Advertising or listing your company for free, good or bad? part 1 the comparison
Over the past 6 months and over the last 3.5 years and the many years I have been a contractor, I have spoken with hundreds of contractors, subcontractors and homeowners about their opinions and ideas for www.MyContractorlist.com so pay attention I have some really great insight on this topic.
I want to first say, that my intention is to educate on this topic not to destroy, hurt, attack, ruin the reputation of or look down upon any individual, other companies or industries who participate in free advertising, be it offering the free service or using the free service, or other variations of free/cheap advertising. I myself have been there.
In the past advertising or listing your company, in the limited ways available has always been a great sign of I’ve made it or at-least we are on our way, it was proof to yourself, your employees and the general public that you have arrived or at least on your way, because advertising wasn’t cheap or free and everybody knows it. Advertising is still not cheap but some advertising is free.
We all had a high opinion of any company we seen advertising their services in the past, especially in the construction and remodeling industry. Lets face it most people have their own various love/hate opinions about contractors, but when we seen one advertising their services we had the opinion they must be a good company, a company that stands behind its work, a legit company, a financially strong company, a company that invest in advertising, is a company investing in themselves, a company that cares. Homeowners would call those companies and hire them, just based on the advertisement they had seen and their first impression of them after their first meeting. Most homeowners would hire with little to no questions asked.
That was then and this is now, after working for someone else as an employee or subcontractor for years learning their trade and learning the business they may at that time decide to go public with their business. If an individual, a subcontractor or contractor just starting out who wanted to get noticed would start off with word of mouth, business cards, flyer’s, small listing in the local paper and keep moving up from there. After some time of paying our dues, learning from our mistakes (as new business owners), developing our reference list, purchasing the additional much needed tools for our trade we would begin to spend money on advertising. We wouldn’t spend money on advertising unless we knew we where ready, why spend so much money to ruin your own reputation if your not ready? That’s the way we thought and that’s the way it was, that’s why most homeowners had little doubt about a company they hired after seeing their advertisement. That was then…over the years the market became flooded with advertising opportunities especially for contractors and handymen with the just list your services area in most papers bringing the cost of advertising down drastically. With the new listing opportunities and then the Internet bringing the listing cost down, even free, as a result ”watering down” any legitimacy us contractors had developed through advertising over the years.
The result, by giving contractors, remodeling companies and construction companies the listing areas in the papers at a lower rate and the Internet giving the listing areas away for free, the homeowners has lost that confidence they once had in a companies advertisement. Unless a company advertises BIG and has some really deep pockets the average homeowner mentally files us all in the same category. Before when you seen a fly-er on your door or mailbox with a company name on it you may have thought, wow a new company and you may have called them to have some work done, upon meeting them you most likely realized they where inexperienced or not as professional as you where custom to, if you had used professional contractors in the past. They may have given a great price much better than expected and then they start, the realization of why the great price, maybe they don’t have the tools, experience, don’t show up or the many other things that has caused homeowners to loose trust in us. Homeowners went from having confidence in us, from the moment they seen our advertisement(like in the past) to now wanting every little detail about our business and who can blame them. I’m not saying all fly-er contractors are bad, I was one but many have ruin our image, mentally most homeowners and contractors view the fly-er type to the free listing type of contractors and handymen as inexperienced or cheap. This is true for most, Not all but most.
The sad truth, many of us contractors, remodeling companies and handymen have gotten caught up in this advertising or listing your company for free tidal wave. The thing about a free tidal wave is everyone gets on and at some point a wave will crash and this one crashed a few years ago but so many contractors, subcontractors, handymen and even suppliers haven’t figured it out yet, for some its just habit or their marketing plan and others believe the best advertising besides “word of mouth” is free advertising. That’s not always true, some free advertising can and will hurt you. With the free listings inviting everyone to participate, for the average homeowner they view every contractor, handyman and supplier as having the same experience and the same credentials. Many, many, many of the “contractors” listed on these free sites have little to no experience, no tools and no idea of operating cost, the result cheap bids. Homeowners have caught onto this and some homeowners don’t care about experience, inconvenience, job deadlines, or the many qualities a professional contractor brings to the table, they only care about the cheapest price. These are the same homeowners that will go around complaining about how worthless their “contractor” is or what a bad experience they had with a contractor giving us all a bad name. Their are some legitimately bad contractors out there but most complaints are about “want a be” contractors.
With homeowners having this type of mentally looking for the cheapest bid, real contractors, remodeling companies and handymen have found themselves going on countless number of estimates and getting no jobs or maybe the occasional one.
What we found out, when we spoke with homeowners and contractors nationwide who use free listing sites and referral sites.
