You spend a lot of time, energy and money advertising and marketing your contracting business to generate leads. Newspapers, yellow pages, Internet, radio, direct mail, television; all things used by today’s contractor to build a steady stream of business. It doesn’t matter if you’re a one-man band or a team of 200, fresh prospects are what make the world go round.
Hopefully you have the time to pay attention and know the response you get when your ads drop, or know how many phone calls you get when your postcards or e-mail campaigns are launched. And if you’re paying attention and the phone isn’t ringing enough, then use these tips to help generate a steady stream of leads for your business.
You are probably familiar with some or all of these tips, and I know I’ve mentioned them before, but advertising is advertising and they bear repeating.
1. Get their attention — before a prospect can ever become a customer you have to grab them, grab them and hold them and stop them in their tracks and then force them to read your offer. Make it so good that they have to stop what they’re doing and read everything on the page, on the postcard or on the screen.
2. Focus on the customer — Instead of focusing on how great your product or service is, think about how they will benefit your client. In all of your marketing always ask yourself “what’s in it for them?” Know why? Because your prospects will be asking themselves what’s in it for them!
3. Target the problem — leaky basement, cracked foundation, ugly kitchen — and target the problem by driving home the pain associated with it. Be friendly in your approach, but do everything possible to make the problem hurt, and use words and images to paint the picture.
4. Become the solution — once you have made them feel terrible about themselves (in a good way) now begins the task of rebuilding them. Transition into the solution that your product or service provides. Do this the right way and the ad copy itself will close the deal for you.
5. Where’s the beef? — remember that little old lady in the Burger King commercial? She was looking for proof that there was actually a hamburger on that bun. My point here is that people want proof that you are the right contractor for them, and the best way to do that is to let others do the talking for you by providing testimonials.
6. Give them something to do — once you’ve got their attention, identified the problem, offered a solution, and provided proof that you’re the right contractor for them; then you need to make them act with an offer or incentive that is too good to pass up. The point is whatever action it is that you want them to take state it clearly.
With so many ad messages blasting us in our faces every day you have to make sure that you’re able to land as many of the tips above in your advertising as possible in order to convert more prospects into new clients for your contracting business.
