Online Advertising – Page 11

Grow Your Painting Business By A Factor of 10 With These 5 Steps – Part 1 of 5

Are you looking to grow your painting company but aren’t sure where to start?

It’s difficult to know what steps to take or where to invest your time and money. However, we have created a proven roadmap for you to follow that will help you 10X your painting business.

Step 1 – Implement A Follow-Up System So Your Potential Clients See You Over and Over

Did you know that at any given time, only 3% of your market is ready to buy from you?

This means that 97% of the people that see your advertising are going to need a little more time. In fact, your average customer is exposed to about 10,000 marketing messages every day.

What are the chances that your marketing message is going to be the one that stands out among the 10,000 that your client is seeing (especially if they had never heard of you before)?

Typically, your potential clients need to see and hear from you multiple times in order to make an informed buying decision. This is why you must FOLLOW UP. In fact, a 2011 study from Google found that a buyer needs 7 hours of interaction across 11 touch points in 4 locations.

Let’s break that down quickly. You (or your marketing) needs to interact (or be in front of) your potential client 11 times. These interactions can be snail mail, videos, ads, phone calls, emails or anything that gets you in front of them.

Then, these 11 interactions need to be across 4 locations. This means that you can’t just always call or email. You need to expand the number of places that people see you. You need to be “everywhere” your clients may be. So, adding to phone or email, text, Facebook Ads, YouTube, the Google Display Network, LinkedIn etc. To accomplish this task correctly, think about where your clients commonly are.

Finally, these touches need to result in about 7 hours of interaction. In other words, you want a prospect to spend about 7 hours thinking about you. This is when it helps to have video. For a house painting business, customer testimonials are great ads to use. It allows other people to “toot your horn”, so you don’t have to.

Another great interaction piece is a downloadable pdf that contains information about your company, examples of your past work, testimonials and more. You can make this available on your website or social media.

How To Implement A Great Customer Follow-Up System – Set Up A 3×3 Contact Matrix

First things first – automation is your friend. Don’t shy away from technology because it seems complicated. In the long run, it will be worth it.

So, what is the first thing to set up?

Start using a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system, like GoHighLevel, CorkCRM or Keap. It will more than pay for itself in the long run.

In your CRM, you will want to set up what we call a 3×3 contact matrix. You want a potential client that requested a quote to receive a call, text and email from you. If they don’t respond, do it again 3 days later. If they don’t respond, do it 5 days later. This automatically gives you 9 interactions on 3 different channels.

A common fear that we hear from painters is “What if they get annoyed or tell us it’s too much?”

They won’t. Remember, they originally contacted you. The more information that you give them that allows them to make a good decision when choosing a house painter will be appreciated.

Another common question that we get is “What should I say in these emails, texts and calls?”

CALLS: The calls can just be follow ups to the original contact for quote, which most painting businesses are used to doing.
TEXTS: The texts should be quick messages asking them for a reply, so you get them engaged. This is also a great time to offer an exclusive discount that they can only get by replying. Keep these short, sweet and to the point.
EMAILS: The emails are where you can shine and really highlight your company. Send them more information about what it’s like working with your company. Have a testimonial video? This is a perfect opportunity to share it with them. Do you offer something completely unique in your area, like a guarantee or a special technique? Share it here.

People buy with emotions and justify it with logic. Use these 9 points of contact to get them emotionally invested. Then, provide the facts so they can justify their decision.

How To Implement A Great Customer Follow-Up System – Play The Follow Game

Have you ever looked at a toaster on Amazon and suddenly, that toaster is everywhere? You need to apply the same principles to your painting business.

The way to accomplish this is through the use of the Facebook pixel and the Google cookie.

Install these on your website (don’t forget to mention them in your terms and conditions) and they will start tracking your website visitors. You can now show people ads on Facebook that have been on certain pages of your website. You can use the Google cookie in a similar way.

Another way to interact with people multiple times based on their past browsing behavior is making use of Video Ads. Create a set of 3 videos where you answer questions that people commonly have when hiring house painters. Use the questions that you get from potential clients all the time. These videos do not have to be formal or cost a ton of money. A video shot on site with an iPhone will work for this.

Use these 3 videos to advertise to a broad audience. You want to use them to weed out people. Then, advertise your services in a follow up specifically to people that have watched at least 25% of one of your videos.

Why 25% of a video?

