Marketing Your Service Business
Marketing any business is a science professional marketers
follow to get results. There are three principles that are most
important to the small business owner and should be adopted and
used:
1. Benefits - Most people make the mistake of telling everyone
the features of their business. This is not what your customers
are looking for. They want to know why they should give you the
job and not your competition.
2. Business Purpose - Are you sure you understand what your
business purpose is? Most people start a business to make money.
But your real job is to satisfy your customer needs.
3. Market Testing - Most small business owners run advertising
because they've heard that's what you do to get customers. But
they fail to track their ads to learn what is working and what
is not. The natural response to a failed ad is to decide the ad
did not work due to the publication or timing. This may be part
of it, but only by tracking and measuring the results of each ad
will you discover if it's even worth spending the money.
Benefits After defining your new business, it's only
natural to want to tell everyone what your business does and how
the service is performed. Not everyone is interested in that,
especially in your advertising. Those are the features of your
service but real people that need your service want to know how
they will benefit. A Pest Control service is just like any
other, right? They come to the property and spray the inside on
the initial appointment and spray the outside on every
appointment. Not much to tell anyone except maybe you get
behind, up high and in the corners. But that still doesn'ttell
me anything. By getting behind, up high and in the corners, what
is the benefit to me, your customer?
- "We sweep down cobwebs so you don't have spiders multiplying
in your living area."
- "Your attic is thoroughly inspected for crevices and holes
which allow squirrels and mice to live. We'll seal these up to
prevent these critters from multiplying and storing food
supplies and scaring you in the middle of the night, running
down the outside wall."
- "We clear all vaulted roof and ceiling areas of bees and
wasps so you're not caught in a swarm while enjoying your nice
evening on the patio."
These are all benefits that cause the reader to start thinking
they really do need your service. These are people that would
have never called you because they were not aware of these
problems. Now they're worried because they've never looked for
these problems and how many do they have? They can't get to
their phone fast enough. You've managed to convey some of the
problems people could have on their property and you've stirred
them to action with a little fear. Understand how important this
is as compared to some of the features you may be inclined to
advertise.
Purpose Are you in business to make a profit or to add
value for your customers? This is the most effective sales tool
you have. How many times have you called a company and have been
dissatisfied just with the person answering the phone? They seem
indifferent to your needs, shallow, uncaring. People sense this
right away and will assume the service you offer is run with the
same indifference. People want to know you care about them. And
it's really not hard to do. If you are running your business
with the joy of providing a service your customers need, people
will be attracted to your business and will refer you to their
friends and family. Get clear about why you are running your
business. If it's only to make a profit, then you need to do
something else because you will never succeed at a pace that
allows you to have a lifestyle and a business.
Testing Even if you knew to test the results of your ad
campaign, would you find the time to do it? Probably not,
because you're busy running the details of the business. But
what if I told you this could save you a lot of money in useless
ads? Most advertising is useless because small business owners
don't understand the basic concepts to make it successful. Good
ads don't just happen. Even professional marketers make sure
they test every aspect of every ad. A minor change to the
headline, the body or the call to action could make a major
difference in the campaign results; as high as 100-300%.