Marketing Tips For a Lawn Care Business

by Nate on February 12, 2011

your lawn care business and are guaranteed to be looked at as the homeowner has to take it off of their door handle.  Some will be irritated but some won’t.  Another potential benefit to using the door hanger is that they have to be hand delivered so you may be able to talk with the homeowner about their needs.  Be sure to be presentable and professional to make the most out of this type of marketing.

 Like the flyer and postcard, door hangers can be printed by local printers and some companies online at very reasonable prices.   

Word of Mouth

We all hear about how word of mouth is the best form of advertisement but it should not be your only strategy to bring in new clients. 

The word of mouth comes from years of providing great service and won’t grow your business overnight.  Word of mouth is something that is built on your attention to detail, excellent customer service, expert knowledge, etc. 

Referrals

Asking your customers to refer potential customers to you by giving them an incentive to do so is another weapon in your marketing arsenal.  This incentive could be a discount or additional add-on service at no cost for every opportunity to do an estimate.  By giving the free add-on service (like soil analysis, aeration, etc), you may even get additional work from that customer.  Referrals are a great way to advertise because people like to hire who they can trust.

Door-to-door

While door to door sales aren’t well received these days it can be a strategy that works, but only if you have good people skills and don’t come off as creepy.

One approach that works better than most is before knocking on the customer’s door, take a look at their yard and notice problems in the lawn to discuss with the homeowner.  That way, instead of trying to make a sales pitch on what you do, you can say that you noticed (type of weeds, fungus, etc) in their yard and here is how you fix it.  You can even mention proper mowing, dull blades, deck height, etc.  Mention that you can help them do it if they would like and hand a business card.  Simple, no hard sale, but giving information to the homeowner makes it for a more comfortable conversation.  Maybe take you up on the offer or not, but who will they call if they have a question about their yard and landscaping?   By giving out your knowledge and secrets and people see you are trying to help and not just trying to pressure them into a mowing contract, they will be more willing to talk with you.  If their yard looks good find out if someone is doing it for them.

Online

There are many ways to advertise your lawn business online and the best part is that many are free. 

           Website

          A website is pretty a much a must have if you plan on looking professional.           The good news is that the website hosts have made it really simple to put a website together in a matter of minutes, even if you don’t know anything        about building a website.  The cost is about /year for a domain name    (usually free with a hosting account) and -/month for the website.  With your website up you have a number of free and paid options to get your  business noticed.  Also when you get your website up, be sure to put the address on all of your marketing materials.

          Local Search

          The major search engines have the ability to put your business on the                       map, literally.  You can sign up with them for free and they give the ability to put in your business information.  When someone in your  area searches online for the category of business you are in, your information is displayed.   For best results you should have a website.

  Google – www.google.com/places
  Yahoo – www.local.yahoo.com
  MSN/Bing – https://ssl.bing.com/listings/BusinessSearch.aspx

        Paid Search

Paid search marketing is also called other names such as Pay Per Click (PPC), sponsored marketing and search engine marketing and is the advertising you see on the side of webpages (such as this one).  The primary providers are the search engines themselves such as Google Adwords or MSN AdCenter.  Google is the primary source of internet traffic with around 70% of total internet traffic so that is where you would probably want to put a majority of your paid search budget.  The paid search will also allow you to target your advertising in a geographical range so your message is going to people who are actually in your area.

Depending on your area, expect to spend from $ .20 – .00 per click if you want to be in the top five listings. 

      Google Adsense -

Pages: 1 2 3 4

{ 0 comments… add one now }

Leave a Comment

Previous post:

Next post: