Many people will tell you that advertising flyers are no longer an effective medium to generate leads for a business. However, numerous lawn care business owners are still having a great deal of success with this method. You really don't want to write off any low-cost marketing opportunity until you have tested it for yourself.
You will find a great deal of information online about what a well designed flyer should look like and how you can go about having them printed. This article focuses on distribution. Once you have that big stack of freshly printed flyers in your office, how are you going to get them in front of the eyeballs of prospective lawn care customers? Here are ten ideas.
1) Your Existing Clients
If you do already have some lawn care accounts, start by giving a few flyers to each of your customers. Just tell them that you are currently doing a promotion to drum up some new business. Ask them politely if they would be able to pass on a couple of flyers to their friends or neighbors.
2) Hand Them Out
Walk the streets in your target area and look for people who are out in their yards or walking down the street. Hand them a flyer and politely ask them if they would be interested in receiving a free estimate to do their lawn. This approach gives you a chance of making a personal connection and possibly an appointment. Your flyer will stand a better chance of being read as well.
3) Door to Door Delivery
Select houses in your area with decent sized lawns and drop off a flyer to them. In some countries like the US it is illegal to put unsolicited mail into mail boxes so you must check with your local post office first so that you know what is permitted. You may be better off having door hangers printed as these can easily be slipped over a door handle. You can always do it officially and purchase stamps and a mailing list from your local post office.
4) Insertion into Local Publications
Many local newspapers and magazines will insert your flyer into their publication for a small fee. This will usually give you better exposure than purchasing ad space.
5) Waiting Rooms
Think of some businesses that people go to and spend time waiting around. If you can get a flyer onto the wall or notice board at a fast food restaurant, laundromat, dental surgery or hair salon then you may benefit from some free or low cost exposure. Your flyer will have a better chance of being read if people in the room are sitting around with nothing to do.
6) Parking Lots
One common approach to flyer distribution over the years has been to put them under the wind screen wipers on car windscreens. Be careful with this approach though as it does bother some people. If your flyers end up blowing all over the place in the wind then your reputation may suffer as a result.
7) Community Notice Boards
Many buildings in your community will have notice boards. Churches, schools and other organizations may let you post a copy of your flyer if you are polite and seek permission first.
8) Busy Events
Look for busy events in your local area like fairs, carnivals, garden shows or even garage sales. If you have permission to attend and hand out flyers you may meet some local prospects.
9) Direct Mail
Purchase a mailing list of targeted prospects in your area and mail them a copy of your flyer with an accompanying letter and business card. Some printing companies will handle this for you. They will take your flyer hot of the press and mail them out to a targeted address list.
10) PO Box Drops
Some post offices will arrange to have a copy of your flyer inserted into each one of their PO Boxes. A small fee is charged for each flyer. Many box holders will be business owners so this approach may be effective for securing commercial lawn care accounts.
It is ideal if you can have flyers made up with different coupon codes on them. Or you can put separate stickers onto them. Then you will know which of the above methods is more effective for you and you can focus more on that method. If a method is not effective in generating leads for your lawn care business then you can drop it all together.
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Running a Lawn Care Business - Focus on Marketing and Productivity
The lawn care industry offers so many opportunities for entrepreneurs during both good and bad economic times. But not all lawn business owners are successful at making a decent income. Some don't even survive past their first year.
Your success in the lawn care business, like any other industry is almost certainly going to be measured by how much money you are making. To make a good income you have to be generating healthy profits.
Success comes down to not only the need for lots of lawn mowing jobs but also the need to complete jobs efficiently. Marketing and productivity are the two areas that you need to focus on.
A lawn business owner who is a master of marketing but slow at mowing lawns (or currently employing staff who are slow at mowing lawns) will simply not make money. Likewise, you can be the fastest lawn mower in the world but fail in business due to the fact that you were unable to generate any customers.
Let’s look a little more at these two important buzz words; marketing and productivity. It is important to focus on both and not to become a master of one while neglecting the other.
All the other details about starting a lawn business such as getting licensed and insured are trivial really. If you can get these two things right your success will almost certainly be assured.
Marketing - Maximize Opportunities to Make Money
Firstly, you have to have a constant stream of income coming into your lawn business at all times. For lawn care business operators this means having healthy routes with a slowly increasing number of accounts. While some lawn business owners buy accounts, most depend on marketing to bring in the clients that they need.
Your marketing system will have to generate leads, convert these enquiries into new accounts and then encourage loyalty and referrals over the long term. Customer retention is just as important as customer acquisition so a high standard of customer service is required.
The starting point for marketing should be research so that you can understand who your customers are, what they want and what kind of promotions they are likely to respond to. You need to meet market needs by coming up with a brand that is appealing and services that are in demand.
Then you can test advertising strategies, offers and sales approaches until you hit on winning combinations that produce results. You also have to become good at doing business in a way that allows you to stand out from the competition.
