Competition in the HVAC, Pest Control and other Consumer Home Services markets is intense. Many owners struggle to deliver consistent, profitable growth year over year. We understand these hurdles firsthand after years of working across this category.
In this first blog in a three-part series, we will outline strategies companies should employ to accelerate growth. The first critical strategy in this process is new customer acquisition … at scale.
Step 1:
Your best new customer prospects are likely to look a lot like your current customers. To find these new customers takes more than looking at zip codes, income levels and other basic demographic factors. Modern data tools allow us to map your best current customers across 10-12 key factors, and different public and private databases, to understand who they are at a much deeper level.
We identify high potential “look-a-like” audiences, creating a ranked list of top prospects. Within this, we target specific, identifiable households or a “known audience.” This helps ensure that every marketing and sales dollar is attributable and works three to four times more effectively than traditional methods.
Step 2:
Creating compelling offers for new customers. The right offer not only spurs customer interest, but also distinguishes you from the competition and helps overcome inertia. This could be a low-interest loan or an energy-savings rebate in HVAC, or a free home inspection in Pest Control. There are a range of offer strategies we’ve successfully used over the years, and we consistently test which offers perform best.
Step 3:
Efficiently reach and activate new customer prospects. Modern digital and other marketing tools now enable companies to reach high potential customers with little to no waste. We employ a multichannel combination of offline and online tools, including digital display and online video, postcards, personalized emails and more, as this multichannel approach provides a proven, stronger return on investment. By focusing on a known audience, we are able to cost-effectively deliver 7-10 consumer touches to build awareness of your company and its services to drive customer conversion. Additionally, in the early stages of a campaign, we create small test cells, helping us understand which creative options and marketing vehicles are working best, which focuses media investments.
Throughout a campaign, we conduct monthly match-back analysis on new customers to directly attribute return on investment from the campaign. And at the end of the campaign, we develop and share a detailed analysis, showing how much future sales (and profits) you should expect.
In our next two blogs, we will focus on two additional growth strategies – how you can reduce customer churn and build loyalty, as well as how you can accelerate growth by increasing the average annual spend of existing customers.
Interested to learn more in the interim, visit: https://princetonpartners.com/consumer-home-services
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