If you’ve noticed changes in your lead flow recently, you’re not alone. My remote local cleaning business MaidThis has felt it — and it could be because of a myriad of reasons: the economy, tech layoffs, a lot of fear going around about a recession, and there are fewer people buying online.
The other piece of the puzzle is of course Google. Its algorithm changed and now favors AI-powered content. As a result, people across the nation are experiencing a shortage of local service ads (LSAs). Now, I still believe that these ads are important. But, it also means that they no longer guarantee a ton of leads.
We all need to get scrappier with our marketing. I came up with this list of 5 marketing tactics that you can use to survive this next year. It’s all about a little something I like to call community marketing.
1. Hyper Targetting Local Facebook Groups
A few weeks ago I connected with another cleaning company in Australia. The owner was crushing it, and she told me that she didn’t even have a website. Her only way of getting leads was through local Facebook groups.
She posted in mom and parenting groups and offered a massive discount to anyone who signed up for her services. If they agreed to give her a glowing review and tag her in the various groups she would offer them $50 off the service.
What she really did was create a flywheel — anyone who was willing to review her and post it in the group would get that $50 off promo. It’s important to note that in order to create that flywheel and keep it going you need to be active in the groups.
It may sound like a pain, especially if you’re social media-averse, but it gets easier over time.
2. Cold Emailing
In my opinion, cold emailing doesn’t really work for residential gigs. But, they can work wonders for B2B.
Start by determining the big B2B players in your niche that you can reach out to. Then you can do a combination of outbound emails as well as phone calls.
We do this all the time for our franchisees at MaidThis. When they start, we provide them with a cold outbound email list that includes property managers, brokers, real estate agents, realtors, or anyone who we think is an Airbnb property management company.
There are tons of email scraping websites and software you can use to find those emails. I like using UpLead. Once you have your list, set up a 5-step email sequence (I use QuickMail) to market a special promotion. Consider your ideal customer’s pain point and offers ways to solve it.
Yes, I know cold emailing can be painful, especially when it feels like you’re not getting any responses. My advice is to keep chugging along. I’ve had great luck with this tactic.
3. Instagram or Facebook Giveaways
This one is pretty simple. I recently came across an ad on Facebook that was running a contest to win $500 toward a cleaning — the only requirement was to enter your name and email. The play here is that you can grab a bunch of emails and then hyper-target them.
Say you get 500 entries. Yes, you will have to give away that $500 but you’ll be left with 499 other emails to market to. You can reach out to thank them for entering and then offer a smaller giveaway, say $50 off the next service, with a link to sign up.
A lot of the people who entered were in it for the “free stuff.” But, if just one person signs up and then continues on with a recurring service, this tactic just paid for itself.
4. Postcards
You may be thinking, “But Neel, postcards are so old-fashioned!” Hear me out for a sec.
My opinion on postcards is generally varied, and it’s definitely a long-game move. It works really well for some services, and others not so much. I suggest you try it out at least once to see how you make out. There are a few different ways to do it.
One way is through Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) via the USPS. You can select different neighborhoods based on demographic information and then the Post Office will deliver your postcards to every mailbox in that area.
I like to hyper-target with a different type of service as opposed to EDDM. There are a few companies out there to choose from that will allow you to hyper-target different groups of people.
I also like the idea of hand-delivering postcards in neighborhoods where you’re already operating. You can leave them in neighbors’ mailboxes or on their doorsteps with a note saying that you just cleaned (or whatever it is that you do) in the area and you’ll be back in a few weeks. Offer a discounted rate because you’ll already be in the neighborhood.
There are of course other services that will do these deliveries for you, but you’ll get the best ROI if you do it yourself.
5. Apartment Complex Infiltration
This tactic is the most local-service-business-specific option on my list.
All apartment complexes have a ton of individual units, meaning a ton of individual potential customers. You can “infiltrate” it so that you become the go-to vendor for the residents.
This can take some time, so here are some ideas for what you can do:
- Contact the manager. Try to go in person, but if you can’t, I always suggest calling instead of just emailing.
- Offer to sponsor an event. This could be something as simple as a community meetup or something as elaborate as a block party. Make sure to have business carts on hand to pass around.
- See if the complex allows yard signs. They’re cheap to make and are great for brand awareness.
- Pass out postcards again. Now that the residents recognize your name, they’ll be more willing to give you a call.
In short, don’t just rely on Google LSAs for leads, especially this year.
It’s getting more and more competitive out there. This list of scrappy marketing tactics is a great way to set yourself apart and garner those all-important leads!
Photo by Startaê Team on Unsplash
This article was written by Neel from MaidThis Franchise, a remote-local franchise opportunity for people looking to escape the rate race and reach financial freedom. Learn more here.