When we ask contractors and up and coming contractors that used the free listing sites.
Did you get more job leads? Yes, was always the answer some said it even double the amount of jobs they looked at.
How many calls out of 25 is for the type of service you offered? 50/50
How many jobs out of 25 leads do you get? Contractors none or maybe the occasional one. Up and coming contractors maybe 1 or 2.
What is the number one reason you didn’t get the job? I was to high or they found someone else cheaper.
Has it been worth it? Contractors No. Up and coming contractors Yes “any work is better than no work”
When we ask homeowners that used the free listing sites.
Why do you use the free listing sites? Most common answer, to get a free estimate.
How many different estimate do you get for the same project? Most common answer, 10
Why so many estimates? Looking for the best deal.
Are you looking for the cheapest price? When we pressed the people who got more than three estimates the answer was 100% yes
Why don’t you select your contractor from other forms of marketing? 50% said they new up front they would be more expensive. 50% said they didn’t really know where else to look, “besides you have to go through a 100 contractors to find one who has and dose what you want or works in your area.”
Some solutions offered, some contractor referral business and contractor referral sites have starting popping up everywhere.
When we ask homeowners who used these contractor referral sites.
Do you feel you receive contact from professional contractors? Most common answer, yes – but
We ask do you feel the estimates you receive are fair? Most common answer, yes
How many estimates do you get before hiring? Most common answer, 3 - but
Are you looking for the cheapest price? 100% said No
Do you use free listing sites? about 60% said no and 40% said no never again!
What are the “buts”about, what is it you don’t like in general? Most common response 1. “you get flooded with contractors trying to give you an estimate for a job that is already be awarded or done” 2. “Some contractors I already know are told to contact me and now they are mad because they have to pay a lead fee” 3. “I still don’t know what all they do or very little about them” 4. “I only know what the service tells me about them” 5. I wish I could look at their profile and decide for my self” 6. Why do they have to contact me, why can’t I contact them?” 7. “Why dose everything have to run through the service if I am doing the hiring?”
When we ask contractors who have or use contractor referral sites.
Do you get more job leads? Yes – but
How many jobs out of 25 leads do you get? Most common answer was between 2 & 5 it really varied based on the referral service.
How many calls out of 25 is for the type of service you offered? Most common answer about 80% “their was a lot of can you or will you asked by the services”
Has it been worth it? Even more confusion about 50/50 Most said it depended on the month and the job, many said they would pay lead fees for sometimes up to three months and then finally that one job would pay for the past three months…
Dose having to pay lead fees increase your rate? 60% said no but “if I have a couple of bad months just paying lead fees then yes” 40% said of course how can you not think about the lead fees and not included it in your cost?”
What are the “buts”about, what is it you don’t like in general? Most common response 1. “Having to pay for leads I don’t even get a chance to bid on” 2. “Calling up homeowners who have already had over 25 or 30 other contractors contact them” 3. “Having to pay for a lead that isn’t even my trade” 4. “Receiving & having to pay for leads in areas I don’t work in!” 5. Being misrepresented to the homeowner” 6. “Having to run everything I do through the service!” 7. Having to pay for lead fees, membership fees, commission fees based on size of jobs, administrative fees just to be told that that one job will make up for all of these fees!”
So is free advertising or free listing good or bad for your business? We have the answer, many who use the free listing sites, do it because they are free without the realization of the cost, (for both homeowner and contractor) habit, not sure where else to go, some just want the cheapest price they can get or just simply just want to have as much control over what is going to happen (for both homeowner and contractor). Can free listings be bad for your business, the answer is YES they can be.
Whats the answer? www.MyContractorList.com we have developed our site so everyone can compare ”apples to apples”, if a homeowner or consumer wants a license , insured contractor at MyContractorList.com they can search, find and compare a license contractor to a license contractor. If a homeowner or consumer dosn’t want or think they need a license or insured contractor BUT dose want a contractor who cares, who does invest in their company and has been around for sometime they can also find that contractor at MyContractorList.com and compare a unlicensed contractor to a unlicensed contractor. With MyContractorlist.com all consumers can verify how long any contractor has been listed with us by simply looking at their profile, that is complete with date joined, a list of questions about their company and any and all the services they offer, the service areas, they can even include pictures.
With MyContractorList.com we have attempted to solved the many problems we have heard about over the years about referral services and free listing sites from the consumers and contractors point of view.
For homeowners/consumers the ability to decide excatly what you are looking for and get the result instantly. For more information please go to http://mycontractorlist.com/homeowner/index.php
For contractors the ability to let the homeowner know excatly what you do and where for one flat monthly rate. For more information please go to http://mycontractorlist.com/contractor/index.php
Thank You
