Contractor Marketing & Consulting Services
Since 2006
All Contractor Marketing (ACM), a leading contractor marketing company and consulting agency, is excited to announce that they have been named to the annual Inc. 5000 list. All Contractor Marketing has earned the #160 ranking nationwide, #11 in the Advertising & Contractor Marketing industry, and #13 in metro Atlanta, Georgia. The ACM team has achieved impressive three-year revenue growth of 2,597%. Inc. 5000 List .


The PowerVie™ HVAC
Local Market Share System
At All Contractor Marketing, we specialize in aligning manufacturer, distributor, and dealer co-op marketing through the proprietary PowerVie™ system. This proven system breaks down HVAC’s local market share to a science and allows the dealer, territory manager, and general manager to work together to systematically take local market share and crush the competition. The PowerVie™ system creates brand lift, gains local market share, and increases profitability.





Our Marketing, Advertising
and Consulting Services
Since 2006 we have been helping home service providers improve their business, grow the business, and then sell the business. Our teams of experienced professionals are unmatched in the industry. From the day you open your doors to the day you retire and walk away, we can help you win, make more money, and have more fun. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel, let us help you crush the competition and gain market share.
ACM’s Recent Testimonials
Marketing agency frequently asked questions
Should HVAC companies still use email marketing?
You might think that with the growing popularity of social media platforms, sending emails to customers is no longer necessary. Think again. In actuality, email is still one of the most widely used digital tools for communication and also marketing. According to a study by Statista, over 90% of internet users in the United States also use email. At All Contractor Marketing, we are your expert email marketing firm. Trust our experience.
Mobile devices’ growing popularity means that individuals check their emails more easily and also more frequently today. Consider your own life. Are you guilty of checking your email in line at the coffee shop or the grocery store? Have you responded to emails in the waiting room at the doctor’s office?
4 Benefits of Expert Email Marketing for Service Companies
Inexpensive, Easy, and Effective
For small to medium-sized companies on a budget, email marketing is a cost-effective channel to reach customers. Consider a traditional marketing campaign that sends out a direct mail piece to residents. There are a lot of costs associated with printing, postage, and also creative design. With emails, you can use the same imagery and message without the additional expense. Moreover, further information can be accessed easily with one click to your website.
Moreover, for every $1 you spend on email marketing, you can expect an average return of $42 (DMA, 2019).[https://dma.org.uk/uploads/misc/marketers-email-tracker-2019.pdf] There are many email marketing benefits, as we will discuss. Still, this one tops the list for generating leads and also boosting revenues.
More Customizable, Therefore More Effective
Social media platforms are an excellent channel for interacting with your audience and also building relationships with your customers. However, when you write a Facebook post, you have to address your entire client base. An example post might say, ‘We want to ensure that your family stays warm and also safe through the cold winter nights. Book an appointment now!’
With email marketing, you can segment your audience lists and send each a tailored email message. You can also include the recipient’s name. For example, an email could be sent to clients who’ve previously booked a fall tune-up but haven’t scheduled it for spring. Creating a targeted, personalized message increases customer engagement and leads to more booked appointments than social media.
Results are Measurable
Today’s advanced email marketing software can track who opened your email and also which embedded links were clicked. There is no guesswork as to how your email campaigns are performing. Real-time analytics also means that you can make adjustments and also improve the effectiveness of your email marketing mid-campaign. For instance, many email marketing campaigns utilize A/B testing. In one A/B test, all emails could have the same email but with two different subject lines. Do more customers open an email with the subject ‘Reminder: Spring Tune-up Due’ or ‘20% Off All Spring Tune-ups.’ These things can be measured and also improved upon.
Builds Brand Awareness
Effective email marketing keeps your business name front of mind with your customer. Research shows that the more individuals see a company’s brand name, the more likely they are to recall that name. Consider the homeowner whose air-conditioning breaks down during humid Georgia summer. If the homeowner has received frequent, relevant, and also helpful emails over the year, they will think of you. If not, they will go to the Internet and search for a company with good reviews. With traditional email marketing, your customer will more likely recall your name when the need for service arises.
Proven Expert Email Marketing Results
At All Contractor Marketing, we have extensive experience in email marketing. We know the types of email messages to send to your customers and also how often. We offer proven results with our highly profitable digital email marketing techniques. To learn more about how Email Marketing can increase jobs for you, contact us today.
Why Should I Use Pay-Per-Click for Marketing?
How Can Pay Per Click Grow My Business?
Many businesses struggle to find ways to grow at a fast pace. Getting your website found through search engine optimization can take months or even years to build. If you need immediate results to boost your revenue, there is an alternative: Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising.
PPC advertising generates new leads, drives targeted traffic to your website, and positions your heating and cooling business better in the market. Moreover, PPC is an instant and effective advertising method to grow your business.
Need a little more convincing? Here are 5 ways PPC advertising can help grow your business.
Generate Hot Leads
PPC displays your business ad at the exact moment a consumer is searching for your service or product. A consumer that clicks on your ad at the moment they need heating and cooling services is a hot lead. Because a hot lead is ready to make a purchase, they can convert to a sale quickly. So not only do you generate revenue fast, you also do so with minimal sales effort.
Get Immediate, Daily Results
If you need immediate results to boost your revenue, say for a rapid post COVID recovery, PPC advertising is the answer. PPC advertising is like a faucet. As soon as you turn it on, prospective consumers start flowing to your website enquiring about your services. PPC is an immediate way to generate leads and increase sales.
Increase Brand Recognition
Extensive research shows that humans respond more positively to images they’ve seen regularly. Therefore, a PPC ad, by just being shown online, will make a consumer more familiar with your business. So, even if they aren’t ready for your services yet, a PPC ad exposes them to your business name. Then, when they do need heating and cooling services, your name will be recognized as one they know and trust. This may be enough to choose you over a competitor. And the best part, if a consumer doesn’t click on an ad, you don’t pay for it. So in effect, you can get this increased brand recognition without paying a penny.
Pay For Performance
Suppose you are a company paying $4 per click for the keywords ‘furnace repair’ in the depths of winter. During the day, 10 people click on your ad. Of these 10 people, two call your business, and one turns into a paying customer. For an investment of $40, you were able to secure a job that profits significantly more than that. With PPC, you only pay for the ad when someone clicks on it. You pay for performance. Since everything is measurable, you can easily make adjustments to ensure your campaign is profitable and grows your bottom line.
Controllable, Affordable Budget
With PPC advertising, you can create daily and cost-per-click budgets. You can also pause or turn off a PPC campaign easily. These features mean that you stay in control of spending. The size of your ad budget will determine how many businesses leads you will attract. However, pay-per-click offers affordable, proven results for businesses of all ad budget sizes.
Grow Your Business Today With a PPC Ad Campaign
To sum it up, a PPC advertising campaign can grow your business quickly and affordably. If you want to know more about PPC advertising or are looking for a professional to handle your PPC campaign, contact All Contractor Marketing today.
