In 2019, Alvin, Joel, and myself got together to create a first and last-mile car aftersales solution that is known as AutoApp today. Besides being family men leading impossibly busy lives, we each were the ‘go-to’ guys in our own circles of family and friends when it came to all-things cars.

Whenever anyone we knew sought car advice; “Which car should I buy next?”, “Where’s the best place to repair my car?, or “Help! I’ve just got into an accident…” we had a solution for just about any problem our friends came to us with, as we were somewhat well connected in the car industry from our jobs as automotive journalists and aftersales management.

Then, there was the hassle of having to take time from our already-busy schedules for mundane tasks like car inspections or periodic servicing, and waiting for our cars to be ready was simply not a productive way to spend time.

Seeing an opportunity to help other car owners, we set out to create an app where owners could outsource their car-related chores with just a few taps on their smartphones. After all, we use our smartphones for just about everything else. 

On our journey to creating AutoApp, some friends would reach out to us if they had come across similar services. It soon dawned on us that what we were creating was actually not new. Others had already come and gone. Worryingly, there was even a well-funded international conglomerate that had just arrived in Singapore, just as AutoApp was taking its first, furtive steps. On the horizon, industry insiders also told us of at least two other apps that also aiming to disrupt the car aftersales scene.  

Spoiler alert — as far as we know, these other car aftersales startups that were better-resourced and established than us have quietly exited the local market. As the only ones standing, AutoApp finds itself in unchartered territory. To borrow a phrase from the iconic Sci-Fi franchise, Star Trek, our mission now is: “To boldly go, where no one has gone before…”

One of our most significant encounters was an opportunity to meet the founder of an app that was close to what AutoApp would be about. Let’s call him Dave, for the sake of this article.

By the time we met Dave, he had exited the market years before. These days, he is focused on the FinTech sector, but was generous enough to share his experiences of where he went wrong. 

Takeaways 

Although the path ahead seems fraught with failed ventures and burgeoning behemoths ready to snuff us out, we choose to look at these ‘threats’ as case studies that would help shape AutoApp into a model that would not suffer the same folly as others before us. These are the main takeaways we learnt.

1. Know thyself 

It may sound patently obvious, but having a deep understanding of the environment you are operating in is probably the most crucial step. Yet, the founder of the defunct app we spoke with admitted that nobody in his team knew much about cars or the automotive industry. Rather, they were a team of coders who approached the car aftersales business from an analytical perspective. Numbers don’t lie, right? Well, evidently they don’t tell the complete story either. 

Many companies, especially automotive manufacturers and dealers, like to take the approach of hiring talent from outside the industry in the interest of looking at things with a “fresh pair of eyes”. What usually happens then, is that these businesses end up being managed by individuals with no passion for their brands. Worse still, is the tendency to think that a car is just a product that is no different from a burger, or mattress, or smartphone. It’s all the same to them. 

While this management style can offer some advantages like better objectivity, the brand tends to lose its soul in the process. If you’re transactional with the brand, long term plans like growing your next generation of customers can be difficult to achieve. 

The biggest problem with Dave’s app was that nobody on his team even owned a car or could even drive! How could they understand the needs of car owners, let alone the nuances of customers who own different types of cars? 

As for the operations team of AutoApp, I can honestly say that we live and breathe cars. We grew up reading and learning about cars, and have dedicated our careers to this craft. We make it a point to hire professionally-trained service advisors to be our Service Ambassadors who pick-up cars from our customers’ doorsteps and return them when their cars are serviced.  

2. Protect your ecosystem

The other problem with Dave’s app as well as others is that they served as aggregators rather than service providers. They were effectively directories that made it easy for car owners to find the right workshops for them. However, once that connection is made, the customer has little need for the app again. If the app did a good job, the customer would have found a workshop for life. And if they didn’t have a good experience, they wouldn’t be inclined to use the app again. It’s a lose-lose proposition. 

The comprehensive end-to-end solution that AutoApp offers is the hard part, but it sets us apart from these aggregators. Not only do we find the right workshops for their cars, the nature of our service saves our customers the hassle of decision fatigue. Sure, you could Google for the best workshops near you, but chances are, there’ll be a ton of listings that all claim to be the best. The customer then has to spend more time to research and decide. 

