Marketing a Local Contracting Business: Here’s What You Need to Know

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The home construction and renovation industry are booming right now. Despite several uncertainties in the economy, the market is growing at a steady pace and the real estate market is seeing the same level of growth. Aside from individual homeowners making improvements to their properties, there are also real estate investors seeking to add value to their properties.

The demand for contractors is high, but that doesn’t mean you can win business easily. In a market as competitive as today, it is still necessary to do sufficient marketing and build your brand to earn clients. To help you market your business as a local contractor, here are some of the things you need to know.

Establish Credibility

The first thing you want to do before you run other marketing campaigns is establishing credibility. As a contractor, your credibility is everything. Potential clients will determine whether to contact you for an inspection and further discussions based on what they think about your business as an entity. Having sufficient credibility will change the way potential clients see you.

There are several ways to establish credibility. You can join an industry association and follow their standards. Certified members of an association tend to get more business than those who choose to enter the market independently. The Associated General Contractors of America is a good example of an organization you can join to establish credibility.

Having sufficient insurance coverage in place is another way to boost your credibility to a new level. Clients prefer working with contractors that have sufficient insurance coverage for obvious reasons, which means insurance is an investment worth making. Next Insurance offers business coverage for contractors and it is a great place to start.

Strengthen Your Online Presence

The internet is your best friend when it comes to marketing your business as a contractor. Customers automatically turn to search engines like Google and Bing whenever they need to find information, including when doing research on contractors near them. Not having a strong online presence means missing out on thousands of leads and potential customers.

If you don’t have an online presence, you can create a website to get started. Add social media pages to get closer to potential customers. Don’t forget to set up business pages – usually on Facebook and Google – so that the customers can find you by location. A Google Business Page will also get you on Google Maps, which is another huge plus.

Creating these pages is only the beginning. Next, you need to establish yourself as a trustworthy and reliable contractor. You can do this through content marketing and other digital marketing instruments. Don’t forget to set aside some time for interacting with target customers on social media and other platforms.

Go Digital

Digital marketing is still the best way to market your business as a contractor, even when you only cater to a local market. This is because you can now be very specific with your targeting when doing digital marketing. There is no need to waste a valuable marketing budget and other resources on reaching internet users that aren’t really your target market.

With SEO, for instance, you can use location information to specifically reach people near your business. Adding location information to your website also helps align your site with the right target audience. The same can be said for social media, where it is easy to target users near your business and interact with them.

Advertising networks offer an even more detailed targeting mechanism for local businesses. Not only can you target people in a particular area, you can further group them based on interest, demographic, and other metrics. With the help of constant evaluation and some fine-tuning, your online advertising campaigns will be very effective.

Work with the Community

There are a lot of marketing opportunities around you and they often lean to direct sales when approached properly. Local realtors are among the first parties to engage when you want to win more business from customers near you. A lot of new homeowners look for contractors to handle repair and maintenance projects; you can be the contractor they turn to with the recommendation of their realtors.

Local businesses also present potential marketing opportunities. For businesses, maintaining the property is often crucial to their operations. Why not offer the businesses around you your services at a discounted rate in exchange for recommendations?

Once you have a few projects going, marketing your services becomes easier. You now have happy customers recommending you to their friends and relatives. You also have the experience of completing the projects to add to your portfolio. The more work you do, the easier marketing your business as a contractor will be.

Now that you know everything there is to know about marketing your business as a contractor, it is time to get started and put these tips to good use. You’ll start getting more customers before you know it.

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