Personally I'd look in my local village paper. I'd rather employ someone who was local and known rather than a fly by night you will never see again. The council round our way offer a service where businesses / workers have been vetted for their suitability to work with the elderly / disadvantaged. I don't know much about it but it may be something to look in to as it implies your trustworthy.
On that note, I see your home page says you have 30years building experience. Could you not get testimonies from your previous customers? Plus never lie to your punters. They will spot this a mile a way.
If you are doing garden work etc get a board made up with your name / number and ask permission from the owner if you can display the board while you are doing the work or leave it with them for up until a week after that.
I recently built a front garden wall and the number of folk that stopped and asked me for a quote while I was in the area was unbelievable. That was without a board. Made me almost want to pack in my nursing job and do bricklaying full time. Not ;o)
Not for a handyman, maybe for a supplier of obscure widgets.
If you can target your area maybe. Quality of leaflet would be very influential. B&W A5 inkjet on 80gsm paper with poor english, layout, graphics, etc would go in the bin. Smaller A6? (to pin on notice board or stick in edge of mirror) on 100gsm paper or light card, still B&W but laser or litho printed, nice graphics and correct english stands a much better chance of being kept.
You could help the targeting by doing the drop yourself, this is still "working" all be it unpaid. Provided your are presentable (corporate clothing indicates that you probably are) knocking on doors just to show your presentable friendly face ask if they have any little jobs and leave a leaflet but be quick on the door step.
Check circulation area, might be to large.
NO! Nothing annoys me quite as much as something under my wipers. Oh er Mrs...
Or local newsletters not just those associated with a particular belief system. I do look at the ads in our local newsletter but don't take the Parish News, that isn't available in the PO/Newsagents/shops etc.
Newsagent and local PO notice boards, word of mouth (perhaps asking around after seeing name on a notice board). Newsagents card needs to be percentable but not "expensive" see leaflet drops. If there are large employers with notice boards getting on their might be useful, may help with the word of mouth "Oh yes, I used Fred, his cards on the notice board".
I doubt the box ads are any more useful than one-liners. I'd *always* include one-liner people when asking for quotes.
In our area the majority of leaflet drops are from very dubious sources (mostly "charities" collecting unwanted clothes, to sell on at a profit, grrrr) and the local NHW recomendation is to bine them all. I always shake the local paper out over the recycling bin (very shortly before the paper itself joins them).
Nononono!
Yes. But make the ad both informative and eyecatching.
Our local police and trading standards keep a register of tradesmen who have been checked out by them, and encourage the vulnerable only to use them. (The checks are more on probity than on competence.) I can find details if you mail me. Perhaps Medway might do something similar?
Personally if I needed a handyman I'd google for handman cambridge. Don't bother with google clicks: just ensure that you have enough relevant data on your home page for it to appear on the first results page!
No. You need to search for handyman and then automatically put the results through a "location" database so the results are more specific. The location database needs to be based on something like the IP address or a cookie or anything else that gives a clue as to the searchers location.
Its the same thing that makes IPTV so attractive to advertisers.. you can tailor ads to areas or even specific addresses so they become more valuable.
This is simply not currently feasible. The vast majority of ADSL and dialup IP addresses are not assigned accurate locations - most of them simply have the location of the ISP. As such, the data is unusable for this purpose.
As for using a cookie, all you can do with a cookie is store data you already have - you still need to get the data in the first place.
YP is however the main port of call for the non-netted, and >50% of people still dont use the net to any significant extent. People know the 1 line YP ads there are going to be cheaper, and that costs nada.
very inefficient
yes, it'd have to stand right out to even be noticed. Nevertheless its used so much because it does work. 0.5% response rate at 2p each =3D =A34 a job.
yes
illegal, antisocial, liable to attract problem customers, and likely to get you banned from diy outlets.
illegal and mildly antisocial, not a good start. Also these ads are typically placed by people just out of jail with no advertising money. If thats the image you want, using unregistered phones to try and escape prosecution... upto you I guess. But I figure youre going for not that market.
tiny circulation, but then very cheap. However local papers offer a much better reader/cost ratio.
