In search, a franchised dealership is several businesses at once: a brand dealer, a used car lot and a service centre, each with its own customers and its own hours, and Google has separate guidelines for how dealers list themselves. An independent garage competes make by make and job by job, from brake repair to EV servicing. SearchOps tracks every site, service and make across the area it serves, shows the rivals ahead of you, and reports what ChatGPT and Gemini say when a driver asks which garage to trust.
The problem
Google asks car dealerships to use their car sales hours as the main opening hours, with More hours for specific services, and gives dealers their own guidelines for listing departments and brands. The result is that a dealership's visibility for 'Toyota dealer' and for 'car service near me' can be very different, and a group with several brands and sites multiplies the gap. Independent garages face the same split across makes and jobs.
Make searches ('Honda dealer', 'BMW specialist') and service searches ('brake repair', 'MOT near me') can each show different businesses.
Servicing hours can differ from sales hours, so More hours need setting accurately for customers booking a service.
Reviews about pricing, turnaround and aftersales are public and part of how Google judges prominence.
When a driver asks an AI assistant which garage is honest or where to buy a used car, the answer names only a few businesses.
Questions SearchOps answers
Whether you run one workshop or a multi-brand group, these questions show where sales and aftersales visibility is being won and lost. Each one is answered by data SearchOps collects.
01Services
Track each service and make as its own keyword in each site's town, such as 'brake repair Dallas', 'Toyota service Ottawa', 'NCT preparation Galway' or 'roadworthy certificate Melbourne'. Google Search Visibility shows the Map Pack, web results and AI Overviews for each one, on desktop and mobile.
Visibility for the work that fills the bays and the forecourt
Used in this step
02Catchment
Geo-grid scans show each site's Google Maps position across the area it serves, with the businesses ahead of it at each point. Map Insights compares you with the leaders on categories, reviews and listing details.
The areas each site wins, and the rivals that take the rest
Used in this step
03Group view
Every dealership, workshop or tyre centre is its own tracked location, so rankings, map coverage, reviews and profile results can be compared across the group. Connected profiles show calls, direction requests and website clicks for each site.
A clear view of which sites need attention
Used in this step
04AI answers
SearchOps asks ChatGPT and Gemini questions like which garages in Leeds are honest about pricing, or where to buy a reliable used car in Houston. You see how often you're recommended, the businesses named instead, how you're described, and the review sites and directories the answers cite.
Your share of AI recommendations, and what shapes them
Used in this step
05Reviews
Reviews from connected Google profiles arrive in one inbox, with sentiment grouped by topic, so complaints about waiting times or pricing show up as a trend at a specific site. The agent drafts calm, specific replies for you to check and send.
Reputation problems caught at the site where they start
Used in this step
The toolkit
Make and service rankings, map coverage for each site, ChatGPT and Gemini, site profiles and reviews, in one place, from a single garage to a multi-brand dealer group.
Also working for you
Before and after
Use cases
Illustrative examples from dealerships, independent garages and tyre centres.
Independent repair shopDallas, Texas
Rank tracking for 'BMW repair Dallas' and 'Audi specialist near me' shows the shop in the Map Pack close to its door and on page two further out, where two specialists with more reviews appear. AI visibility checks show ChatGPT naming the same two. The gap is visibility for one kind of work, not the quality of it.
Dealer group, nine sitesOntario, Canada
Tracking 'Toyota service' and 'oil change' searches in each dealership's town shows most sites visible for sales searches but only three appearing for service. Those three also show more calls on their profiles. The group can see where service visibility lags behind sales.
Tyre and MOT centreLeeds, UK
A scan for 'MOT near me' across the city shows the centre holding the top three near its site and losing ground a mile away to two chain centres with far more reviews. Running the same scan each month shows whether a steady stream of new reviews moves that line.
Used car dealershipAuckland, New Zealand
AI visibility checks ask ChatGPT and Gemini where to buy a reliable used car in Auckland. The dealership is mentioned in a few answers, a competitor is recommended in most, and the answers cite a review site where the competitor has many more reviews. That shows where the recommendation gap starts.
Choosing a plan
Plans scale with the sites and department profiles you track, and whether a group marketing team or an agency works on the account. Every plan includes every tracking tool.
For a single garage, tyre centre or dealership
For multi-site garages and small dealer groups
For dealer groups, franchises and their agencies
FAQ
The same platform, set up for a different kind of business.