How Can I beat my Competition with Marketing?
Supercharge Your Digital Marketing
You may feel that a Facebook business page is all the digital marketing you need. Whilst some Internet presence is better than nothing, to grow your business, you need to do more than exist online. Your business name needs to pop up during Google searches. Listing your company in online listings is imperative. Your business also needs an active social media presence.
When digital marketing is optimized, you can utilize the web to generate sales, build customer loyalty, and also develop brand recognition. Enhancing your digital presence on your own is possible, but not easy. You need time, a precise strategy, and also core expertise. Below, we look at three ways an expert can supercharge your digital marketing.
Create a Broad and Consistent Online Presence
The first step in supercharging your digital marketing is to identify where your business appears online. Do you have a Facebook page? A website? Is your business listed on Yelp? Bing? Mapquest? Better Business Bureau?
You might be surprised to find that there are dozens of location-specific and industry-specific business listings where your business data appears or should appear. Making sure you have a broad presence everywhere your potential customers might find you is critical. Getting your Name, Address, and also your Phone Number (NAP) listed on directories and online business listing sites helps improve visibility and benefit SEO.
As well as being listed in the right places, you will need to make sure your business details are correct. Do the listings provide consistent company information across each directory? Is there a link to your website? Is there an accurate company description? A consistent online presence can help supercharge your digital marketing.
Maintain an Active Social Media Presence
Most online listings allow verified customers to rate their experience with a business. Being aware of what your customers are saying is essential. Even more critical is responding quickly to every positive and negative new feedback your business receives. To improve your digital marketing strategy, it’s important to be automatically alerted when new feedback is posted. To supercharge your strategy, even more, you can share positive reviews to amplify word of mouth.
Keep an Eye on the Competition
Understanding what is going on outside your business is also imperative in digital marketing. For one, it can help you understand your competitive advantages and disadvantages relative to others in the market. Are you the only local company in a 50-mile radius that can install ductless systems? That could be an advantage worth promoting. Keeping an eye on your competition can alert you to new products they might be offering or customer problems they might be having. Whatever knowledge we obtain is powerful. Understanding your competitors gives you the information to win more business and also retain existing customers.
Call an Expert to Supercharge Your Digital Marketing
All Contractor Marketing has over a decade of experience in marketing programming. We can develop a customized digital marketing strategy to ensure search engines and customers can find you online. We then use proprietary data analytics to track every view, click and call to drive sales. To learn more about how we can supercharge your marketing, contact us today!
What is a good SEO strategy?
In today’s internet landscape, it is absolutely essential that all businesses, large and small; incorporate Search Engine Optimization (SEO) into their marketing strategy. This article will help explain exactly why you need an SEO strategy, what is included in an SEO marketing strategy, and also how to create an SEO strategy.
Why You Need an SEO Strategy
Simply put, there is much more to SEO than simply adding keywords to your website. Just like any business, marketing, or sales plan, you need to carefully consider; and plan out your approach to search engine optimization. Search engines are now primarily focused on providing their users with search results that best match their intent, as well as content that will provide the best, most complete answer to their questions.
What is Included in a Search Engine Optimization Strategy
Technical SEO – Technical SEO refers to the optimization strategies you take to make sure that search engines can effectively crawl your site. Technical SEO should be built into your website and it includes: making sure you use SSL, ensuring your site is mobile-friendly, keeping your content unique, ensuring you have a clear site structure, making sure your site loads quickly, and creating an XML sitemap to submit to search engines. We will discuss Technical SEO even further in a future article.
Onsite SEO – Your website needs to be optimized for SEO on a meta and a micro level. The best place to start applying onsite SEO strategies is to make sure you have a clear hierarchy on your site. This was briefly mentioned in our technical SEO section, but it bears repeating. Your site needs to have a clear, logical structure if you want it to be properly crawled by search engines.
How to Create an SEO Strategy
When you are just beginning to develop your SEO Strategy for your website, there are some basic steps worth following. Please note: these primarily pertain on onsite SEO, especially since your technical SEO should already have been addressed when you set up your site. When you create a new page or post or are updating a current page/post, we suggest you follow these steps to ensure they are SEO-friendly:
SEO Friendly Steps
- Find a Great Keyword. It will take you a bit of time to fully develop your keyword research strategy, but it is a crucial first step. Many businesses will utilize a paid keyword search tool to help them identify the best keyword for their purposes. Your overall goal will be to find a keyword that has a high Click Through Rate (CTR) that you also have the possibility of ranking for.
- Analyze Your Competition. After you’ve picked your keyword(s), search for it yourself, and analyze the results on Google’s first page. What is similar about the top 10 results; are there additional keywords they are using that you could use as well? How can you make your content stand out among those top 10?
- Diversity and Improve. The best way to outrank the sites that make the first page of Google search results is to either create something different or better or both. Brainstorm ways you can diversify your content and make it even better than what’s currently available.
- Write a Memorable Meta Description. Users will not click through to your website if you don’t have a memorable meta description with a good call to action (CTA).
- Leverage Onsite SEO. Within your page/article, you’ll need to include relevant internal links and have a keyword-focused URL
SEO Strategy Overview
This is a brief overview of search engine marketing strategies. SEO can be a very challenging concept to grasp, and even more difficult to master. Many businesses large and small, leverage web optimization services and SEO consultant services to help them improve their search rankings. When you leverage the professional SEO services from All Contractor Marketing, you can ensure that you are receiving top-notch, custom SEO, and web marketing services that will drive traffic to your site. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help your business grow.
What is the best Social Media Strategy?
By now, most businesses, big and also small, know they should have a social media presence. However, a lot of companies, particularly providers, do not do social media marketing right. Simply having a FaceBook page is not enough. You need a strategy for social media marketing to be effective. Yet, when social media marketing is done right, it can help build brand awareness, engage customers, and also generate leads. Here are some of the key ways to do social media marketing right.
Identify Your Audience – Social Media Presence
Defining your target customers and identifying how they engage with social media is key to doing social media marketing right. First, determine your key audience’s age, location, income, and also their homeownership status. Then, research how your target customer base engages with social media. Is your target audience Millennials? Gen Xers? Do they mostly use Snapchat, Facebook, or Instagram? Social media analytics or a social media marketing company can help find this information. Armed with these insights, you can better decide the right platform for your content and also better target your audience.
Research Your Competition
Another way to ensure you do social media marketing right is to research your competition. Are your competitors using social media? How many platforms are they on? How many posts are they putting out? What social media marketing is working for them? What isn’t? Undertaking a competitor analysis can also help you spot opportunities and help define your business’s social media marketing strategy.
Create Engaging Posts
Social media marketing posts should be about more than selling your product. Social media presence and content should be informative and add value. By creating engaging social media marketing posts, you build customer engagement and also loyalty. In turn, this leads to real-time sales. Engaging social media posts often include eye-catching imagery, along with useful knowledge. Posts could include notifying your target audience of new regulatory changes, like the new freon regulations. Or posts could announce company awards like receiving a Carrier President’s Award. The aim is to build up a customer relationship through trust and also honesty.
