Summer is an incredibly busy time for Wayden Dobier. His company, Dobier Prop Works, offers propeller and fiberglass hull repair services to recreational boaters. Dobier's business is nestled on the bank of a major waterway and reservoir popular with fishermen, skiers, and families.

To cope with the high seasonal demand for its services, Dobier Prop Works relies on an answering service to help serve its customers. "Just last week, I had a guy call us on a Sunday afternoon. The very first time he took his new boat on the water, he hit a deadhead [a submerged tree trunk] and put a hole in his hull. It was a $30,000 boat and it had only been wet for about an hour," said Wayden.

"Since it was a Sunday, we weren't open, but the answering service was able to get him taken care of. They took down all the details, told him where to deliver the boat and wrote up a work order. When the guys got to the shop Monday morning, everything was ready for us to get to work on the situation. We got him up and running in about two weeks, with lots of summer left for him to enjoy his new boat."

The waterway is also a nationally-known walleye fishery. "One of our most-common repairs is a prop repair. Some of those fishermen are really serious. We even have a few guys who are nationally sponsored professionals. For them, service has to be available. They are great ambassadors for us," said Wayden.

The professional and personal service that Dobier Prop Works offers has cultivated a national customer base. "Mostly, our non-local customers are big-time fishermen. Word spreads pretty quickly regarding customer service. Since we do good work, offer 24 hour service, and turn our jobs around quickly, we've attracted a lot of out-of-town customers," said Wayden.

Taking a business approach meant making some changes. For example, Wayden added a toll-free number to encourage his nationwide customers. Initially, he said, it didn't seem like an idea that was going to pay off. In the summer, calls tend to cluster together at certain times of the day, but the Prop Works' two phone lines weren't up to the volume. Then in the fall, calls tended to come in before the shop was open or after it was closed, as customers in different time zones were attempting to call for service.

To overcome these challenges, Wayden sends the overflow calls to his telephone answering service. If a customer attempts to contact his shop while both lines are busy, the call is automatically forwarded to the answering service. Their professional staff handle routine matters, such as providing standard prices, business hours, and directions. For more specialized questions, the messages are sent to the Prop Works shop via fax.

Wayden also added after-hours answering service. When an out-of-state customer's prop is damaged, they can be provided with repair tickets directly through the answering service, which has remote access to Prop Works' scheduling system. The customer then ships the prop directly to the Prop Works.

The service, says Wayden, opened up a whole new realm of opportunity. "Our off-season work has really picked up," he said. "Word-of-mouth advertising has been a big part of our success, but so has being there. There is no substitute for that kind of service."

Learn more about telephone answering services and discover how the might be able to help you.