Landscaping client acquisition
The landscaping business has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t competitive. As a Landscaping service provider, you know how challenging it can be to grow your outdoor business. It takes time to build a brand and a client base. To stand out from the competition and attract new clients, you need to have marketing strategies, and best practices in place that give you an edge over other Landscaping businesses.
Read the following best practices on how to acquire clients for landscaping services if you're looking for more long-term approaches to expand your outdoor lawn maintenance business. Each of these suggestions has been proven effective for landscapers who want to see their customer base rise more rapidly than usual.
1- Increase visibility with a Local market domination strategy.
If you are just getting your landscaping business off the ground or you're in your first year as a yard care service provider, then there is a lot of hustle yet to be involved in acquiring new landscaping clients.
However, At whatever stage of lawn care business you are, for attracting customers it's primarily important to showcase your multi-dimensional visibility in local regions. This will serve as your best attribute for a successful future in the green industry and will emerge your reputation as the top landscaper in your area. If you're struggling to decide at the beginning, here are a few ideas to get you started on the local market game.
Personal engagement is still effective - The most effective way for acquiring landscaping customers is to connect on a personal level. Word-of-mouth marketing still works for outdoor businesses like landscaping and you can market your lawn care services when you engage with random residential owners across your surroundings. At the initial level, Be prepared to distribute door hangers, flyers, and magnetic business cards to your local communities aggressively in the spring and fall seasons because most lawn Maintenance jobs are done in these times. The start may be slower than your expectations but remember 'Rome wasn't built in a day.
'Work creates work' strategy - Whether you are doing a lawn care job in a residential area or at a cluster of subdivisions, just be aware, wherever you go 'work creates work', but this does not mean that prospective clients will simply knock on your door and ask if you have any vacant schedule in your job calendar. As a landscaper, you just have to hustle and find customers nearby to sell services effectively. The idea behind it is, when you get a client for a landscaping job, there is an opportunity to attract prospecting customers in that neighbourhood. It all depends on your superior service quality and competitive pricing than other contractors, which may encourage residents to avidly opt for your lawn care services, and you eventually began to build up a customer base from such former job sites.
Make your business omnipresent - Place your service board( Bandit signs ) on the landscaping project site you completed so that locals or Neighbours may see your work and may call you up for their lawn maintenance. Put your bandit signs at every street intersection and turn around in subdivisions across metropolitan areas. Make use of everything from machinery, vehicles, and t-shirts to implant your Landscaping branding on the heads of potential clients. As a landscaper, you should be omnipresent in your region, making your reputation in lawn care services as the only worthy option for homeowners.
2- Utilise various online platforms aggressively.
These days, the majority of landscapers are quite selective with their spending. There is a significant amount of competition out there, so you need to figure out how to stand out and draw a suitable level of attention to your Lawn care business. Combining multiple online marketing channels is an excellent approach to growing your business. Nearly 80% of businesses do so and landscaping is not a new industry when it comes to employing internet marketing to promote itself. But with so many lawn care service providers vying for the same clients over the online platforms, that may also be a challenging situation. Some efficient approaches to online market your outdoor business are listed below
Engaging local prospects remotely - The use of Google My Business listing is a productive and free method to attract local landscaping customers if you are new to the lawn business and don't have much to spend on the marketing and advertising side. Include every detail about your organisation like contact number, website link, email address, services list, and client reviews if any. Regularly update your GMB profile with new landscaping-related technology and tools you just invested in.
Remember, to geo-target specific zip codes where you can offer services without delay. This will boost your service efficiency and loyalty across customers.
Getting an online face with a website - If you want to capitalise on this phenomenal digital growth and secure your spot as a successful landscape contractor, now is the time to start thinking about online marketing methods. Promoting organically with the website as a medium is the best way to get more leads and acquire new customers for your business. When users spend a long time on your website content, they are likely to trust you more and want to buy services from you later.
Following these points, you can triumph the organic marketing using a well-maintained service website.
Remember you are not bound to win a Pulitzer prize at a website design conference to get the landscaping job done. What matters is leads coming to your website organically, and acquiring clients that would pay for your business. For this to happen, you must begin to optimise the website for visitors by creating more Compelling messages and articles around issues relating to the green industry rather than touting your landscaping superiority.