Because no one is going to watch a video on commonly asked questions about house painting unless they are in the market for house painting. This is a great way to narrow down your audience.

You can apply this tactic on YouTube and Facebook.

How To Implement A Great Customer Follow-Up System – Advertise on Multiple Platforms

To be “everywhere”, you need to advertise on multiple platforms.

Google Ads are a great resource that lets you advertise on Google, YouTube, Gmail and the Google Display Network (GDN). The GDN allows your ads to show up on websites that Google leases space on. You can decide what type of website “lease” you want to rent from Google. So, as a painting business, Home Improvement sites or Home Decorating sites may be good places to start.

Facebook Ads are another great place to target specific audiences with all types of advertising. Videos perform better than static ads, so start filming!

Depending upon the type of work you do, LinkedIn advertising could help you reach certain professionals.

How To Implement A Great Customer Follow-Up System – Let’s Look At An Example

To really illustrate how powerful just this one step is, let’s look at an example painting business, ABC Painting.

Let’s say that ABC Painting gets 50 leads per month, their close rate is 20% and the average painting project in their area is $4000. This means that they will get 10 clients and the company will gross $40,000 per month.

If you implement the follow up systems discussed above, you will increase your leads by about 60%.

To use the numbers above, this means that instead of 50 leads, ABC Painting will now have 80 leads per month. They will close on 20% of them, which is 16 clients and the company will now gross $64,000.

How To Implement A Great Customer Follow-Up System

See, the CRM really will pay for itself…

Stay tuned for next week when we discuss how to double your leads!

How To Market Your Painting Business – 8 Benefits of Local Marketing for Painters

In today’s world, technology is a small business’s best friend. It has made it exceptionally easier to reach out to target customers, set different variables when marketing, and ensure that those customers stay up to date about what you are offering.

As a painting business, it is essential that all of your customers, especially those in the same local area as your business, know about you and are able to find you should they need your services. This is called local marketing.

With local marketing, a painting business can advertise specifically to the targeted location where the business operates.

Businesses of all sizes, including large firms and corporations, utilize local marketing to grow their sales and customer base. Even the little guys are killing it, and so can you! But how exactly can you benefit from it?

In this article we are going to cover 8 benefits of local marketing for painting businesses and why you should start implementing these strategies today.

Before we get started.. We have 7 simple steps that will help you get your business in front of the right customers, downloadable as a free guide.

The Painter Marketing Broad Brush Effect

Get a FREE download of our 7 simple steps that will bring in more painting customers than you can handle in 2021 and beyond.

Ready to roll?

Benefits of Local Marketing for Painting Businesses

Painting businesses that implement local marketing strategies can attest to the growth that comes with it. Here are some of the benefits that you cannot afford to miss out on:

1. Highly Targeted

Your painting business may be located in New Jersey, but how do you get the locals to even notice you, let alone schedule an estimate? Thankfully, local marketing allows you to specify the demographics and location of your potential customers.

It also allows you to target customers based on their interests, and even filter through the timewasters. Local marketing is the best way to get in front of those local customers who are really hungry for your services and are willing to make a purchase. And all this can be done while you’re on a low budget.

2. Low Cost

Forget what you thought you knew about marketing and advertising 20 years ago. Local marketing these days is known for its low-cost strategies, thanks to the web. Traditional forms of advertising can still be a bit costly, reserved mostly for larger companies with an in-house advertising department who can afford the expenses; but you’re not Home Depot, are you?

When it comes to local online marketing, marketing strategies are significantly low-cost and customizable, even for the smallest of businesses.

3. Local Search

With local marketing, you are positioned right in front of your future customer — a local who is either actively searching for your painting services or has a significant interest in them.

You will appear in the search engines based on local queries (“professional painter near me”, “New Jersey painting company”), and rank the highest if you go about it strategically and have the know-how of ranking factors and things like SEO.

Local search is on a constant rise, with the words “local” and “near me” being searched 350 times more than they were 10 years ago. You’d be crazy not to take advantage of this!

4. Lasting Business Relations

Customer loyalty is one of the cornerstones of a successful painting business. In the world of digital, we like to replace the term with “community”.

Building local online communities is not only easy, cost-free and accessible, but it also results in lasting business relations. You don’t need to be Coca-Cola or Apple or have your own in-house PR department to build good, long-lasting customer relations. All you need to do is choose a platform and start building a community around your business. You can do this by sharing information, photos and other content related to your painting services, and by keeping in touch with your customers through direct messages and comments.

