Home Shows

[mellowjohny]

Heres a thought,

T- shirts and literature.

[tulsa lawn guy]

Elwood,

How many people do you typically sign-up from these shows? Do you find them to be an effective way to spend your advertising dollars?

[Elwood]

Tulsa, I feel it is an excellent way to spend advertising dollars.

I am from a smaller area and the shows I have done only flow about 3k people. Of those, I have about 400-500 register. Depending on how hungry for work I am and how I price these jobs, I can land around 40 new mowing accounts and many single service jobs, directly from the first lead. Over the course of the year, I land several other clients, directly related to the show. Most are single service jobs, but a few are repeat clients. One thing to remember, I am NOT the cheapest guy around, typically the highest, but people who are willing to pay for premium service will pay my prices. Those numbers could be a LOT higher if my prices were "competitive" so to speak.

The trick is to send them letters and flyers thru-out the season, keeping your name fresh in their minds, especially the ones who already pay someone else for services. If they screw up, you will probly get the first call.


I have also picked up clients because I networked with other companies there. Other people in business will refer me to their clients or use me for jobs that they are on. For example, a concrete guy and an electrician use me for seeding and landscaping after they trench or pour sidewalks or patios. Mostly they are small jobs, but I get "in" with the client and with good service, and a small talk with them, many times, it can lead to extra work. I have done several small landscape jobs around patios when they only wanted seeding because I was able to sell the work to them. This valuable networking with other business people can lead you to meduim and large commercial work too. It is all about people and if the electrician for "Joe Industrial Site" recommends you or introduces you to the decision maker at that site, you have a foot in ahead of everyone else. If you are good, you can land "Joe Industrial Site", all because of the networking done and the contacts you make at a show like this.

The home show is all about communication. Communicating with potential clients and other business people. It will ALL lead to work, it mainly depends on how aggressive you are and how hungry you are.

I have landed more work for the dollar with home shows than any other type of advertising I have done. The bonus for the people in the maintenance end of it is that many times the lead you get for the dollar can pay you for YEARS in the future with repeat service.

[RRS]

Just to hit on what Elwood said about networking. I saw some nice displays at the Richmond Show last week that were combination displays. Such as, a water garden install done by a landscape contractor, but as you walked through the display they had putting greens done by a different contractor, a nice arbor and patio done by fence and concrete contractors, outdoor lighting throughout the whole thing done by a lighting contractor, and so on.

Each contractor had a rep in their area of the display answer questions, taking names, and passing out info.

[tulsa lawn guy]

Elwood and RRS,

Thank you guys very much for the info. The Tulsa show is in a couple of weeks, so I'm in no way prepared for that this year. However, I'm going to go browse around and get some ideas...

Thanks for your thoughts.

[Jbyrd485]

Sod

Hey I saw a booth at a show like this and I could not stop looking at it. They put sod down in the whole booth. They were advertising putting greens but you could put sod down or cover a table top with sod and place things on it like business cards, mugs, T-shirts, Pens, I promise the sod will catch their eye I know that for a fact. Its not expensive and its a unique touch that I am sure nobody else will have.

(Just my thoughts and its only worth price paid)

JByrd

[Phillip Baker]

Hey Elwood that was some really solid sound advise , im trying to get booked on my show here and if i do i'll take some pics and let everybody know how it went.