Track and Tweak What You Do
All social media marketing strategies should be tested and also tracked. With the use of social media marketing tools, you can identify what is working best and implement small changes. Continually tracking and tweaking your social media marketing strategy will ensure it is the most effective it can be.
Elevate Your Social Media Marketing Presence
Social media marketing is essential in the 21st Century, even for small businesses. When you do social media marketing right, you can build a relationship with your target audience, increase brand awareness, and generate business leads. At All Contractor Marketing, we have one of the highest-performing social media marketing programs available in the area. If you are interested in doing your social media right, contact us today.
How can I fix all these online errors about my business?
Long gone are the days of printed telephone books stuffed in kitchen junk drawers. Today’s proliferation of mobile devices means that most people now use Internet searches to find local businesses instead. However, a user searching for an ‘HVAC technician near me’ or ‘best pizza restaurant in town’ will probably only look through the top few results. If your business listing isn’t easy to find online, then it is probably hurting you.
Common Listing Errors that Hurt Your Business
Inconsistent or Inaccurate NAP
Just having an online listing isn’t going to be enough to drive relevant customers to your local business. Your various listings need to be consistent and have accurate NAP (Name, Address, Phone) details. If one online listing says you are a plumbing business and another state you as an auot repair shop, you will put off your Internet searcher. Likewise, inconsistencies in your name, address, and phone number reduce your Google ranking effectiveness. If search engines don’t know where you are, they can’t correctly list you in mapping directory locations such as Google Maps.
Having Only One Listing
In general, the more online directories you are listed on, the better odds that your customers will find you. You are probably familiar with Yelp and Angie’s List. Yet, there are literally hundreds of service-related directories that your business should be listed with. With 46% of all Google searches being for local businesses, making sure you have multiple listings will help increase your Google profile ranking.
Not Having A Local Search Strategy
‘Near Me’ searches for local businesses have increased by 500% in the past couple of years. However, to show up on these Internet searches, a business must include the right keyword search terms and have a specific geographic location tagged to its online listing. A local marketing company will know the top search terms for the customers in your area. And it will make sure your online listing appears in the rankings. A local marketing agency can also align all of your digital assets so that they work together. This will not only make your business look good but increase your local SEO.
Not Monitoring Customer Reviews
Online listings generally also include opportunities for customers to leave reviews about your business. Not monitoring what your customers are saying about your business could be hurting your business. Businesses need to be proactive about responding to both positive and negative reviews. Replying to a negative review gives you a chance to both tell your side of the story and apologize. Responding to a positive review shows that you value your customers.
Online Listing Advice to Help Your Business
Having an accurate and relevant online listing is essential to ensure your business displays in local Google search results. By creating the right local listing strategy and avoiding common listing errors, you will drive more local customers to your business.
At All Contractor Marketing, we have a dedicated team that will improve your online listing presence. Contact us online or call us today at 404-419-6884 to speak to one of our specialists about optimizing your online listings today.
Should I use Facebook Ads to grow my business?
Millions of small business owners have seen just how impactful Facebook Ads can be. Your friends at All Contractor Marketing have put together this Ultimate Guide to Facebook Ads for Your business. This guide will help you learn to leverage Facebook Ads to drive traffic to your site and reach potential customers. Follow these 8 steps and you’ll be placing effective Facebook ads in no time.
Step 1: Choose Where to Place Your Ads
There are 3 main places where you can place your Facebook ads:
- On Your Company’s Fan Page. There are four different types of ads you can place on your company’s Facebook page. These ad types include:
- Promote your company’s “Learn More” button
- Get More Website Visitors
- Promote Your Business Locally
- Promote Your Page
This is the simplest advertising tool on Facebook, but it is the least robust. Note: you can always Invite Your Friends to like your business’ fan page for free.
- The Power Editor. Although the Power Editor is the most challenging to use, it is the most powerful advertising location available. Consider using the Power Editor if:
- You want to create, edit and upload ads in bulk.
- You need more characters/text than the Fan Page Ads or Ads Manager ads will permit. The Power Editor has no character limit.
- You want to leverage dark posts meaning you want to run ads that won’t appear on your business’ page.
- The Ads Manager. Most business owners use Facebook’s Ads Manager and we recommend you use it for your HVAC business as well. It’s easier to use than the Power Editor and it has more functionality than the ads available through your Fan Page.
Step 2: Understand Facebook’s Ad Structure
Every Facebook ad campaign has a unique objective. The goal might be to increase website visits, create more brand awareness or promote a new product. Within your marketing campaign, you’ll have one or more Ad Sets. Ad Sets are organizational tools that help you categorize your ads according to the audience, budget, schedule, and placement. Each Ad Set houses one or more Ads that may differ based on media, format, and/or text.
To get started creating a Facebook ad for your business, click Create Ad while you’re in Ads Manager.
Step 3: Create Your Ad and Choose Your Objectives
After clicking Create Ad, you will be prompted to choose an objective for your campaign. You will need to choose one out of 11 objectives. Most Facebook advertisers choose one of two objectives housed in the Consideration column: Traffic or Engagement. Either of these options would be a good place to start. These objectives can allow you to accomplish a variety of goals. You can increase your website traffic, increase the number of Likes on your Facebook page or Boost a specific post.
Facebook will also permit you to choose one of two different ways to bid for your ad’s placement. You can bid by Auction or by Reach and Frequency. Small businesses, and those who are new to Facebook ads, often choose Auction. We recommend you choose this option as well.
Depending on which objective you choose, a second section may pop up where you will need to choose a sub-category. These might include Post Engagement, Page Like, etc. Oftentimes, the only thing you need to do is enter a name for your ad campaign.
Step 4: Build Your Facebook Ad Audience
The next step is to build your ad’s audience – the people who will actually see your ad. This is another essential element to building a successful Facebook ad campaign. You will be presented with a number of options to choose from. You can break your audience down by location, age, gender, interests, language, and more. We suggest you create an imaginary ideal client to help you narrow your audience down.
After coming up with a picture of your ideal client, you’ll need to narrow the audience size down further by using the Detailed Targeting section. To properly use this section, we encourage you to think about your ideal client. Once you have a picture of this client in your mind, think about what Facebook pages they might follow. These might include other local businesses, sports groups, or topics of interest. You want your HVAC business ads to be shown to users who visit those pages.
You can enter these details one at a time and see how it impacts your ad’s potential audience size. The general rule of thumb is to keep your audience size between 500,000 to 2mil. However, as a local business, your audience may be much smaller – and that’s ok. If you’re in a small town, it isn’t essential to narrow your audience down much at all.
Step 5: Set Your Budget and Your Schedule
The next step is to set your campaign’s budget and also its schedule. If you’re new to placing ads on Facebook, we suggest you let Facebook decide where to place your ads. We also suggest you choose a low daily budget, somewhere between $5 to $10. Finally, use the default delivery method, allow Facebook to place bids for you, use the standard delivery time and run your ads all the time.