Besides the free consumer information, your business can advertise bonuses, discounts, or new products. This way, you can retain customers even after a sale, and nurture repeat client relationships that will last.

5. Branding and Brand Control

Branding might sound a bit too technical for most people but with local marketing, small businesses can dominate and establish themselves as industry experts if they can position and brand themselves effectively. You can always contact us at IFTS if you want to learn more about branding rather than figure out and do the legwork all by yourself.

As an industry expert who is well-branded, you will draw in more customers without having to do much work — your branding does the work for you. Customers will know your brand when they see it, and learn to trust and identify it.

You can then reap the benefits of your branding efforts by easily keeping track of clients’ opinions of your services and rectifying dissatisfactions before they get out of control. Armed with clients’ preferences and consistency, you can retain your relevance in the market and, in turn, convert more locals into paying clients. It’s all about branding, baby.

6. Scaling Your Business

Have you ever watched a YouTube video on DIY painting by an average Joe who owns a small local painting business on the other side of the country, yet has a slew of worldwide followers? That’s what scaling your business may look like in the digital world.

Because you are on a globally-accessible tool called the Internet, your small local business may grow beyond its regional status into possibly national and international levels.

As the business scales, the established local communities will help you maintain your relevance locally as you garner attention from others beyond your local area. While this may not result in actual service sales, boosting your following will, more often than not, boost your digital visibility, ranking, positive reviews, Likes, and referrals — regardless of where your web-based supporters are located.

7. Accessible Booking

Another benefit of local marketing is making use of online booking tools. If you have a local Google My Business or Facebook page, for example, you can add your phone number, email, or even make use of the scheduling button to make booking accessible to your potential customers as soon as they visit the page.

80% of home services queries lead to a phone call after search, but that’s if you make it easy for them to call you.

8. Keeping Track of Marketing Efforts

Online local marketing is one of the easiest ways to keep track of the performance of your ads and marketing efforts.

As a business, you can access low-cost and sometimes free statistics. You can get and analyze information such as website hits, engagement on posts, and even sales for free from the available inbuilt platform statistics. If you feel fancy, you can pay for marketing automation tools that also keep detailed business statistics.

Any kind of painting business stands to grow tremendously from implementing a well-thought-out local marketing strategy.

Don’t forget, we have a FREE guide that you can download for instant access to 7 simple steps that will bring in more painting customers than you can handle in 2021 and beyond.

If you’d like us to do some or all of the work for you, contact IFTS for a free consultation and let’s talk about your business specifically.

Get the Top 3 Social Media Post Templates for Painting Companies to Grow Your Following and Get New Clients

Engage with prospects and save time with your FREE Canva template kit. This kit features the top 3 social media posts for painting companies and directions on how to brand them for your own business in 5 minutes or less.

Enter your email below and get the templates sent directly to your inbox along with an instructional video on how to make personalized edits.

Facebook Ads vs. Google Ads – Is One Platform Better to Advertise on Than the Other?

A common question for many business owners when it comes to online advertising is where is my budget better spent?

Google, with over 85% of the search market share, is undoubtedly known as the most popular search engine on the internet as Facebook is the largest social media platform in the world. Both Google and Facebook are valuable places to advertise your business, but for different reasons depending on a few factors.

We all know that both time and money are limited, so where should you start with paid advertising to get the best bang for your buck?

No matter if you’re an expert in pay-per-click advertising (PPC) or if you’re just getting started, this article will help you understand the key differences between Google Ads and Facebook Ads and which is the best fit for you.

What is the Main Difference Between Facebook Ads and Google Ads?

Before we look at the factors that make each of these advertising platforms their own, let’s take a look at the main difference between Facebook ads and Google ads.

Google ads = paid search

As Google is the world’s largest, most popular search engine, it is also the largest PPC advertising platform.

Google ads is a paid search platform working on a pay-per-click model where ads show up in search results above organic results giving immense opportunity to advertisers.

Pay-per-click means exactly what it says – you do not pay until someone clicks on your ad.

Paid search primarily focuses on targeting specific keywords that advertisers bid on in hopes that their ads will be displayed on SERPs (Search Engine Results Page) when specific words and phrases (keywords) are searched by Google users.

