Home contracting is a skill you’ve worked hard to develop. You can determine what materials you’ll need for the job, how much help you’ll need, and how long the project will take to complete. You may be a professional at planning all this out, but are you a pro at planning out your marketing strategy?
Marketing is a vital concept for all businesses. You may be the best home contractor in the area, but how are people going to know that if you don’t market your services? Getting your name out into the community and generating buzz around your services is how you’ll attract new clients and get previous clients to come back. Some people may think marketing is too expensive or too time consuming to invest in, but the truth is, it’s not. There are ways you can effectively market your services without spending a fortune. Here are some of the top marketing tips for contractors, and how following these tips can help you grow your client base and keep your services up and going.
Leverage Your Existing Clients
One of the most cost-effective and simple marketing tips for contractors is to leverage their existing network on clients. Word-of-mouth advertising is one of the most influential marketing strategies to pursue. If you have a loyal client base, ask them to help you spread the word about your contracting business. If you know you did a great job installing a client’s bathroom cabinets, reach out to that client and see if they’d recommend you to others looking to start similar projects. Having someone vouch for your services, especially to people in their inner circle, can go a long way in establishing trust.
There are other ways to leverage your existing clients for marketing efforts. You could ask them to leave a review online. Google Reviews can help boost your online search ranking, plus you establish credibility with each review. You could also ask clients to provide testimonials to put on your website.
Make a Great Website
One of the most important marketing tips for contractors is to make a great website. The days of picking up the phone book and looking up commercial contractors to call are done. Now, a majority of people search online to find services. This is why it’s so important for contractors to have a clean, clear, and engaging website.
Think of your website as your storefront, only online. It’s the first place where people will stop by to check out your services. That’s why it’s important that your website is clean, concise, and engaging. It should also clearly display who you are, what your services are, and how prospects can get in touch with you. If you have a poorly designed website, it could give people a bad impression of you and your services. Take the time to design a website that properly displays what your business is about and help you rank highly on search engines.
A key part of ranking high on search engines is to make sure your website has good mobile site speed. Today, so many people search the internet on their phones. You can use the search tool on your iPhone homescreen to search the web, just like a search engine. If your mobile site speed is low, your search ranking will decrease. Check your desktop and mobile site speed to make sure they’re in ideal ranges.
Start a Blog
This is one of those marketing tips for contractors that may seem like a lot of work, but is well worth it. One of the best organic ways to market your contracting services is to start a blog. Part of search engine optimization, commonly referred to as SEO, is Google determining how valuable your overall website is. A great way to show your value is to write a blog that offers tips and talks about trends. For example, you could write a blog post about how to eliminate soil erosion and make your lawn look better. Or, you could write about drain line repair tips every homeowner should know about. You can choose the topics based on your services, your audience, and what keywords you want to rank for on Google.
Blogs can also help by creating opportunities for other websites to back link to your website. Back links allow more traffic to come to your site. The more back links your site has, the more authoritative Google sees you, and therefore rewards you by ranking you higher in searches. Establishing SEO for general contractors doesn’t have to be a huge process. You can start out slow by creating relevant content for your audience, and working on your strategy from there.
Establish a Social Media Presence
One of the least expensive marketing tips for contractors is to establish a social media presence for your services. You can use social media to stay connected with your audience, attract new clients, and establish your brand. If you don’t have social media accounts, set them up as soon as possible. You can establish accounts on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Here, you can connect with similar companies, customers, and list some of your products, like garage door sales, and more.
Once you set up your social media accounts, you should develop a social media strategy. The key to growing your social following is to post relevant content on a consistent basis. If you aren’t consistent on social media, you risk looking unprofessional and irrelevant to your audience. Your social media content can include videos, blog posts, graphics, and pictures. Make sure you know which kind of content works best for each platform. For example, Instagram is all about images and stories. What you post on there will be different from what you post on LinkedIn, which rewards long form posts. Do your research on which content works best for each platform and how often you should be posting.
You could also use social media to promote your services. For example, if you want to grow your Twitter account, you could run a contest that gives away a residential painting job for free. You could ask your followers to enter the contest by following your Twitter account, post why they deserve the free prize, and use a specific hashtag in their post so you can pick a winner. When done correctly, social media marketing can help you steadily grow your client list.