By using these settings, you’ll achieve somewhat predictable results and you can also scale up after some fine-tuning. We suggest you run your ad for about 2 days and then use the analytics to make some adjustments.
Step 6: Add Your Graphics and/or Video
Other than choosing the right audience, the next most important factor in your ad’s success will be its visual element. We find that graphics or videos that include one or more of these elements perform the best:
- They stir up a positive emotion.
- They show an interesting aspect of the business or its products.
- They match the messaging in the ad’s text.
- They include the company’s branding and also colors.
- They are high-quality/hi-resolution
Keep in mind, Facebook penalizes companies whose graphics include more than 20% text. Sometimes they won’t show the graphic in the ad at all.
You can choose to use one image for your ad or use a Carousel Ad. Carousel Ads permit you to use up to 10 images. All Contractor Marketing suggests you create 6 versions of your ad’s graphic and also choose the 1 graphic per ad option. Then, Facebook can do a test run on each of these ads. After 24 to 36 hours, you’ll be able to see which graphic performs best.
If you don’t have high-quality/high-resolution images to use for your ad, don’t worry. Facebook has stock images you can use for free.
Step 7: Add Your Text and Preview the Ad
Once you’ve uploaded your graphic, it’s time to enter your ad’s text and see a preview of the finished product. When you choose the single image ad option, you have a 25-character limit for the headline. In addition, you have a 90-character limit for the text and a 200-character limit for the News Feed description. Since you won’t have many characters to work with, we suggest you follow these guidelines:
- Headline: Use 1 Action + 1 Subject
- Text: Use 1 Pain Point + 1 Solution + 1 CTA
- News Feed Description: Use 1 CTA + Detailed Description of Pain Point + Detailed Description of Solution
We suggest you also leverage the Call-to-Action option. In addition, we also suggest that you run your ads on both the desktop and also mobile news feeds. Finally, also consider running your ads on the Desktop Right Column and the Audience Network. Within 2 days of initially running your ad, you’ll be able to see which location is performing best. Then, you can shift your campaign’s placement over to that (those) location.
Step 8: Order Your Ad
Once you’ve completed the 7 steps above, review it one last time by clicking Review Ad. If you’re satisfied with how everything looks, simply click Place Order. It may take Facebook up to 24 hours to review and either reject or accept your ad. But, the overwhelming majority of ads are reviewed within 30 minutes. If your ad is approved, it will start running right away. If it is rejected, Facebook will also provide you with a reason.
Facebook Ad Solutions with All Contractor Marketing
Facebook advertising is a great option for large and also small businesses alike. Although it might seem a little daunting, it’s definitely worth investing in. If you need help with your company’s social media marketing plan, give All Contractor Marketing a call. We provide consultation and also social media marketing services to companies nationwide. Give us a call today – we look forward to helping your business succeed.
Is SEO really worth it for a business?
As a local heating and cooling company, the overwhelming majority of your business comes from your local community. This means it is absolutely essential that you incorporate local SEO into your internet marketing plan. Fortunately, local SEO relatively easy to incorporate, but you’ll need to make a commitment to leveraging these best practices.
If you’re wondering why you should bother with local SEO, consider the following:
- Most people looking for services will choose a business that shows up on Page 1 of search results.
- Almost 90% of consumers value online reviews equally as much as they do personal recommendations.
- Nearly 80% of smartphone users reach out to a local business after finding them in search results.
Although you may not be sure how exactly you should start to incorporate local SEO, ACM is here to help. These are the 4 main elements you should focus on when adding local SEO into your internet marketing plan.
Optimize Your Google My Business Listing
The first thing you should do is make sure your local directory listings are optimized. Currently, Google My Business Listing is the first one you should focus on. Local HVAC businesses can claim a free business listing and set up their own Google Business page.
After starting the process of claiming your free business listing, the site will bring up a map. From here, you can enter your business information and create a new listing. This is also a great place to check and see if there are other listings shown. If you do see other listings, it’s possible that were incorrectly transferred from Google+ to Google My Business. The most important thing is to have one listing that contains accurate, current information for your business.
Once you’ve claimed your business listing, you also need to optimize your listing. You can accomplish this by choosing the correct business category and subcategories for your business. You should also make sure the name, address, and phone listed on your website match the Google Business Listing. This can help your business land in the Top 3 of local listings.
Correctly Markup Your Website’s Pages
All search engines use what’s called a markup protocol to help them identify important information contained within websites. Some of this information includes the type of business, reviews, phone numbers, addresses, etc. When you use markup properly it will help search engines categorize your business’ information.
Contact us at All Contractor Marketing to learn more today.
Should companies use Search Engine Marketing SEM?
The term Search Engine Marketing (SEM) was coined in 2001 to describe any marketing that uses search engines. As the digital marketing landscape has shifted over the years, so has the definition of SEM. Today, search engine marketing more narrowly refers to any marketing that involves purchasing ads on the Internet. Understanding why SEM is essential, but challenging can help you decide how to implement SEM into your overall business marketing strategy.
Why is SEM Essential?
SEM is a useful tool in a business’s marketing and advertising mix. SEM increases search visibility, improves search ranking, and drives more traffic to a website. More importantly, search engine marketing offers these benefits quickly. These benefits make SEM marketing a very effective method for small businesses to attract new leads and increase revenue.
In comparison, search engine optimization (SEO) often uses unpaid methods, like blog sites, to increase a brand’s visibility online. Although equally valuable, this organic strategy takes longer to achieve results.
A good marketing strategy will incorporate a balance of SEM and SEO methods.
Challenges of SEM
SEM is a paid-for marketing strategy that usually involves pay-per-click (PPC) marketing. PPC is where an advertiser gets charged a set fee every time an individual click on an ad. GoogleAds is a popular platform for PPC. PPC can also involve placing ads on social media sites like FaceBook.
The challenge with SEM is that it requires precision and experience to develop and execute a successful campaign. Correct keywords must be chosen so that when an individual searches for these terms they see your ad. SEM marketing also requires knowledge of geocoding to ensure that your ads only show to internet users in your service area. A detailed SEM campaign will also involve linking your ads to dedicated website pages. These ad-related specific website pages often need to be developed.
These factors make generating qualified leads that make you money difficult if you don’t know what you are doing.
All Contractor Marketing: Your Local SEM Expert
The good news is that All Contractor Marketing can take the challenge of SEM marketing out of your hands. Our first-rate team are experts at planning and also executing successful SEM campaigns that won’t waste your ad dollars.
Now that you have a better understanding of SEM marketing, call ACM today to let us help you with your goals.
What is the best online Marketing?
Pay per click (PPC) advertising, also known as search engine marketing, occurs when an ad appears on a results page following a specific keyword search. If the user clicks on the ad, the advertiser will then have to pay the search engine or media host. One of the main advantages of PPC advertising is that a product or service ad pops up just as an individual is looking for that information. Let’s look five other benefits of using pay-per-click advertising.https://allcontractormarketing.com/https://allcontractormarketing.com/
5 Compelling Benefits of PPC Advertising
- Targeted
You choose the audience according to a defined set of demographics. This ensures your business ad is only visible to internet searchers in your territory. You can also target your audience according to homeownership status, gender, and age.
