More Advertising Advice

[ClipKing]

Hello to all,

Some may have read my posts from a week or so ago describing my situation. If you didn't, long story short, I got a really good deal on commercial lawn care equipment and went ahead and bought it, without any jobs. been spending the past week canvassing fliers on cars at grocery stores, etc. Not much response. My plan is, this weekend to go door to door with fliers and business cards and try to work up business this way as well. What Do You Think? My justification for doing this is that I will be able to concentrate my advertising and also can be quite confident that the responses that I do get will be relatively close to each other, cutting down on wasted travel time all over the city. Am I thinking correctly here or will this simply be a waste of time? What is an avg. response rate you honestly believe I will get by doing this? I'm hoping to get at least a 5% response rate. Could be wishful thinking! I'm anxious to hear your responses!

[mooseyy]

Don't go door to door. Unless you want to spend your free time knocking doors. Print up some more flyers and goto a neighborhood that you want to do business. Make sure they have mailboxes by the curb and drop flyers in there newspaper box or tape to there psot. Or some new ones have the newspaper box built in. If they don't have boxes near curb then grab a buddy or two and walk from house to house and deliver. If anyone is walking approach them and introduce yourself and hand them a flyer.

[Woody]

I'll go on the record as being in 100% disagreement with Mooseyy on this one.

A flyer, when it does its job, is only ever going to get you a face-to-face meeting. That is THE BEST OUTCOME YOU CAN EVER HOPE FOR! In order to achieve this meeting, someone has to read your flyer, be interested in your company or services, call you, set up an appointment, and THEN you get to see them face-to-face! Now, going door-to-door with door hangers or flyers and KNOCKING on those doors is going to get you a face-to-face meeting every time the door is answered! Of course, that won't be 100% of the time, but it WILL be more than the measly 0.5% to 2% response rate of a typical flyer!

Door-to-door knocking has these advantages:

1) You will get more comfortable in talking with people.
2) You can look the prospect straight in the eyes.
3) You can show a genuine concern for them and their property. (see "How to Win Friends and Influence People", by Dale Carnegie)
4) You can ASK them if they have a current LCO.
5) You can ASK them what they are currently paying to have their property maintained, and thus get a "feel" for pricing in that neighborhood, rather than trying to guess!
6) You can look around and see what OTHER services they might need, and you can OFFER those services.
7) You would be suprised just how many people have THOUGHT about having an LCO, but always thought it was "too expensive". Then, when you give them a price, they say "Oh, that isn't too bad".

There are more advantages, but I will leave it at this. To just run around dropping flyers in paper boxes, or putting them on car windshields (a BIG NO-NO in my books...... that is a SCRUB technique, and people get PISSED about flyers on their windshields!) will give you dismal results. You need to get out there and TALK TO PEOPLE in order to SELL YOURSELF AND YOUR COMPANY!

The only disadvantage to going door-to-door is that you will need to learn to direct the conversation to avoid standing there BS'ing all day.

Woody

[clclawn]

woody
lets say you get 2% on news paper boxes, and 4% on door kocking, but you can get 5 times as many out on newspaper boxes, what is better?

I'm not trying to step on your toes, but fix my way of thinking. this is a fight i have had in my head for a year now and i can't figure it out. Are my #'s off or what am i missing.

[Woody]

Clclawn:

If you are getting 2% on putting them in paper boxes, you are doing pretty good. In your scenario, I would be putting them in paper boxes. I would also be up early, looking for the paperboy, and make a deal with him to put them in with the paper for a fee. Also, around here there are weekly "community" papers that are delivered. I plan on finding out who is delivering these in some of my target neighborhoods, and offering them a deal to put my flyer in as an insert.

The whole thing I was disagreeing with was the "don't go door to door" statement. If you have certain neighborhoods targeted, blanket them with flyers in the paper box 2 or 3 times, and if you aren't happy with the amount of customers you have gained, go door to door. Your name has already been in front of them a few times, and going in person adds, well, a PERSONAL touch. Sometimes people will tell you that they have been meaning to call you, but haven't gotten around to it yet. Better you knocking on their door, then the competition who just happened to be next door mowing, and thought they might see if the neighbor needed lawncare.

A lot of people are going to look at your flyer and think "I'll have to call him", but then the next thing they know, the grass needs cut! At that point, they will likely sign with whoever approaches them first.

Just my 2 cents.

Woody

[Phillip Baker]

I agree with Woody, face to face makes the sell. I p/u yards on either side of cust. just because i ask, I just about mow every yard on my block just because i walked up and asked. The only house's that i didnt ask are using somebody else now!!! Go figure!!!!But no one really starts calling until they need mowing, So just keep pounding the pavement, when the grass goes green, you'll see the difference.

[clclawn]

woody

what about the anoyance(sp????) factor. There is a window co that come to my door 1 time every year asking me to us them, i will not use them because they bothered me. just like tela-marketing, i will not use em because they bother me.

i think you are bigger then i am, so i am interested in what you say. help change my thinking.

[mooseyy]

I definetly started something here.

But Woody you are right. I got to reading what you wrote and agree with you. Now I too have asked neighbors of clients and had them ask me why I'm next door to service them.

Some like the face to face and some don't have time and don't like it. But Woody is right..

By the way I put out 950 flyers in October for snow removal and recieved 30 calls and landed 19 jobs. So we'll see what happens with the lawn cutting flyers.

[Woody]

Clclawn:

I don't think the annoyance factor is there if someone is interested in having their property taken care of. You are correct though, and it could become an issue if you keep knocking the same doors over and over. As far as how big I am, I stand 6'1" tall, and weigh in at right about 200 pounds. How big are you?

Mooseyy:

You kicked azz with the snow removal flyers. Those are very respectable numbers. Now, if you just had your location in your profile, I would know about how much it snows where you are at.

Woody

[clclawn]

woody
i didn't ask how big you are, i was just stating i thought you were bigger. I didn't want you ro think i was trying to start crap with ya. And as for how big am i?????????? are you hitting on me|??????????????? just joking don't reply.

[mooseyy]

Northern burbs of Detroit.

It's ok around here this year. But last year was better.