A concierge service that had been chiefly offered by luxury brands suddenly became a must-do for mainstream brands to keep their service bays busy.

Pandemic or not, "people want to feel reassured, and they want to know that somebody's put forth the extra effort to keep germs off their car," says fixed operations consultant Lee Harkins .

Woody Buick-GMC in Naperville, Ill., is spending $2,500 a month on highly targeted social media and SEO efforts. It's money well spent.

The sudden importance of service marketing in the early days of the pandemic led many dealers to closely examine new strategies.