In Philly, there are some pretty serious home improvement companies, and they all beat each other’s heads in everyday with their marketing and advertising. A few weeks back, one of those companies went belly up, taking deposits on jobs up until the week before they shut their doors with them.
When your enemy is weak, attack!
Words from the great Sun Tzu, which are still pretty fitting for today’s business combatants. And that is exactly what another major home improvement company did. They attacked on all fronts: television, radio, print. Everywhere they could tell the public about their company they did it.
And it worked…but it had to!
Just as rising tides lift all boats, a typhoon crashing onto shore trashes everything, and a 30 year-old home improvement company that goes ass-over-teacups sends shock waves throughout the local citizenry. This makes everyone’s job (especially mine) more difficult to win new jobs because of the mistrust people already have for the home improvement industry.
The wounded zebra
Just as the herd will distance themselves from a wounded zebra on the African Savanna, you too should do everything you can to distance your company from trouble in your market. You do this with a solid Unique Selling Proposition or USP. Keep it real and tell people why they should do business with you, and why you ARE NOT like the company I mentioned above.
If you can develop a marketing campaign that attacks your industry for its failings while convincing people why they should do business with you instead of your competition, then you have a serious chance to win a disproportionate amount of bids that you go out on. But you can’t get that message out if you don’t advertise, so get to it!
Photo Credit: Kainet