Marketing can be a complex beast to work out. Just break it down into parts though and work on getting every step right. If you keep making changes and experimenting you will come across a system that works.
Productivity - Minimize Money and Resources Going Out While Still Providing a Quality Service
Secondly, you need to focus on daily operations and productivity. You need to be able to get tasks done efficiently in order to make money. You have to know how to make the most of the work that is available to you.
This is done in the office, out on the road and in the yards of your clients and will involve systems to manage and track the performance of every aspect of your business.
You need a reliable computer system and dedicated software that can handle accounting, scheduling, estimating and other important functions.
You will need to understand how to plan routes that are efficient and save on time and gasoline. Equipment like a mobile phone, GPS and route planning software can really help you to be more organized and keep control.
You will also need to ensure that your productivity out on the job is maximized. You need to have the right gear and you need to know how to maintain it and how to use it correctly. If you have employees then you will need to have systems in place to monitor their productivity.
The Right Balance - Slow Growth Is Best to Keep Things In Balance
Success in the lawn mowing business is all about becoming good at marketing and managing an efficient operation. You need to maximize cash flows coming into your business and you have to give your clients a high standard of service while minimizing the time and costs that are incurred in the process.
Your marketing and operating systems have to develop slowly together. If one gets ahead of the other then problems can occur. A sudden burts in new accounts can be a disaster if you can't handle them properly. Slow growth usually allows your operational activities to keep pace with your growing number of clients.
Some people tend to overcomplicate business and make everything seem more complicated than it has to be. Just remember two words; marketing and productivity and you'll be fine. If you focus on these two things you will be able to keep a clear head and remember what the fundamentals of your lawn care business are all about.
Your success in the lawn care business, like any other industry is almost certainly going to be measured by how much money you are making. To make a good income you have to be generating healthy profits.
Success comes down to not only the need for lots of lawn mowing jobs but also the need to complete jobs efficiently. Marketing and productivity are the two areas that you need to focus on.
A lawn business owner who is a master of marketing but slow at mowing lawns (or currently employing staff who are slow at mowing lawns) will simply not make money. Likewise, you can be the fastest lawn mower in the world but fail in business due to the fact that you were unable to generate any customers.
Let’s look a little more at these two important buzz words; marketing and productivity. It is important to focus on both and not to become a master of one while neglecting the other.
All the other details about starting a lawn business such as getting licensed and insured are trivial really. If you can get these two things right your success will almost certainly be assured.
Marketing - Maximize Opportunities to Make Money
Firstly, you have to have a constant stream of income coming into your lawn business at all times. For lawn care business operators this means having healthy routes with a slowly increasing number of accounts. While some lawn business owners buy accounts, most depend on marketing to bring in the clients that they need.
Your marketing system will have to generate leads, convert these enquiries into new accounts and then encourage loyalty and referrals over the long term. Customer retention is just as important as customer acquisition so a high standard of customer service is required.
The starting point for marketing should be research so that you can understand who your customers are, what they want and what kind of promotions they are likely to respond to. You need to meet market needs by coming up with a brand that is appealing and services that are in demand.
Then you can test advertising strategies, offers and sales approaches until you hit on winning combinations that produce results. You also have to become good at doing business in a way that allows you to stand out from the competition.
Marketing can be a complex beast to work out. Just break it down into parts though and work on getting every step right. If you keep making changes and experimenting you will come across a system that works.
Productivity - Minimize Money and Resources Going Out While Still Providing a Quality Service
Secondly, you need to focus on daily operations and productivity. You need to be able to get tasks done efficiently in order to make money. You have to know how to make the most of the work that is available to you.
This is done in the office, out on the road and in the yards of your clients and will involve systems to manage and track the performance of every aspect of your business.
You need a reliable computer system and dedicated software that can handle accounting, scheduling, estimating and other important functions.
You will need to understand how to plan routes that are efficient and save on time and gasoline. Equipment like a mobile phone, GPS and route planning software can really help you to be more organized and keep control.
You will also need to ensure that your productivity out on the job is maximized. You need to have the right gear and you need to know how to maintain it and how to use it correctly. If you have employees then you will need to have systems in place to monitor their productivity.
The Right Balance - Slow Growth Is Best to Keep Things In Balance
Success in the lawn mowing business is all about becoming good at marketing and managing an efficient operation. You need to maximize cash flows coming into your business and you have to give your clients a high standard of service while minimizing the time and costs that are incurred in the process.
Your marketing and operating systems have to develop slowly together. If one gets ahead of the other then problems can occur. A sudden burts in new accounts can be a disaster if you can't handle them properly. Slow growth usually allows your operational activities to keep pace with your growing number of clients.
Some people tend to overcomplicate business and make everything seem more complicated than it has to be. Just remember two words; marketing and productivity and you'll be fine. If you focus on these two things you will be able to keep a clear head and remember what the fundamentals of your lawn care business are all about.
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