This video is a few things – First of all, it is my first video with a new camera, so I know I have some bugs to work out with sound and positioning as I cut off the top of my head. But it’s funny that I need to worry about positioning the camera since that is what the video is about. Positioning your company not just against your competition, but against all of the alternatives homeowners have to NOT do business with you. So, enjoy the video, and I promise the next one will be better! [Read more…] about Positioning Your Company
Brand Management
Keep Your Friends Close – But Your Competition Closer!
This is a guest post by one of my clients, Chris Spoerl at Magic Pool Services in Orlando. Chris took my post a few weeks ago on paying attention to your competition to heart…to say the least! What would you do if you were in his shoes and thought your competitors were duplicating your efforts?
“All war is based on deception.” – Sun Tzu
Marketing is a tough business, and if business is tough, people will do whatever it takes to succeed. I am referring to your competition folks, and sometimes if you are not careful, they will try to get the best of you.
This weekend we attended the 2011 Orlando Pool and Spa Show, which is basically the pool-a-palooza for the pool industry. Vendors from across the United States and the world display the newest products and technologies and there are also continuing education courses and training seminars. [Read more…] about Keep Your Friends Close – But Your Competition Closer!
Quick Tips for Contractors #2 – Pick a Number, Any Number
Contractors ask me all the time how much they should spend on marketing, and I have answered the question in a couple of posts here at Darren’s. But this time I am going to make it simple – just pick a friggin’ number and start!
If you haven’t decided to set aside any amount of your gross sales to apply towards building your business, then what the hell are you waiting for? Pick something; $100 a job, 5% of gross a month, something. Just start doing something to assure your business is around not just next week or next year, but 5 years from now.
Defend Your Brand Everywhere!
Brand management doesn’t just mean defending yourself against people who are negative about you. It means defending yourself from people who are wrong about who/what you are. Left unchecked, that becomes your brand, not what you have been working on in the marketplace! So defend your brand all the time at all costs! Can’t see the video, click here.
Contractor Marketing and How Steve Jobs is Just Like You!
Steve Jobs is as synonymous with Apple as you probably are to your contracting company. There are a lot of things you can learn both pre and post Jobs departure from Apple. Pay attention and learn something about branding your company and yourself.
What AllState Can Teach Contractors About Being Prepared
How companies respond in times of panic is a great indication of their ability to cope with changing markets. How do you cope during times of trouble?
Using Logos to Promote Your Brand
One of the problems I run into with smaller contractors is that they don’t have strong “brand identity” in their marketplace. Brand identity comes in the form of a logo or tagline, or both. A logo helps you brand yourself with an image that goes along with content of your ads across all of your marketing. You bigger contractors have problems too. You have never “grown-up” with regards to your logo or branding as your company grew.
Let’s face it; it’s getting harder and harder to express who you are and what you do in a crowded home services market. But one of the best ways to stand out is by utilizing a logo. But getting a logo design done right costs hundreds if not thousands right? Well, I hope I have a solution for that.
My Construction Logo Service for Contractors
I get asked a lot to do design work for ads, which I don’t do. I am a salesman and a marketer, so I always have to outsource my design work. Well, not anymore! I have hired my own design person, Harry, to help you get noticed in the market so you can close more business!
This service is perfect for you if you:
- Currently don’t have a logo
- Think your logo could use a freshening up
- Want to rebrand your company after adding new product lines
No other method gives you the ability to position your company in the market like a logo can. You put your logo on your cards, invoices, vehicles…anywhere and everywhere, and it works for you 24/7…for free!
Here’s what you get:
- 2 Initial Design Concepts
- Unlimited Revisions – We won’t stop until we get it right!
- 1-3 Day Turnaround with 24 hour “Emergency Service”
- 100% Copyright ownership delivered to you
- All High-Res formats JPEG, PNG, GIF, PDF, PSD
Want to see some of the new guy’s work? Click here and scroll to the bottom.
Reputation Management For Contractors
Reputation management for contractors – One of the things I hear a lot from contractors when I bring up negative reviews that I find online is that they either never knew about them, or figured they couldn’t defend themselves.
This becomes especially hard for contractors who are either technophobes or don’t have the time to allocate to monitor what is being said about them (good or bad) online.
So, here are my questions to you, trying to defend yourself from homeowners everyday
- If you had a service that actively monitored what’s being said about you, your competition, your company and your industry across the web, would you use it?
- If you could be updated within minutes of someone either praising your company or ripping it to shreds on Facebook, in forums and on review sites, would you pay for it?
Google Alerts is reputation management for contractors 101
Google Alerts is pretty good, and should take care of most contractors. But it doesn’t get updates from Facebook (where more people spend their time online today more than any other website) as well as forums and other review sites. So what winds up happening is that you only “think” you’re covered.
If guarding your company’s image not only from homeowners but from your competitors is something you worry about, then maybe a one better program is what you need? But wouldn’t you also want to know when people were saying something good too?
Reputation management isn’t just about paying attention to Mrs. Jones when she crushes you because your dirty boots left stains on her carpet. Reputation management is about getting in front of Mrs. Jones and thanking her when she says something good about you too. That’s how you build brand loyalty, and this type of proactive approach to social media marketing should be a cornerstone to any marketing program.
But what about when it is bad?
So let’s say you did piss off Mrs. Jones, and now she is ripping you all over the web, and each person she turns away from your company is costing you thousands, wouldn’t you want a solution that could suppress this info? That would have to be a value added feature that you would be interested in right?
I ask because I don’t know. I don’t know how interested you are in protecting your name on the web. I don’t know how interested you are in trying to clear up any issues you have when they arise. I imagine you have a passing interest in the topic if you are still reading, but is it something you would invest in on a monthly basis, and if so how much?
So…If I get programmers involved and take the time to do this right, and I can:
- Provide you with a reputation management solution specifically for contractors, would you be interested?
- Secondly, if I developed a solution that would help you attack negative reviews, would you be interested in that?
- Understand would be a two-tiered solution that would involve reputation management and a negative review solution.
That’s why I need you…
If this sounds like a good idea, let me know. If it sounds like a crappy idea let me know that too. If you think you already have the bases covered then I will drop it and move on. But I think between the monitoring service and the adverse review service, there should be a market for one or the other or both. But you have to tell me. I am not going to just go get this thing done without a better understanding of what you need.
Tell me in the comments or in an email if you think this program is for you or not. And think about this, just one negative comment has the ability to not only ruin your reputation online, but to stop people in their tracks who were thinking about doing business with you.