2. Measurable & Trackable
PPC advertising campaigns are also easy to measure. With the right tracking in place, you get detailed analytics on how many people clicked the ad and what click-throughs converted to sales. The ability to analyze what is and isn’t working and make real-time adjustments, ensures you make a return on your investment.
3. Quick Entry
If you’re operating a new business or just lagging behind your competitors in marketing, PPC advertising can help. PPC advertising offers a quick way to start generating leads and increasing sales. In contrast, marketing efforts relying on SEO take considerably more time and investment for the same return. With PPC, you will see your results almost immediately.
4. Profitable
Managed correctly, PPC advertising can be your most profitable lead generation tool. When the right search terms are targeted at the appropriate spend rate, each click-through can lead to a high positive return on investment.
5. Controllable Budget
PPC advertising budgets are controllable. You can set a maximum cost per ad click as well as a maximum daily spend. This means you decide how much you can afford to spend upfront.
Contact All Contractor Marketing
Developing a successful pay-per-click advertising campaign requires strategy in order to produce a high positive return on investment. At All Contractor Marketing, we have over 12 years of local experience generating qualified leads at lower spend rates. Speak to our expert team today. They are ready to help build and manage your online search engine marketing campaign.
Can I still use old school marketing?
The short answer – yes! Despite the fantastic results, you may be able to achieve through social media marketing and search engine ads; traditional marketing still has a place in all business marketing plans. No matter if you have an HVAC company or a car dealership, your current, and also your potential customers will be receptive to a variety of marketing techniques. The best marketing plans include a combination of traditional and online marketing; since they ensure they are reaching potential customers in a variety of ways.
6 Traditional Marketing Avenues
When you work with All Contractor Marketing, we may suggest one or more of these traditional marketing techniques to complement your online marketing efforts:
- Direct Mail. Whether we suggest radius or mass postcards for your business, direct mail has a consistent ROI.
- Broadcast TV. Our broadcast TV advertising partners consistently provide us with the highest gross rating points for the lowest possible price.
- Cable TV. All Contractor Marketing also has close relationships with Cable TV providers which enable us to obtain the highest gross rating points for the lowest possible price.
- Broadcast Radio. We work with broadcast radio stations across the nation and consistently produce a high ROI for our clients.
- Digital Radio. We are also adept at working with digital radio platforms, like Pandora, Spotify, etc. to bring digital radio advertising opportunities to our clients.
- Billboards. Still a solid marketing approach, our talented team will find the best location for your billboard(s) and offer a turn-key approach to this advertising channel.
Call All Contractor Marketing to Learn More!
Contact All Contractor Marketing today to learn more about the traditional and online marketing techniques we recommend for your business. We have extensive experience helping large and small businesses, as well as co-op marketing groups, find success in an ever-changing landscape. Give us a call or send us a message today!
What is the best way to hire new HVAC technicians?
If you want to know how many leads your social media strategy has produced, all you need to do is ask your marketing department. But – what if you want to know how many recruitments leads your strategy has produced. That’s another question altogether. Although you might be wary of using social media to recruit job candidates, it can be a great tool if you use it properly.
Why You Should Use Social Media in Your Recruitment Process
- Social media can help you market your company to a wide range of candidates, as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, etc. all cater to different audiences.
- You’ll be able to learn more about your candidate’s personality – this can help you determine if they’ll fit into your organization’s culture and if their work history matches what they’ve included in their social media profiles.
- Social media is a free tool that can help you reach the right candidates.
- Using Social media can help you find candidates passively since many job seekers use social media to look for potential employers.
- Social media can help showcase your brand to potential clients. It will allow you to show them what your organization’s mission and values are.
Keys to Recruiting the Best Candidates Through Social Media
If you’re ready to start recruiting candidates through social media, there are several things you need to think about to make sure you’re successful:
- Carefully Develop Your Strategy – Without a well-developed social media recruitment strategy, you can waste a lot of time and resources. As you develop your social media recruitment strategy, consider these questions:
- What is your current social media presence? The first thing you should do is to assess your organization’s social media presence.
- What are your specific, measurable goals? You also need to ask yourself what your SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, timely) goals are.
- What will your recruitment tactics be? You will need to develop different approaches depending on the role you’re hiring for. You’ll use different tactics to recruit an office manager and another set to recruit a service technician.
- Choose Your Platform(s) Wisely – There are several social media sites these days and each is used more often by different groups. When you’ve determined exactly what your current presence is and what your SMART goals are, you’ll be able to choose the social media sites that are best suited for your recruiting needs.
A wide range of businesses leverages LinkedIn and Facebook to build brand awareness and recruit highly-skilled employees. If you have questions about how LinkedIn, or other social media sites, can benefit your recruitment efforts, give the experts at All Contractor Marketing a call!
- Put Your Best Foot Forward – When you use social media, for marketing or also recruitment, it’s essential that you showcase what your company is truly about; its values and its mission. Readers want to know that your organization is trustworthy, has a solid reputation, and is also approachable. Social media is not the place for a hard sell or spammy tactics.
When you use social media to recruit future employees, we always recommend you:
- Leverage Social Shares – encourage your current employees to share your recruitment posts. There’s a good chance they are already acquainted with someone who would be a perfect fit.
- Build Relationships – social media is really about building relationships with current and also potential clients and prospects. Be sure you engage in industry-related discussions on Facebook and LinkedIn groups.
- Mutual Connections – if you’re interested in recruiting someone with whom you share a mutual connection, ask that connection to introduce you. It’ll go even further than an unsolicited direct message. If you don’t have a mutual connection, that’s ok! You can still message them; you’ll just want to make sure your approach is more personal and less spammy.
Create Your Social Media Recruitment Messaging
Once you’ve come up with your SMART goals and a solid strategy for recruiting via social media, it’s time to develop your messaging. You need to carefully consider who your ideal candidate is and then also think about how to effectively reach them. We’ve put together some questions to think about as you begin to draft your messaging:
- What traits does your ideal candidate have? What are their interests, motivations, and hobbies?
- How does your company’s brand fit in with those passions and hobbies?
- What specific benefits and other perks do you offer that your ideal candidate should know about?
- What social media site(s) is the best place to meet your ideal candidate?
- How do other companies in your niche recruit employees on these sites? What appears to be working for them? What would you do differently? How can you set your company apart from competitors?
Constantly Evaluate and Refine Your Tactics
The best way to gain success in the social media realm is to be willing to do your research and also consistently refine your messaging and tactics. When you work with All Contractor Marketing on your social media strategy, and your social media recruitment strategy, you’ll learn the tools you need to be successful in your efforts.
Part of experimenting with social media recruitment is to find out which platforms work best for your specific goals. We find most of our clients use Facebook and LinkedIn to post jobs, but you may also find success on other channels. Focus on the platforms that work best for your business and don’t be afraid to change your approach if you find out that something isn’t quite working.