Start a YouTube Channel
YouTube is a great platform to utilize for your marketing efforts. Create a YouTube channel and start posting helpful videos for your audience. These videos can include do-it-yourself home projects, or tips on how to maintain a home. If your content is well optimized, it could rank high on searches, which means more clicks to your videos. The more clicks you get, the more your brand awareness you create.
If your YouTube content meets certain criteria, you could even have your videos monetized. This means you have the potential to earn money from the videos you upload from ads that run on your videos. An effective YouTube strategy can help you build your client base, help you rank better on Google, and provide an extra revenue stream. Plus, if there aren’t many contractors on YouTube, you could establish yourself as a leader in a specific YouTube niche.
Plan Out a Paid Marketing Strategy
There are many organic ways to grow your marketing strategy. However, one of the top marketing tips for contractors is to plan out a paid marketing strategy. Paid marketing is when companies pay money to target their audience through digital channels. You could do Facebook advertising, Instagram advertising, or even LinkedIn advertising. Contractors can also look pay money to advertise on Google and get their services ranked on the first page of a search. There’s also pay-per-click, also know as PPC, advertising available.
Another form of paid marketing is email marketing. You may have a free account with an email service provider, however if you want to build your email list and create a robust email marketing strategy, you may need to invest in a paid plan. When planning your paid marketing strategy, the first thing you should do is set a budget. How much can you spend on paid marketing? Once you have a budget, determine which channel you want to pursue first. Test the kind of ads you run and see which one gets the biggest return on your investment. Once you get a profit, you can increase your budget and advertise on other channels.
Work With Marketing Professionals
You can read about a bunch of marketing tips for contractors, but you still may need some help with your marketing strategy. If you need help with digital marketing in particular, consider working with a digital marketing agency. This agency is full of digital marketing professionals who are dedicated to helping you plan a successful strategy. They can help you with paid advertising, social media marketing, and many agencies even offer SEO services.
If you’re contracting on your own, handling marketing initiatives could overload you. Seeking the help of marketing professionals will allow you to get your contracting work done and still have marketing strategies in place. You will have to pay for their services, and some agencies are more expensive than others. If you don’t have the money to work with an agency, you could hire freelancers to help you with your digital marketing needs.
Create Business Partnerships
Creating business partnerships is a win-win for you and the businesses you collaborate with. Let’s say you do home contracting, but you need extra help when it comes to roofing. You could contact roofers in your area to see if they’d like to help you with the contract. By doing this, you establish a business partnership with them. If they end up working on a contract and their client needs more home projects done, they can recommend your services. Business partnerships can help you receive more clients through word-of-mouth advertising, and you can also help out other local businesses in your industry.
Look Into Traditional Media
When talking about marketing tips for contractors, it’s important to discuss a strategy surrounding traditional media. Traditional media refers to newspaper, radio and television advertising. There’s a lot of emphasis put on paid digital advertising, but traditional media advertising can also help your marketing efforts.
Take the time to research if your target audience is engaging with traditional media. Are they listening to the radio, reading the paper, and/or watching television? If so, how often, and what are they engaging with? Take that research and formulate a plan around traditional media. You could have an ad on television, or even sponsor a radio program. The kind of advertising you do with traditional media will depend on your budget, what your audience is engaging with, and the kind of content traditional media is putting out.
Plan Out Promotions
One of the best marketing tips for contractors is to plan out promotions ahead of time. Promotions are special deals you offer in hopes to attract more clients. For example, you could do a promotion where people can enter to win a free estimate for a home project. The kind of promotions you plan will depend on your goals.
You can also use the time of year to plan promotions. For example, you could do a Father’s Day giveaway where you pick one person to get a free deck makeover. Or, you could do a Thanksgiving-theme promotion where someone could win $10,000 towards a new kitchen, just in time for the holidays. Promotions like this can help you build a loyal following and increase engagement with your brand.
These marketing tips for contractors may seem like a lot to take in, but remember: you don’t have to do all these things at one time. You can start with the strategy that makes the most sense to you right now, and go from there. You’ve worked hard to get where you are today, and the world should know about the incredible contract work you do. Marketing will help spread the word about your work and help you draw in new business, which helps you stay in business longer.