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Contractor Marketing Tips From Famous Dog Trainer Cesar Millan

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Product or Service Extensions Broaden Your Reach of Clients

An old expression made famous by Dean Martin, “keep those cards and letters coming,” actually has a direct application to any contractor marketing plan.  There is a well know tactic in the internet business world that can be applied to other types of business rather easily.

Consider a Cesar Millan, famous K-9 training expert and star of NatGeo’s Dog Whisperer for a second.  Cesar has years of experience handling different types of dogs with various problems and successfully turning these rascals into well-behaved pets.  In order to reach more people and generate more revenue, he puts all of his tactics and proven tips into a book and sells it through his website.  People contact him, pay for his book and receive the package while leaving behind their name, address, and email.

A couple of months go by and Cesar learns of a great grooming technique that works amazingly well with a new shampoo.  What does he do?  He gathers the list of email and addresses and sends out a little note to his past customers “hey, thought you might want to know about this wonderful dog shampoo and grooming technique.  Drop me a line if you want more information.”  What do you think happens?  People buy more stuff from him because they have confidence in him based on past work.

Are you collecting addresses and emails of past clients?  Do you let them know about new developments in your industry?  This is a very simple method of using the success and satisfaction from past projects to land new work without the need for using expensive means of finding new clients.

Contractor Marketing Ideas: What Are Benefits?

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Yesterday I talked about the difference between features and benefits. After re-reading the post, I came up with an even easier way for you to determine the difference between the two. Benefits answer the “What’s in it for me?” question every consumer has when looking for a home improvement contractor.

That’s why your marketing has to be about results

A customer’s perception of each of your features is what moves them to action. When someone chooses a self-cleaning pool vacuum, the assumption is that the benefit is convenience, and the results are that they won’t have to clean their pool as much.

When you only talk about features, the customer is responsible for figuring out how it is going to either give them pleasure or remove pain. But people are lazy…or busy, or whatever, so make it easy for them by spelling it out for them, because that is the advertising they are going to be drawn to.More

What’s Your Big Idea?

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I hope you know, because it’s your company, and you better have one! Your big idea is what gives people their “aha moment”. That momentary point in time when they decide YOU are the right contractor for them.

But big ideas come in the form of many things; sometimes pricing (although I hope not), sometimes in the form of a great reputation, a new twist to an old product or service offering, or maybe it’s how or where you advertise.More

Classified Ads Aren’t Just For Strippers

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There are contractors out there that still find value advertising locally in their classified ads, and classified advertising has transitioned well online on sites like Craigslist.org. In fact, some of the most successful contractors I know make it a point to steadily advertise their businesses on Craigslist as part of their overall marketing strategy.

But who reads the classifieds? Buyers do!

Classified advertising isn’t about flash or pizzazz; it’s about answering the reader’s question. And let’s face it, people reading the classifieds are buyers. Think about it, have you ever looked on Craigslist or in the classified section because you had some time to kill?More

Miracle Whip Commercial: My Quick Review

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If you haven’t seen the Miracle Whip commercial where they literally tell you “We are not for everyone” in the ad, than you have missed a real treat. If this ad ran during the Super Bowl I would bet it would have beat the Darth Vader Passat hands down.

Poking fun at yourself is OK…

Making a joke at your own expense is alright if everyone already knows who you are. But the fact that the Miracle Whip commercial hits home on a psychological level really is great marketing.

What do I mean?

If your house is divided over the Miracle Whip – Mayonnaise debate like mine, than this commercial quite literally hits home. In my house, my wife is a Miracle Whip freak, while my daughter and I prefer mayo…but not just any mayo as any mayo fan knows – it’s got to be Hellmanns!More

Your Clients Are Talking to You – Are You Listening?

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I shot a video about keyword research the other day, and I think the point that I am trying to make in the video is that you need to look at keyword research as listening. Listening to exactly what your best clients or customers are asking for. Keyword research IS NOT hocus pocus, it is not Internet crap, and it is not something to be ignored. I mean, you can, but you will get buried under the weight of the stampede of clients or customers rushing past you to get to your competition.

Marketing is Like Meatballs

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Having a Birthday during the winter means there will be times when your party gets rearranged, which is exactly what happen to my daughter last weekend. So, last night my wife was whipping up meatballs for sandwiches and asked me how many I thought she should make. I said you have to make sure you have enough to cover everyone and then some.

But she cooked up a bunch of trays without figuring out the meatball to people ratio and therefore didn’t know. So, we had to count the meatballs, then consider how many each guest would eat, and then decide if we had enough to cover it.More

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