Once the customer experiences the convenience of AutoApp, they’ll never want to send their cars in themselves again. This is evidenced by our 100% record of 5-star customer reviews and over half of them have used our service twice in the last 12 months.

3. Keep it small

Almost all our competitors boasted thousands of workshops to choose from in their directories. While this might seem impressive, it also leads to the aforementioned decision fatigue for the customer. Worse still, these apps don’t start with a customer base that is large enough to support all these listings. Workshops then soon grow weary of supporting these apps since it hardly sends any business their way and give up on supporting them altogether. 

AutoApp takes a more conservative approach in selecting workshops for our network. We would rather work with a smaller network but send a higher volume of business to these preferred workshops. This incentivises operators to offer better quality and value for our customers.

4. The secret ‘sauce’

Many startups and investors obsess over the ’secret sauce’. Is there a part of the business model is proprietary? While this is understandable, there are also many successful businesses don’t rely on a singular technology or process that gives them an edge. Two examples come to mind. 

The first is Ya Kun Kaya Toast. This iconic chain of coffee shops has been serving Singapore since 1944 with their simple but satisfying toasted bread with butter and kaya, sock-brewed coffee, and soft-boiled eggs. The menu has expanded over the years, but these core products are arguably still their best-selling items. With some practice, anyone could make coffee, kaya toast, and soft-boils eggs that taste as good as Ya Kun’s.

Although the Ya Kun business model is theoretically easy to replicate from a product standpoint — and it has a few competitors — it is still the most recognisable local-style coffee stall chain by a long shot. (No pun intended.) 

At the other end of the spectrum is the Ritz Carlton chain of hotels. The opulent furnishings and design of its resorts are copied and even outclassed by some of its competitors.

Yet, the Ritz Carlton is regarded as an industry benchmark for quality service that its guests can’t get enough of. What’s the secret to their success? Instead of jealously guarding it, their operating principles, known as The Gold Standards are proudly published on their website.

And just like Ya Kun and The Ritz Carlton, the secret of AutoApp is that, there is no secret. Instead, we believe in conducting business in an open, honest and transparent way because it builds trust amongst our customers and service provider partners. It boils down to a willingness to work with passion, have an intimate understanding of our business, and to put our customers’ interests first.

By Sheldon Trollope, AutoApp Co-founder

When we set out to create AutoApp over dinners in the office and ideas sketched on pizza boxes, the start-up’s founders, Joel Tam, Alvin Tan and I had to make a fundamental decision — What defines AutoApp?

Answering this was crucial because it would set us on a trajectory as the app began to take shape. The options for AutoApp were for it to be, a product, a service, or an experience. 

Some might see AutoApp merely as a product; a smartphone app where customers can get their cars serviced or repaired without having leave their homes, offices or even taking time off from their busy schedules. While they wouldn’t be wrong with this assumption, this is actually just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

At the heart of AutoApp, is our desire to revolutionise the automotive aftersales industry. While the way cars are bought and sold have progressed by light years through digitalisation, the aftersales segment is very much mired as a traditional, brick-and-mortar business model. 

We identified pain points from both aftersales service providers as well as car owners. We often came across a sentiment of distrust, especially with independent workshops caused by a few bad apples in the past. 

Changing mindsets

So, to change this mindset, nothing less than the best customer experience was imperative. The convenience of a first and last-mile solution alone is not enough. In fact, convenience can be a double-edged sword where it could also imply a compromise in quality or service standards. The saying, “if you want something done right, do it yourself” is one such example. 

To address this concern, we had to go above and beyond to prove that there was no trade-off in quality. After all, AutoApp is not just a more convenient way to service and repair your car, it is the best way to do it that also happens to be more convenient.

To offer levels of service hitherto unseen in the aftersales segment, we had to look outside the industry for inspiration. To this end, there’s probably no higher standard of customer service than at the Ritz Carlton. The backbone of this legendary customer service is a set of principles that the luxury hotel chain calls Gold Standards. 

Encompassing the values and philosophy by which they operate, Gold Standards is a simple yet effective set of guidelines that, when applied, can elevate the customer experience to new levels. The Ritz Carlton makes no secret of this and in fact, proudly lists this on their webpage. 

Although I could go on for hours about how Gold Standards are applied to the AutoApp use case, these are some of the more pertinent points that will serve as an example of the approach we take to customer service. 

