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[Lumo]

Hey guys,

2017 I started a service business after reading the carpet cleaning thread in this forum to get a solid foundation.


It was and still is a challenge for myself to crush it in a local market.


So me and my business partner started out 2017 with a mobile car cleaning business.


Which mistakes did we make?


For the first 6 months we had no revenue, because we waited for many business owners to "reply" for our business requests.


Even when we followed up after the meetings they would always come up with another excuse why they couldn't work with us now.

We managed to close one of the biggest hotel companies in the world to provide our service to their clients.

But even after that(we thought they'll bring us some profit)...

NOTHING.

We wasted time on waiting for things to come instead of pulling the customers to our offer.


The second half of 2017 brought a change:


We focused more on B2C Clients and started with Flyers.


We got the first people on the phone, BUT...


...We couldn't close, because we had no sales experience in this particular area.


Are you sometimes afraid to do something without having the knowledge?
After we got the sales mode on, we optimized our B2C efforts and achieved a good ROI.
Short question: Is it recommended to always market with a "discount" or does it make sense to make the service more appealing?
We worked with vouchers until now.
Both of us are still working corporate jobs(ends in february 2018), so it is hard sometimes to get the appointments set up properly.
Currently we are working 18 hours a day and are acquiring a new customer nearly every day.
Selling licenses to earn "great" income is our long term plan.
Local Service Businesses are a great way to achieve a stable income, right?
But lemme tell you:


Only if you know how to properly SELL your services.


Your marketing needs to be better than your competitors.


Until now, we are doing the dirty, hard work like flyer/direct mail delivery, cleaning floors to get more budget for adwords and doing cold calls.


To talk numbers we will do 3k-4k in revenue this month and always try to optimize our marketing strategies.


We would love to exchange ideas here.


Marketing and Sales Advice is much appreciated!


Best regards
Mo

 

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[garyjsmith]

In sales, I silently discount price for customers when writing the proposal/estimate. Ex: if they're getting 30 lin ft of fence, I can't really drop the price much but I can make the price 1) lower than the competition, and 2) visibly appealing ($1160 vs $1200 -- there's a thread on this: Notable! - Pricing and Psychology). If it's a larger job, there is more 'wiggle room' so I can do better.

If you market with a discount/savings, you're going to get that kind of customer. Know your cost/expenses, find out what the competition is doing and see if they're either more efficient or operating at a loss. If you advertise value and deliver with set expectations, you'll be fine. Some people value a good job more than their money.

 

[domefs]

In sales, I silently discount price for customers when writing the proposal/estimate. Ex: if they're getting 30 lin ft of fence, I can't really drop the price much but I can make the price 1) lower than the competition, and 2) visibly appealing ($1160 vs $1200 -- there's a thread on this: Notable! - Pricing and Psychology). If it's a larger job, there is more 'wiggle room' so I can do better.

If you market with a discount/savings, you're going to get that kind of customer. Know your cost/expenses, find out what the competition is doing and see if they're either more efficient or operating at a loss. If you advertise value and deliver with set expectations, you'll be fine. Some people value a good job more than their money.

So you'd recommend to advertise with regular prices and give vouchers away from time to time?

Thanks for your answer