Every time a user clicks on a Google ad, the advertiser is charged a certain amount of money.

Facebook ads = paid social

A great example of advertising on social networks, also known as “paid social”, is Facebook ads.

With more than 2 billion active monthly users, Facebook has become a highly competitive element across many businesses’ digital advertising strategies.

You may think that advertising on Facebook is similar to advertising on Google as advertisers use both platforms to promote their business online… but this is where the two become very different.

Unlike paid search advertising, where businesses can be found with keywords, paid social helps connect users to businesses based on their interests and behaviors online.

A common strategy used with facebook ads is retargeting. Facebook retargeting ads are one of the platform’s prime advertising features where these ads allow you to reach out to users who are already familiar with your brand. We’ll touch back on this advantage later in the article.

When Should You Use One Advertising Platform Over The Other?

Now that we’ve covered the primary difference between Google ads and Facebook ads, let’s take a look into the features of advertising on each platform and how they can be used effectively.

Targeting users

Google ads target users based on specific keywords pertaining to their search queries. By doing keyword research, you can find out exactly what users are searching for to target them accordingly.

Targeting through Facebook ads allows you to target users based on how they interact online. You can focus on demographics, interests, previous behaviors and more.

Although Facebook users don’t use the platform to search for products as they would with Google, with the many different targeting options available, you still have the opportunity to get yourself in front of your audience.

As we mentioned earlier in this article, Facebook retargeting allows you to reconnect with users who have previously interacted with your business in some way.

This could include users who have:

Interacted with your Instagram or Facebook page
Shared their email with you
Watched your videos (or a portion of them)
Interacted with your app
Viewed or taken actions on your website

As of late 2020, retargeting on Facebook has changed. With the Apple 14.3 IOS update, Apple will now require people to opt-in to having their data tracked…instead of requiring them to opt-out, which had been the standard. This update will affect your retargeting efforts if you do not take action.

For more information on this update and ways to mitigate the damage to your Facebook ads caused by the IOS 14.3 change, check out our article on How to Avoid Losing All of Your Retargeting Traffic.

Giving users what they want, where they want it

Since Google users see ads based on the keywords they search, it is more likely that they will click on an ad in Google since it is something that they intentionally searched for.

It is likely that those who are served ads while searching on Google are further along in the buyer journey, making them that much closer to purchasing.

When advertising on Facebook, you are most likely putting your product or service in front of an audience who has never heard of you before. You are reaching customers where they already are – social media.

Since social media users use the platform to “hangout” and socialize as opposed to using Google to look for answers, they might not be as far along in the buyer journey as they did not intentionally seek out your product/service.

When this occurs, you have to hope that you are offering the right ad at the right time, hoping that they move along in the buying process.

What is the goal of the ad?

Obviously the goal of every ad is to sell a product or service. But based on what the audience is seeking, these goals change ever so slightly.

The main goal of Facebook ads is to promote awareness of your company, product or service. Advertising to people based on their interests over time will lead to reaching more goals (website visits, new clients, and even purchases!) as users become more familiar with you.

When you advertise on Google, you are advertising with a goal to sell immediately since you are targeting specific keywords.

We know that when users search with specific keywords, they know what they’re looking for and they are more likely to purchase upon finding the product that they want. This is where you are able to make it easy for them to find exactly what they are looking for.

So… Facebook Ads or Google Ads? Is One Platform Really Better Than the Other?

In reality, one of these platforms isn’t necessarily better then the other because both platforms perform differently from one another, bringing unique benefits to the table.

Benefits of using Google:

Target ready-to-purchase users
Choose from a variety of ad formats
Analyze your ads with Google Analytics

Benefits of using Facebook:

Expansive audience (over 2.4 billion users!)
Granular targeting based on demographics
Visually appealing, fun ads

These two platforms should be seen as complementary to one another rather than being viewed in an adversarial way.

You will ultimately find the most success with advertising on both platforms as you will not only show up for popular keywords that users search for on Google, but you will also target users by their interests and behaviors through your ads on facebook.

Why not create the largest possible audience by advertising on both platforms to reach a multitude of new potential customers?

Not sure where to begin with advertising your business? Let us help you. Send me (Stacey Ivol) an email at si@iftsdesign.com or give IFTS, Inc. a call 412.715.6266 for a FREE consultation.