Being genuine

The Credo of the Ritz-Carlton Gold Standards sets the perfect tone of what customer service should really be about: “genuine care and comfort of our guests is our highest mission”. The words ‘genuine care’ is the biggest takeaway here. In this context, AutoApp always acts in the customer’s best interest. Repairs or parts replacement that affects safety are always given top priority and advised accordingly, for example.

The Three Steps of Service are also another highlight that is embraced by AutoApp. A warm and sincere greeting. Using the guest’s (customer’s) name. Anticipating and fulfilling their needs. Lastly, “fond farewell. Give a warm goodbye and use the guest’s name”. 

At no point does Gold Standards encourage one to be spectacular or impressive for the sake of it. Rather, the overarching theme is about building relationships, putting the guests’ wellbeing ahead of everything else and respecting each other. “We are Ladies and Gentlemen serving Ladies and Gentlemen,” goes the Ritz-Carlton motto. 

There may be more efficient and easier ways to send our customers’ car to the workshops or service centres, but we believe in investing in relationships which in turn earns trust.

We’re here for the long game.

Although an automotive concierge app and a theme park may seem worlds apart, the fundamentals of what makes Disneyland tick can be invaluable to any business. For a startup like Ignition Labs, this certainly applied when we set out to create AutoApp. 

Disneyland is just one of several sources of inspiration when we envisioned AutoApp. For starters, the American theme park was the first of its kind and has managed to maintain its position as an industry benchmark. 

Both qualities are something that AutoApp can relate to as well as aspire towards. 

Controlling the environment

One important thing we’ve learnt is that part of what makes the Disney ‘magic’ work is to control the environment they operate in as much as possible. From the moment visitors pass through the gates, to the rides they line up for, as well as the gift stores and restaurants they eat at, every detail is designed to create an experience that’s enjoyable as possible. Nothing is left to chance with visual design, curated music, and even certain scents that are pumped into the air to influence a favorable mood. 

For AutoApp, controlling the environment we operate in begins with a deep understanding of our processes and customers’ journey. Preparations begin almost as soon as the booking is made on the app. As the booking details include the make and model of the car and the type of service required, the operations team springs into action to match the car with the most appropriate workshop in our network for the type of service needed.

By the time the Service Ambassador arrives to pick up the customer’s car, the workshop slot has been reserved, and in most cases, the required parts are ordered for the repairs or servicing. Throughout the process, the customer receives frequent updates of the job status, giving them peace of mind as their car is being worked on. 

Keeping them coming back

Leaving on a good note also sets the wheels in motion for visitors to return to Disneyland for their next vacation.

Likewise, the car return process is a very important part of the customer experience. When the car is returned on time looking in better shape than when it was collected, this tends to leave the customer with a satisfied feeling, and usually leads to AutoApp coming to mind first when the time comes for the next aftersales service. Our track record speaks for itself too, and AutoApp prides itself on its 100% record of five-star reviews on Google and Facebook. After all, nothing spreads like word of mouth.

Staying relevant

Disney University, or latterly Disney College, is where its employees known as ‘Cast Members’ and ‘Imagineers’ are trained to continually adapt and learn ever-evolving trends in culture and entertainment to stay relevant. 

Likewise, the car industry is also going through a revolutionary period with electrified motoring finding its way into every automotive segment. This is a landscape that AutoApp has to navigate if it is to succeed in the long term. Our EV charging concierge is one such example of the steps we have taken to stay relevant in the fast-changing landscape. For a flat fee, customers can arrange for an AutoApp Service Ambassador to pick up their EV for charging at a nearby SP Group charging station. 

While the batteries are being charged, the EV gets a once-over to ensure that the tyres are properly inflated, the lights are in working order, and fluid levels are topped up. Then, for good measure, the interior gets a quick wipe-down with a disinfectant. The car is then returned, fully charged and refreshed from the inside. 

Disneyland’s continued success is one that AutoApp aspires to emulate, and even as we move forward, we are also a constant work-in-progress. Our team is always on the lookout for ways to improve our processes and customer experiences, because the customer journey is paramount to us.

So while AutoApp can’t quite take you to the Happiest Place on Earth, we aim to make you feel just as happy while using our app.