All Contractor Marketing – Your Social Media Recruitment Partner
Becoming proficient in social media marketing and social media recruitment can take a lot of time, but it’s absolutely worth it. Having a winning social media marketing strategy can bring you more business than you ever thought possible and the right recruitment strategy can help you identify and retain high-quality employees.
All Contractor Marketing is here to help every step of the way. Whether you’re simply looking for a consultation or you want to completely hand over your marketing efforts to us, we’re ready to help your business succeed. Call us today to learn more!
Do I really need a website for my business?
In today’s day and age, all businesses, from small companies to Fortune 500 businesses, need to have a website. Small businesses can no longer afford to rely on word of mouth and local yellow pages to drum up business. If you’ve been hesitant about building a website for your business, we’ve come up with 5 reasons you should move forward:
5 Reasons Why You Need a Website for Your Business
- The New Yellow Pages – Several years ago, it was perfectly acceptable to rely on referrals and local business directories to bring in new customers. That is no longer the case. The internet, and search engines in particular, have replaced printed business directories and the majority of customers use the internet (and internet reviews) to access information about local companies. If you don’t have a web presence, you’re missing out on a lot of potential customers.
- Legitimacy – Customers expect all businesses to have a website, no matter if the company is large or small. If your company doesn’t have a website, it can cause customers to question your business’ legitimacy and modernity.
- Diversify Marketing Strategies – Your business’ website will give you the ability to diversify your marketing portfolio and grant you the opportunity to show your brand, and your core values, to potential clients.
- Beat the Competition – Having a business website gives you another opportunity to beat local, regional, and even national competition. Depending on the quality of your site, your search engine ranking, and your other marketing strategies, it can also help set you apart from the competition.
- Highlight Services – Potential customers inevitably have many questions about your services, payment methods, etc. Having a website gives you the opportunity to answer many client questions before they reach out to you.
Contact All Contractor Marketing
All Contractor Marketing is ready to help you create a dynamic website for your business. We have several years of experience helping clients succeed by embracing the digital age. Therefore Give us a call, or send us a message, and let us know how we can help you!
Why is SEO so important for a business?
SEO plays an important role in the success of businesses large and small. Every business owner should understand what exactly SEO is and how it can benefit their business.
What is SEO
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. When marketing companies and web designers employ SEO tactics, its overall goal is to achieve higher rankings in search engine results. In addition, adhering to specific SEO standards will make your company’s website more user-friendly and easier to navigate.
Importance of SEO for Large and Small Businesses
SEO is important for all businesses with a web presence, no matter the size of the company or the industry. Quality SEO can yield the following benefits:
- Increased visits to your site – the overwhelming majority of users will click one of the top 5 ranking websites on search engine results pages. When you optimize your website for SEO, you stand a much better chance of increasing your site’s traffic.
- Better user experience – SEO isn’t solely focused on moving your website up further in results pages, it’s also focused on improving user experience. By using SEO techniques to improve the structure and layout of your website, among other things, you can ensure your visitors will have a good experience using your website. This can not only bring you more business, but it can also make your website more favorable in Google’s eyes.
- Trust Factor – Users also tend to trust sites more that are listed on page 1 of Google search results. The closer your website is to the #1 position, the better.
- Local SEO – If your target audience is within a specific area or community, it’s worth engaging in local SEO tactics. This will help users find your business when they are seeking a specific service.
When you work with All Contractor Marketing to handle your website’s SEO, you can trust that we have the skills and experience needed to optimize your website and get you the search engine ranking you need. Contact All Contractor Marketing today to learn more.
How can I get more traffic on my social media?
As a business owner, you understand the importance of social media and how it can drive a lot of traffic to your site. What you may not know, however; is how to build a solid social media following so that you can start to rely on it as another source of traffic. Here at All Contractor Marketing, we’ve come up with 5 Ways to Boost Your Social Media Traffic; and are happy to share them with you now.
Boost your Social Media traffic
- Visual Appeal – Simply put, your social media posts need to be visually appealing. They need to stand out on the page. They also need to align with your brand as well. When you’re putting together a post, try to incorporate vibrant/bright colors, quality photography and visual storytelling.
- Sharable Content – A great way to increase your social media following and traffic is to make your content easily shareable. The overwhelming majority of people access the web via mobile and you, therefore, need to make social media sharing and social media following easy to accomplish via mobile.
- Research the Competition – Just like you’d research the competition while drafting your business and marketing strategies, you need to do the same in the social media sphere. You may discover which days/times are better to post, what social media channels your customers typically use, how often your competitors are engaged with customers, and what kind of content they post that has high engagement numbers (videos, pictures, graphics, etc.).
- Keep a Schedule – You need to be consistent when posting to social media without seeming spammy. You may want to use a social media scheduler or social media calendar to help you stay on top of posting. We suggest the following frequency for posting:
- Facebook – 3-7 posts per week
- Twitter – 5 tweets per day
- Instagram – 1 post a day
- LinkedIn (if applicable) – 2-3 posts per week
- Engage, Engage, Engage – You can’t simply post on social media and forget about it. You need to engage with likes, comments, direct messages, etc you receive. This is essential if you expect to grow your client base and increase your social media traffic.
Social Media Strategy
As you begin to plan out your social media strategy, contact the experts at All Contractor Marketing to learn how we can help you increase your followers and your social media traffic.
How I can I make Google Stop Calling me?
All Contractor Marketing wants to make each and every one of our clients aware of the dangers of marketing companies who solicit over the phone. Whether these companies are trying to have you purchase a Google Business Listing or they are trying to sell you on buying links or social media followers, none of these tactics are reputable and we strongly urge our clients to be vigilant if they receive these calls.
Google Business Listing Scams
If you, or a member of your staff, receive a robocall or phone call from someone claiming that your Google Business listing might not be verified or claimed, we suggest ending the call and blocking the caller immediately. Google does not charge for business listings and these phone calls are scams.
Unethical Marketing
If you ever receive a call from a marketing company that recommends buying email list subscribers, buying social media followers, offering paid links, or buying positive reviews – run the other way. Not only are these practices unethical, but they can hurt your business and reputation.
Fake Employees
Another issue you may experience originates in call centers. These companies will often misrepresent themselves, even implying, or saying they are with your current marketing company. Often the person calling may not even be from the marketing company, they are just a call center employee trying to generate leads for another company. They have no real interest in you or your business, although they will portray that they do.
All Contractor Marketing’s Approach
All Contractor Marketing handles its dealers with a high-touch approach. The only employees that have dealer contact, or may reach out to you are Michele, Chris, Melissa, Keri, Tricia, or Jake. We want to ensure you receive the best service; therefore, we only allow seasoned employees to have client contact.
If you ever have any questions about a phone call you’ve received or new marketing tactics that have been mentioned to you, please give us a call. We’re here to help and to make sure you don’t fall victim to one of these problems.
How can I get more customer reviews for my company?
