop that writes “clutches and flywheels, cars and vans, Cognac area” gives it a sentence to reuse. “All-makes mechanics” gives it nothing. I align these sources with one another, and from time to time I check what AIs say about garages in your area.
Question asked to an AIMy clutch is slipping and I live near Cognac. Which garage can replace it quickly?
Three workshops come up for this replacement:
Fig. 3. Reconstruction, names hidden. This is the spot we aim for: on the list, with the most precise description.
Three typical cases
Three cases put together for illustration. None describes an existing garage. Yours will get its own plan after the audit.
Its customers are getting older and newcomers go to the retail park.
Its business depends on claims sent its way by a few insurers.
It gets cars from across the département, but only through referrals.
In practice
Pricing
The fee depends on four things. I give you a precise amount after a free first thirty-minute conversation.
Fancy a game?
The copycat, the price-slasher, the big chain: they all want your spot. Grab the piece and slide it into the slot.
INSERT COINSLIDE THE COIN INTO THE SLOT
Fig. 4. Sixteen seconds, five opponents, only one first place.
Together, let's devour your competitors.
One by one, and in order. Every spot gained makes the next one easier to take: that's why it keeps growing. See the method
Who you're talking to
My name is Kévin Papot. More than fifteen years in the job, four co-written books, and the Newp agency, co-founded in Charente. I also run my own online shops, in France and internationally: one of them went from zero to a million visits a month.
Before we talk tags, we talk margin, average basket and profitability. When you book a call, I'm the one who picks up.
FAQ
For “cheap service”, no, and I won't promise you that. For your commune, your speciality and the faults you know how to fix, it's possible. These searches are fewer, but they bring in drivers who need what you do.
Publish what you can stand by: your hourly rate, the price of a simple job, how you put a quote together. For the price display your profession requires, apply your usual rules. The website repeats the same information, without inventing any.
It's an asset with owners of that brand, provided you write about it within the limits your contract sets. For other vehicles, a separate page makes it clear that you take them too.
Not straight away. For a few months, note what each source brings you and what it costs. Once your own requests come in, you decide with figures.
Calmly, in public, with the facts: the signed quote, the work done, your offer to talk it over at the workshop. Readers judge your reply as much as the complaint. I give you an outline; you keep control of the wording.
One website, with two clear sections. Two websites mean twice the work for trust split in two. On the Google Business Profile, both activities appear in the categories and services.
Those customers will stay with you. The question is about the ones arriving: newcomers, young drivers, your customers' children. They search on their phones before calling.
You can say that you prepare vehicles and fix the faults found, if that's the case. I don't write any rules about the inspection itself: those rules change and aren't your workshop's responsibility.
About ten to start with: the front of the building, reception, the lifts, the paint booth, the team if they agree. A recent phone is enough. Blur customers' number plates before publishing.
I don't give a firm timeframe. Profile fixes generally work before website changes, and a new workshop page takes several months to find its place. You follow progress in the monthly report.
See also
30 minutes · video call · with me
Together we look at where you stand on Google and in AI, and what should change first.