There are free to advertise local magazines and papers, cant beat those for cost/benefit ratio.
in a hurry: yellow pages. in no hurry: local papers, on rare occasions even noticeboards or shop windows, and ask around.
I wouldnt bother with google since 99% of results wont be in the area, and 2/3 of them will be in America or Aus where they have towns with the same names. And of course 3/4 wont be for handymen anyway. Just not worth the bother.
Keep handing out business cards, it takes some brass but can generate leads. Especially good for your biz as most people need a handyman.
Influence: I think its really just a case of not mucking up too much. The main problems are:
- someone that talks crap
- people asking silly money for small jobs,
- people suggesting completely inappropriate solutions, maybe costing
6x sensible, or resulting in a dodgy job
- people that never understand whats asked and are obviously a few cells short of a whole brain, not very common but theres always one,
- people that bounce around while you talk to them, constantly looking at their escape route, fists often clenching
- people that show up overpresented, eg with a new van sign written all over, perfectly clean plastic toolbox, corporate dress, and all the other trappings of marketing over substance
- people that want money upfront before they'll do anything - I've no problem with paying for a quote, but not for an empty promise of work
- people that dont do what they say
- people that do a job that looks like sht
And with most retail customers, a cardinal sin is not cleaning up perfectly afterwards. You've just finished the job, it was a btch, youre wiped out, the last thing you care about is the slight film of dust on the dresser on the other side of the room... but this is what a lot of customers care about, and its capitalism.
I would also say for many jobs there are different priced choices, and tradesmen tend to get it wrong by offering one option only, trying to guess what the customer wants. They routinely guess wrong, thus are eliminated. You stand much more chance of getting the job if you offer
2 options. Dont offer all the choices, or you'll be there all day answering qs for someone that doesnt know what theyre doing!
Advertising is sensible to get going, and hopefully will become less necessary once you've got a number of satisfied customers. Dont shy away from doing it just because those with a well established customer base dont need to.
And lastly, I'd use different looking ads so you can easily track where your responses are coming from. Not promotion codes, customers dont remember them and dont care, use less apparent ways to tell which ad it was. Eg the green one, the one with the hammer on, etc. And track your ad responses so you can optimise your return rate. It only takes a minute, and its a sit down job.
I believe this is the best way. We got our garden wall rebuilt by someone recommended by our next door neighbour. During the 3 days it took we must have been asked for his details about a dozen times.
Had a local plumber in a few years ago to do a job in the loft. Someone had recommended him, but he also turned out to have been a trade association's Plumber of the Year.
You could immediately see why. Not only had he quoted a reasonable hourly rate beforehand, but he arrived at the front door with a bundle of cloths under his arm. Carefully wiped his feet, went upstairs, laid a cloth down on the landing and then unrolled a protective runner back down the stairs to the doormat. Then he started to bring his stuff in.
It took him all of a minute to do that, and another minute to roll it all up afterwards, but it absolutely shouted "The Customer Comes First". He made a good job of the plumbing too, but that was only to be expected. It's the things the customer *doesn't* expect that leave the lasting impression.
When you do a job always leaflet drop the five houses either side and,the ten houses opposite include on the leaflet that you have been working at the number ?.
If you have a trade board always try to display this for a week.
When I was jobbing this always paid dividends in extra work.
Much better than blanket leaflet drops which with no focus for neighbours tend to go in the bin.
Yes - I had front garden walls re-built with railings added and re-claimed York stone used for the capping. So it didn't look too pristine on this old house. I employed them - a firm of landscape gardeners - after watching them at work on a nearby garden and noting how well they did the footings for the structural stuff. Think I've 'passed them on' to probably upwards of a dozen others.
Contact your local Volunteer Bureau (they do give out the names of people expexting payment) Age Concern etc. - a way into the 'Grey' market. When I did some handyman work I know of some jobs from this source, but suspecy more from the jungle telegraph. Also contact the Wardens at local sheltered housing complexes - jobs can be for residents (often small but the jungle telegraph works) or for the Management Co. - but you will have to show them Insurance and wait for payment. Best of luck Malcolm
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.