As a business owner, one of the most important things you can do for your business, and its reputation, is to gather reviews; and also customer feedback. When your company has a distinct online presence, coupled with a strong reputation; it can only benefit your business in the long run.
What is Review Generation
As an integral part of your business’ reputation management, review generation is an automated process used to solicit reviews from your customers. We will walk you through the process of generating testimonials, and promoting positive reviews among popular review sites. It will strengthen your company’s reputation and also motivate potential customers to choose your business over others.
How Will Review Generation Help My Business
Online reviews do much more than simply strengthen your business’ reputation. There are a number of other benefits that review generation brings to the table:
- Online reviews are almost as valuable as personal recommendations. Many consumers compare personal recommendations to online reviews.
- The more reviews your business has, the more established your business will appear. Consumers prefer to do business with companies that have lots of reviews; not just one or two.
- Since dissatisfied customers are more likely to automatically leave a review, encouraging all your customers to review your products and services can help minimize the damage caused by poor reviews.
- Many search engines prioritize businesses with higher reviews, which improves your search engine ranking.
- Review generation can also increase customer loyalty. By gathering feedback, you’ll know how to improve your business to increase customer satisfaction.
Contact Us Today
When you hire All Contractor Marketing to manage your company’s reputation, we can help you improve your reputation through review generation. We can show you what you need to do, or we can handle it all in-house – it’s completely up to you. Contact All Contractor Marketing today to learn more about our reputation management programs and how review generation can help your business.
How do I get leads for my business?
Getting leads for your business is dependent on a couple of factors.
Make your message appealing to new customers
You have to put yourself in the mindset of your potential customer. If you were looking for an HVAC company to repair your system what factors would be important? Most customers are looking for the closest, highest-rated company, that looks professional, and they can trust. Your messaging needs to address those concerns and convey those points on your website and all marketing messaging.
Get that message in front of new customers
A great message is not effective if no one can find it. In order to get your message out, you have to use various marketing programs to place your company in front of customers that need your service. This means you need a fast-loading website that has a good Story brand that customers can easily understand and relate you. You then can use van wraps, social media, pay-per-click, direct mail, billboards, radio, or television to get your message out. The key is to maximize the lowest cost messaging first.
Get your number of reviews up
The first thing a new customer is going to do before they book service is research your company online and make sure you are honest and provide good service. This research is going to be looking at your Google, Facebook, and Yelp reviews. It’s important that you have a high number of great reviews. If you don’t, the new customer stops right here and searches for a different company.
Make it easy for your customer to book service
If you pass the online research, then your potential customer wants to book the appointment as easily as possible. Most prefer online booking where they do not have to call your office. When we implement booking automation, the number of new customers that book service always increases.
Provide great communication to the customer during the process
The customer wants some basic communication during the process. They want a confirmation text or email that the appointment has been scheduled. They want an appointment reminder the day before the appointment and the morning of the appointment. Just by providing great communication, you can significantly increase your review ratings. There are now automated systems that handle all of this communication for you, and they are surprisingly affordable. If you want more information about these systems, let us know.
Ask for a review
At the end of every service, always ask for a review. The easier you make it for your customers to provide you a review, the more reviews you will get. We have automated systems that request a review after every call and provide the customer with a simple link they can click to provide the review. If you want more information about these systems, let us know.
How much should I pay for leads?
The answer to this question is complex and takes into account a multitude of variables.
Digital Pay-Per-Click Marketing
Digital marketing is mostly auction-style based on bids. The number of competitors and their top bid amount affects how much you pay. If you outbid them, you get the click. If they outbid you, they get the click. In some areas, this can be highly competitive and the cost per click can be very high. In other areas, this can be an easy and very affordable way to grow your business. We see a range of $10 to $343 dollars (this continues to go up) per click based again on the competition. Also, keep in mind that a click does not always mean a lead.
Postcards and Direct Mail
Postcards and direct mail can be very effective at getting leads depending on the design of the card and the target market you mail them to. The more postcards you mail and the more frequently you mail them all come together to create a better result. Postcard leads range from $100-$250 per lead on average.
Television, Radio, & Billboard
Television, radio, & billboards act as more of a branding tool than a lead generation tool. If you just want the phone the ring, then we recommend that you avoid these. However, when combined with a more comprehensive budget of around $250K per year, these platforms work great to boost the performance of digital marketing and lower your overall cost per lead.
Website & Reviews
Most potential customers who need ac service are going to check your online reviews and your website after they see you add, and before they book the call. So not having a fast professional-looking website or not having good reviews can make your cost per lead increase dramatically. This is simply because they see the ad, they check you out and you do not pass the trust test. So it takes more leads to find the people who are willing to take a risk after they check you out online.
Conversion Rates
A very important calculation in your cost per lead is the conversion rate of your marketing. When a customer sees your marketing and book an appointment, this customer is considered a conversion. Customers who see your marketing but do not book an appointment are not counted in the conversion rate. So, the higher your conversion rate, the lower your cost per lead. In order to get the highest conversion rate, you need to implement Storybrand messaging along with marketing and landing pages that are designed for a higher conversion rate. In this instance, the marketing company you hire has a very large impact on your conversion rate.
Messaging
Having the right message is critical in order for your customers to trust you and relate to your brand. Many times, HVAC marketing speaks in jargon or words that your potential customers do not understand. Having the right message has a huge impact on your conversion rates.
Bottom Line
The bottom line is that the better your marketing locates and relates to your ideal customer, the less you will pay for a lead. In 2020 our customers experienced an average of $40-$80 per lead. This average was across hundreds of HVAC companies that covered a large portion of the southern United States.
How can I promote my business?
Promoting your business is really about a good branding campaign along with a good lead-generating campaign. The more you spend the more customers are exposed to your brand. But smaller companies can use good low-cost options to grow as well.
Here are some good low-cost options:
- Press releases to local newspapers or magazines.
- Social Media posts.
- Booths at craft shows, fairs, and local events.
- Business cards are placed on company boards at local hardware stores.
- Business cards at hair salons.
- Business cards at doctor offices.
Some of the best-paid options are:
- Fast loading Storybranded website.
- Pay-Per-Click Marketing on Google and Bing
- Social Media Ads
- Review Generation
- Customer communication automation
- Direct Mail postcards
- Television, Billboards, & Radio
How do I get more customers?
Getting more customers for your heating and air conditioning company really boils down to a few simple concepts that should be addressed in this order:
- Provide great service at a good (but profitable) price. Providing great service with high-quality techniques and products will go a long way for your customers to refer you to friends and neighbors. If you perform shotty work or use hard close techniques, then you can forget about getting a referral.
- Communicate with your customers. The more communication you have with your customers, the more satisfied they are with your service. Using automated communication software can go a long way to improving your communication. We offer highly effective solutions for this.
- Build your reviews. The more 5 stars review you have, the more customers you will get. Work on making sure every customer gets 5-star service and that they take the time to leave you a review. We have offered highly effective solutions for this.
