Case Study: Auto Repair Shop Grows 31% With Digital Marketing (2025)

Nov 14

Milex Complete Auto Care - Mr. Transmission opened their doors in 2020, so you can imagine the obstacles they faced right off the bat. Plus, auto care is already a niche with stiff competition. But did that stop Matt and Deb from getting after their dream of operating their own auto repair business and even winning a 2024 Torch Award for Ethics? Nope. Because Matt and Deb are awesome like that.

Nevertheless, these auto repair owners found themselves in need of a strategic partner to help them stand out in a saturated market. So, team Emerald got to work researching the solution and putting a plan into action. The big result: 31% increase in revenue from January to October!

Strategy #1 - The Puzzle of High Quality CPC Traffic

When it comes to CPC, you’re literally paying for every ad click that brings users to your website. Unfortunately, if you don’t dial in your ad keyword groups and geotarget strategically, you’ll end up paying for more junky clicks than real leads.

To help our client get more out of their marketing dollars, this erroneous ad spend was the first thing to go.

The Results (mo / mo)

BEFORE: In February 2025, Google delivered thousands of low-quality clicks with a 3.62% Click Through Rate (CTR), below the industry benchmark of 5.69%.
AFTER: In September 2025, Google delivered only 387 clicks with a 7.05% CTR, well above the industry benchmark. The result was a 214% increase in qualified phone calls.

Amanda’s Commentary That No One Asked For

Can we all take a moment to let this be a reminder that vanity traffic is not the end all be all of KPIs?
Hell yeah for smart women collaborating to get results!

Strategy #2 - Double Down on Local + Organic SEO

When you’re part of a franchise, you often get the same old basic website that everyone else gets. But when your competitors have dedicated local SEO landing pages sucking all the leads away, then you have to play ball.

We started by optimizing the existing service landing pages before building several new ones in response to some AWESOME niche keyword opportunities we discovered. We also noticed that no competitors were writing content worth a damn, so we started a helpful blog as well.

Of course, optimizing and maintaining the Google Business Profile and local listing management were also a major part of our strategy here.

The Results

BEFORE: In January 2025, organic traffic accounted for a sliver of total traffic, as ads were primarily driving thousands of low engagement visitors. Useless.
AFTER: In October 2025, the website saw a 740% increase in targeted, engaged organic traffic! We saw a 33% increase in organic visitors turning into leads as a result.

Amanda’s Commentary That No One Asked For

Relying on ads for all of your website traffic is a hard no around here. What if a competitor starts outbidding you? What if you have to scale back your spend one month? What if it was possible to get leads without allocating such a massive portion of your marketing budget paying for your customers? I’m just asking the tough questions.
Now we’re seeing his client gain a ton of authority in the niche (the blog is full of high quality content helping gain authority). As a result, we’re even seeing traffic directly from LLMs. So there’s some AEO/GEO for you. That’s the future of search happening before our eyes, and our client is poised to survive the future.

Strategy #3 - Social Media Reboot

Some people love social media marketing, some people hate social media, and some people are just out here doing their best to make content and keep their head above water. Most business owners have better things to do than become algorithmic experts of social, so we immediately took this off of Matt’s plate.

The strategy involved incorporating video into their content mix, posting engaging carousels with trending audio, and tweaking content to appeal to a more targeted demographic.

The Results

BEFORE: Content got little to no reach, as it was primarily graphics in an algorithm that values video first. Organic socials were doing very little to impact brand awareness or build community, and most exposure was paid.
AFTER: Total impressions increased 1,014%! Total video views jumped 1,316%! Total engagements rose 338%! Phew!

Amanda’s Commentary That No One Asked For

Brand awareness for the win here! We saw a marked increase in “direct” visits in Google Analytics as well as an increase in organic social media visits.
Yes, there were even a handful of direct leads!

Ready For a Growth Partner To Handle Your Marketing?

Milex did the hard work of running an exceptional business. We simply gave them the strategy and support to make sure more people could find them. The result is a 31% mo/mo revenue lift in under a year and a brand positioned to keep climbing.

If you’re tired of guessing, tired of wasting money, and tired of wondering why your competitors keep winning online, you don’t have to stay stuck. You deserve a clear plan, a proven partner, and marketing that finally pulls its weight.

Ready for a growth partner to handle your marketing? Book your strategy call and let’s build your success story next!