Marketing your business is an on-going activity. It’s important to spend approximately 10% of your time focused on Marketing and Sales. The first step is to create a solid marketing plan. It’s easy to react to people who are trying to sell you AD space on websites or social media, but is that really the right thing for your business?

Proven methods are always the best. If you’ve promoted your business in a specific way in the past and it worked … keep doing it. There is no point in changing your marketing strategy unless things have changed in your business, in the industry or in the way you interact with customers.

We asked the Gibson Territory Account Managers for tips on marketing – Roger Milne (East), Adam McBride (Central), and Jordan Spear (West) shared some ideas:

Target Your Audience

• Focus on an area that you can service well. 
• Identify neighbourhoods with houses that are ready for reroofing. 
• Homes that were built around the same time, will likely need new roofs around the same time. 
• Ensure you have all the proper licenses, insurance and workplace safety requirements for the areas you are doing the work.

Professional Branding

• Your business image is important for first and lasting impressions. 
• Prepare high quality branded materials to market your business – name/logo, business cards, signage, letterhead for estimates. 
• Use truck decals and lawn signs with your contact info clearly legible. Ask your clients if they would be okay leaving your lawn sign up after the project is finished. 

Referrals Incentive

• People will often use contractors that their neighbours have used. You can leverage this word-of-mouth opportunity by offering a referral incentive to past customers that help you get your next project. 
• While in the neighbourhood, take time to drop off promotional materials or knock on a few doors. Mention you just finished a job down the street and invite prospects to call your past customers (with their permission, of course.) 

Social Media

• Reach out to your social media followers on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, and let them know you are looking for projects. People generally are very willing to help out a friend. 
• When asked for past references, share the good and the bad stories. It helps to maintain your business integrity when you are honest.

Advertising

• Promote your business where your prospects are searching. Third party online listing services like HomeStars.com are popular for homeowners looking for trades. 
• Consider buying Google Ads and invite your customers to complete a Google review online. Reviews are powerful tools to support your advertise.

The cheapest form of marketing is word-of-mouth. Happy customers are the best way to get the word out. When you are finished with a project, ask your customer to refer you to someone else. Get them to write a testimonial that you can post on social media or your website. Get a letter of reference that you can use in your sales presentations.

In our next Update, we’ll be sharing the 5 Ways to Close End-of-Season Sales