- Storybrand your message – Going through the Storybrand messaging can transform your brand and communicate who you are and what you do in a way that your customers understand and relate to.
- Get out the message – Take your new Storybranded message and put it on your website, digital marketing, and traditional marketing to get your message in front of your potential customers in a way that optimizes conversions.
While it seems simple, this is really the technique that every large or growing HVAC company uses to get more customers profitably. If you go out of order or take risks on bad marketing platforms with a bad message, then you are just wasting money. The more money you waste, the slower you grow. The greater marketing you put in place, the more you grow.
What is the target market for contractors?
The target market is different for each company depending on your service territory. If you are in a large highly populated market, then you can use demographics to place your message in higher-income households. If you are in a rural market, then your target market is based more on a mile radius around your shop. There are some things to take into consideration if you are in a highly populated market.
- The wrong message or wrong website will not convert higher-income households into new customers. They are looking for a company they can trust, who will show up on time and do great work.
- If your marketing is weak or your message is wrong you are going to attract tire kickers, customers who are looking for the lowest price, and usually those who have trouble qualifying for financing. This is also true for ads in coupon clippers, mailer packs, and saver ads.
- The best target market is those customers who can afford your service, who want the job done right, and who are loyal to your company. In order to attract these customers, you have to have the right message and use marketing channels that reach them.
How do I market my Company?
The most cost-effective way to market your company is to start with Storybranding branding, get a mobile-enabled fast-loading website, and then use digital marketing for branding and lead generation. It’s best to put a 5-year marketing plan together so that you can improve the marketing each year and increase revenue at a predictable pace while adding team members to respond to the demand. We have 5-year plans that will take a one van company and guide them in marketing for the next five years to ensure profitable growth and avoid wasting money. The worst thing you can do is try different marketing options as salespeople call you or visit your office selling marketing. If the marketing worked, they have people waiting in line. If they are hard selling you, it’s because it will just waste your money. If you don’t know what to do, don’t do anything until you can afford a good marketing program.
How do I make my marketing successful?
In order for your marketing to be successful you have to follow these rules in order:
- Create a branding message that resonates with your potential new customers. Johns Heating & Air is not a brand message. Go through a Storybrand session to create a brand message that will reach your customers and invite them into a relationship with your company.
- Get a great website. You have to have a fast-loading website that works well on mobile devices. This website has to focus on the right keywords and has to have a strong SEO campaign to get it in front of potential customers.
- Get lots of great reviews. Your potential customers are going to check you out online and see what your reviews are before they book service with you. If you have a three-star rating with only 5 reviews, then your marketing will never work. You need hundreds of reviews with a minimum of a 4.5-star rating. Use a review automation service to increase your number of reviews and your ratings.
- Put your message out there with great marketing that has high conversion rates. Once you have the first three addressed, now you can put your marketing message out in front of your target demographic. You can use digital marketing, pay-per-click, and even traditional marketing to make the phone ring. But if you do not have the first three then almost none of your marketing will work and you will waste money on every ad.
How do I grow a small business?
The key to growing a small business is utilizing a solid 5-year plan to make sure every dollar you spend on marketing has a positive return on your ad spend. The most detrimental thing to a small company is wasted money. So, the best plan to follow is:
- Fix your brand message
- Get a great website
- Run high converting advertising in a 10–15-mile radius around your home or business.
- Avoid advertising that loses money (coupon clippers, movie theater ads, magazine ads, etc).
The key is using a smart marketing plan that grows with your company at a rate you can afford and that you can add employees slowly to meet the demand. Shooting for a 15-20% growth every year is conservative, allows you to build a good foundation, and enables profitable growth.
How do I advertise my business?
The key to advertising any business is to create a message that resonates with your target demographic, place that message in front of your demographic, and then make it easy for your potential customers to buy that product or service. In contracting the same rules apply. You can just run random ads on various marketing platforms, and this will technically be advertising your business. But the smartest thing to do is to advertise your business so that you actually get new customers. In order to do this, you have to have a message that resonates with your potential customer, put that message in front of your target demographic, and then make it easy for these customers to book service with you online without having to call your company. The trick is knowing how to craft a good message, where to place it, and how to have the best online appointment booking. When you do these things correctly you will grow your business each year and make a good profit. When you do them badly you will waste money each year and struggle to grow. In order to them correctly you need to:
- Storybrand your business.
- Build a great website that converts.
- Use the most effective marketing channels.
- Utilize online booking software.
- Utilize customer communication automation software.
The good news is that we are a one-stop shop and can give you a quote on all of these!
How do contractor companies Increase sales?
The key to increasing sales comes down to two strategies. One is increasing pricing and the second is increasing the number of jobs. But each of these is a balancing act. What you really want to do is to increase profit and then increase the number of jobs. The hard reality of contracting is that many companies will use marketing that just makes them lose money faster. Once you have established your pricing at a level that covers your overhead and produces the profit you desire, you then utilize great marketing to grow the number of jobs. The key to this is to start with profit first. How much would you like to make from your company each year? What were your overhead costs last year minus equipment? Then divide this number by the number of jobs you did last year. Now add that number to the cost of equipment for each quote and use your profit multiplier. This makes sure you are adding in profit and overhead costs to each job you quote. Now use good marketing that converts leads and produces a good return on ad spend and now you will only be limited by the number of people you can hire to do the work.
How do I generate more leads?
There is really more to growth than generating leads. The first thing to consider is the type of lead you generate. Many marketing companies make promises of “unlimited leads”. It does not take long for you to realize that your definition of a lead and their definition of a lead is much different. So, the real question is how I generate more repair and replacement leads. In order to do this, you have to have a good company reputation, a brand potential customers trust, a way to get the word out, and a system that allows your customers to book a call as easily as possible. So, let’s look at each of these one by one.
- Having a good company reputation – these are your online reviews. Potential customers check the online reviews of everything today before they buy. It does matter if it’s toothpaste, shoes, cars, or HVAC companies. The first thing they are going to do is check your online reviews. It’s critical that you have good reviews and a decent number of reviews. Today you must utilize review request automation software in order to get steady reviews.
- You have to have a brand potential customers trust – Since you are not a large brand backed by millions of dollars in brand lift advertising, your potential customers are going to use your reviews, your website and you’re messaging to judge your brand. What others have said about you, how you look online, and what you say are going to form the customer’s perception of your company. Since no customers visit your shop, the only thing they have to judge your brand by are these things.
- A way to get the word out – this is critical. You have to get the right message in front of the right customer. This is an art that requires decades of experience to perfect. You can run ads almost anywhere but knowing how to buy media in a manner that maximizes quality impressions at the lowest spend takes experience in the industry. This applies to digital and traditional media.
- A system that lets them book service as easy as possible – You must have 24/7 online booking options that allow your customer to book a service call and get an immediate text or email appointment confirmation back. Allowing your customers to book online dramatically increases your new customer conversion rate. Customers today do not want to call your office and deal with customer service reps in order to get a technician out. They just want to book the call and then someone shows up on time and fix the problem.