Success during the Slow Season: Lower cost marketing and maintaining marketing

The milder seasons of the year tend to bring about slower business for those in the industry of HVAC, Electrical, and Plumbing.  But just because a majority of inbound calls are not “demand” doesn’t mean that your business cannot be successful and productive during the fall and spring.   Slower times call for company creativity and a renewed focus on the important foundations of service excellence.

This is the second week of our 3-week exploration of the keys to success during the “slow season” provided by Matt Stewart, a fellow independent contractor and Operations Manager at Advanced Comfort Systems.  Matt explains that the second way he prepares his company for success during these slower times is to “Focus on some lower cost marketing and maintain the marketing you have in place.”  Here are a few effective marketing tips:

• Boost your company website– Your website is a vital tool that can boost your company’s overall web presence.  It is important that customers can quickly and easily locate your business on Internet search engines.  One way to boost your company’s appearance on search engines is to create keywords and descriptions on the backend of the website.  These keywords should directly relate to your services and industry. They should also be used within your website content whenever possible.  It is important to keep your website professional, updated, easy-to-read, and easy to navigate.  Clearly indicating and updating limited-time specials and promotions as well as investing time in blogging on your company website can also be greatly beneficial.  Investing purposeful time boosting your company website is always an effective marketing technique but it can also give your company an extra “leg-up” during the slower times.
• Maintain a strong web presence on social media sites– Creating a company Facebook page or Twitter account will automatically boost your web presence on Internet search engines.  Devoting purposeful time updating your company’s social media pages goes hand-in-hand with boosting your company website; because these media tools allow you to endorse service promotions, limited-time specials as well as your company website directly.  Social media sites are also a great place to share a link to your company blog and give quick promotional messages simply by updating your status regularly.  While you still want to keep your company’s social media sites clean and professional, they can display more of the personal and intimate characteristics of your company and your message. Continue to maintain your web presence and social media presence no matter how slow business is because your customer base uses the web daily so it is vital to make an effort to go where your customers are located.
• Invest in lower cost marketing efforts– During the slower business times it can be tempting to forgo marketing maintenance but it is important to remember that marketing efforts can serve multiple purposes.  Investing in economical types of marketing such as door hangers can work to spread your company’s name and message in mass as well as keep your technicians busy and productive.  The beauty of marketing tools such as door hangers is that they, unlike mailers, require someone from your company to purposefully place them.  This marketing effort easily creates situations where it is very likely that a service technician or sales technician will meet a potential customer face-to-face.  In the slower times having direct and personal contact with potential customers is a big part of the battle.

An independent contracting company should think of their website, social media sites, and economical marketing efforts as tools that have the potential for aiding their company in the short-run as well as the long-run.  Marketing efforts such as the ones above are important in the process of growing and maintaining a healthy company year-round.  If you want to reexamine certain areas in your company that may need a boost, allow Service Excellence Training to aid in the evaluation process and help guide you to effective resources.

Stay tuned for next week’s post dedicated to Matt’s third piece of advice for achieving success during the “slow season.” Thank you for following Service Excellence Training’s weekly posts.  Here at Service Excellence Training we want to help you turn learning into earning!

-Resource curated by Whitney Stewart of Service Excellence Training.