Written and visual content should be easy to mentally digest and encourage a positive website user experience which will instantly entice viewers to sign up for your newsletter. Set up simple accessibility for prospects to conduct research, so they will eventually request an online quote to execute their lawn care projects.
Use social channels to advertise and network building Businesses that flourish in the landscaping industry are the ones that have learned how to efficiently make use of Social platforms to market themselves. Connections and advertisements are the names of the game that matters to winning the Social arena. Initially, it can be tricky to find new clients socially and get them interested in your services. Consider these recommendations to help you achieve social marketing success rapidly!
Identify your target market. It could be a small residential area, an HOA, or a commercial property. When launching a landscaping business, you must specify what you offer and who you serve. Don't make the mistake of taking on outdoor projects which you can't manage proficiently. Begin by connecting with other lawn service communities using Facebook groups, Linkedin, website referral programs, or any other channel suitable for your purpose. Mutual recommendations by similar businesses on digital channels build trust among clients in your service expertise.
Decide your paid marketing spend at the onset of active seasons, such as spring or fall, and Initiate paid campaigns by limiting your geographic location to a certain radius and zip codes. You can undertake campaigns on your own at first, and as the business expands you can employ an online marketing firm to manage your digital channels and networks. Most essential, monitor the campaign performance ( ROAS) to fine-tune your marketing strategy.
3- Attending exhibitions and expos associated with the green industry.
Participating at green industry-associated exhibitions and expos is an excellent approach to promoting your landscaping company. Attending them will place your brand and image in front of thousands of potential clients while also providing an opportunity to network with other local outdoor businesses. Thousands of lawn and landscape professionals, equipment dealers, growers, and construction companies attend these shows each year, exhibiting their expertise through live demonstrations and educating spectators. Annually, NALP (National association of landscape professionals) is the largest organiser of outdoor industry live expos and events.
If you are looking for a solution to the most pressing challenges owners and their teams face in the outdoor business, attending these live exhibitions will give you a breakthrough transformation and meaningful exposure for your landscaping journey. Follow the tips stated below to take full advantage of these events. -
To achieve the most out of trade events, always use your marketing platforms, such as YouTube and your website to highlight how you displayed your products or services live at your event booth. This will help your company to spread the word about who you are and what you have to offer. At the same time, these live events are great marketing methods to attract potential customers by offering discount coupons and membership programmes for live booking your products or services.
In your initial years of landscaping service, renting a booth at large industry exhibitions can break the bank. To present yourself at the event you can share a common booth with a local landscape contractor to promote each other's expertise and products.
4- Integrate automation tools to draw in potential clients.
Leveraging automated software and AI technology to attract more customers in the landscaping business is the need of the hour. Landscapers must smoothly manage time, budget, crew members and equipment to complete the project and automation proves helpful to manoeuvre these resources efficiently. With a plethora of competition and technological improvement, considering how to gain landscaping customers utilising automation can be a bottleneck for you.
Make use of the pointers below to understand the uphill battle of client acquisition possibilities that automation can create for the landscaping business.
Time is money for outdoor businesses - "Wasted time equals a waste of money." Landscaping firms must manage their time and other resources well from the moment they receive a quote until they complete a project. Manual labour at several important steps of project completion can blunt time and sales. Allowing automation software to handle some of the manual landscaping tasks like property measurements will curb the happening of lost bids due to inaccuracy and guessing. AI site measuring software like Ottermap enables you to focus on attracting new clients and driving more sales within the least time.
Implant robust strategy with data-driven decisions - Implementing automated software is beneficial in replacing errors within business operations. AI systems like telematics can track and report even tiny errors like logistics hiccups and equipment problems that occurred throughout any landscaping project. Iterating operational strategy accordingly by utilising these crucial data reports will increase your service quality and consumer feedback, reflecting your landscaping expertise. This will open the opportunity window for your landscaping business across profitable clients like large HOAs and commercial properties.
As previously mentioned, there are several approaches you may take to attract the attention of emerging prospects and nurture them into potential customers for landscaping services.
Are you utilising every strategy of client acquisition mentioned above? Leave a comment below to encourage us to include about it in the upcoming landscaping blog post.