Transcription:
When you’re engaging with your audience, it’s helping them create a relationship with you, but it’s also helping you as a business owner learn more about your audience so you can continue to provide the correct value for them.
Welcome to another episode of DM shop talk or digital marketing shop talk. As always, my name is Mike. I am Valor Circle’s media specialist and here with me is I’m Jeremy Mullins. I’m the senior marketing director at Valor Circle. Awesome. So once again, we we have another episode here for you just our goal with this podcast is always, I want to kick our off each episode discussing that we want to create a community of home service business owners to really, be able to build upon each other.
Jeremy and I are experts in marketing it. So we’ve created episodes to help you guys Take tips, tapes, tricks that we, strategies that we implement in our own business that would help your businesses grow. We also want to invite you, business owners on to share your stories. And share about some of your successes, maybe some of your, or your the things that you failed at so people can continue to grow upon.
Because obviously we all, working to a common goal and we want to create a community around that. Jeremy we had, an exciting one today. I’m very happy about this one because it’s so important really about no matter what business you’re in. Engaging with your audience is so important. So important because if you’re just working hard, you’re doing your business like, that’s awesome.
But if you’re not interacting, creating relationships. With those potential clients, with those customers with past clients, past customers, then that’s, a lot of times how you could have one and done jobs or not get as much exposure for your business. Just because you’re not.
You’re not building your brand. You’re not building your awareness around your company. Being able to, strategize and engage with your audience on a regular basis is crucial to growing your business, Jeremy. And I know you’re passionate about this. What are your, thoughts?
Do you have something that really sticks out on how a home service business owner, a plumber, electrician? Could do to engage with their audience better. Yeah. I’m, gonna talk about one of the obvious ones which is social media. I think social media is probably the, honestly the, sh the shortcut to get in front of your audience in any fashion.
I, got a tip. And the tip is you have to know, you have to know two things. One of them is that your personal account is always going to get more traction than your business account. So your business account is Facebook’s pretty much stated. It’s a pay to play, meaning that if you want to post to be put in front of people, you have to boost it.
You’re going to have to run an ad on it. So this tip is using your personal account, asking a business question. And when you ask a business question, it’s an easy way to engage your audience. What we’re looking for is really quick responses to a simple question. I’m a home service industry, Mike, give me an industry and we’ll just use that as a, an example, but electrician let’s do electricians.
Fantastic. So electrician what is a service that electricians do on a regular basis? A wall. Let’s is a simple one that. Most homes will need like installing or adjusting wall. Perfect. What’s another one that so there’s wall outlets is one. What’s another one that electricians use replacing light fixtures, right?
Light fixtures. Yep. What’s a, bigger ticket item? Let’s say updating your electrical box, right? Maybe it’s the panel. Yep. All right. So if I’m an electrician. I can engage my audience using a survey my, my personal audience saying Hey take, a picture of yourself.
That’s number one, take a picture of a selfie, maybe put it in front of your truck and take a picture. And then you’re going to ask the question I’m thinking about doing a promotion and the next 90 days. It’s gonna be one of these three. Which one should I do? A 15% off re whole house replacement for electrical outlets.
B $20 off replacement of a light fixture or c 15% off replacement of electrical box. Includes fuses circuit breakers, all that stuff. Which one should I do? And what’s going to happen is the people who are your biggest fans, they’re going to reply A, they’re going to reply B, they’re going to reply C, so something they can reply to really, easily.
One, you’re engaging your audience, two, you’re actually getting data on a good special to run. So maybe you end up running one and then you run another one. And see if you don’t get responses you’re, probably off on what you’re offering. Meaning it’s not a need that your audience needs and you might have to re approach how you do it.
But when we’re, when we get a short answer, what happens is our post will stay sticky longer. Meaning like people actually who will Facebook will feed it to them. Instagram will feed it to them. LinkedIn will feed it to them more. If there’s more engagement, it’s just, it’s a thing called edge ranking that it’s still basic algorithm that people use.
So ask a good question, multiple choice question, A, B, or C, boom. That’s how you engage your audience in the most simple format to actually gain business, in my opinion. Nope. I was gonna say, I love that example because not only is it helping you create engagement and having your audience interact with you, but it also helps you as a business owner, like when you do want to run a campaign.
One of those sales campaigns, it helps you know exactly what your audience is. So when you’re engaging with your audience, it’s helping them create a relationship with you, but it’s also helping you as a business owner learn more about your audience so you can continue to provide the correct value for them.
So that’s, Jeremy used a great example of why it’s so important. Why engaging with your audience? It’s good for them because they get to go know you more and it’s good for you as a business owner because you get to know your audience better as well. And I love how you started off Jeremy with social media, just because.
I think you’re just scratching the surface, like that’s a great example, but there’s so many things you can be doing on social media just because in today’s day and age, like your local community is social media now and getting online, that’s everybody’s checking Facebook every day. Everybody’s checking Instagram every day even tick tock it.
So being able to post things, interact with them. and engage away is, needed. I really in today. And I think one of those strategies is showing, providing value. I know we’ve talked about a previous podcast, answering questions before people can answer them, but I want to even take that a step further to engage with your audience.
Is create, a content that provides them value. I think a perfect example of this, that we see a lot of home service business, home service businesses that are really growing their social media presence. Is creating like either little tutorial videos or literal or just maybe tips and tricks videos So all this is like just setting up your phone And as you’re fixing if you’re an electrician as you’re fixing A wall socket maybe talk through hey, if you just have a single light or a wall socket that you need fixed.
Like here’s the proper way. Here’s the do’s or don’ts, or you can use that as a way to explain why you’re doing it, why they shouldn’t trust themselves as well and why they should trust because it easily get electrocuted in a lot of dangerous things can happen, but if they’re seeing it firsthand.
As you’re explaining it through them, then they’re more engaged with that and you’re creating that content for them that they’re going to continue to want to keep coming back to your page for and they want to keep interacting with it. They’re going to comment on those types of videos. They’re going to like it.
They’re going to share if they got value for it, they’re going to share it and share it with their friends, with their family, on their boards and whatnot. And there’s so many different videos like that style of tutorial or how to videos or tips and tricks that you can’t really do it like we’re in Michigan, Jeremy we’re, in the fall.
And so a lot of homeowners right now are taking steps to winterize and get ready for the cold war, whether that’s cleaning up their yard, cleaning up their roof with the leafs cleaning out their gutters. Or preparing, their heating system and whatnot. This is a perfect opportunity right here, right now.
for home service business owners to create if you’re, a roofer damage restoration expert create videos of how to properly clean out gutters in a safe way or like tips like that, because you’re creating that content that people are going to want to continue to return to your page and see as, an expert.
I don’t know. Do you, I was gonna say, do you have any other things, maybe tips or tricks or videos that people would want to see that would make them want to engage more? I the, satisfying videos that we’ve talked about on the heart AMA with that obviously replacing electrical socket is a good one.
Is there some electrician does that’s satisfying, right? Is it honestly, you could probably record yourself the slipping wires and just, cleaning those off, do slow motion clean off. You probably get, views on that just because it’s a satisfying video to watch. So you take the wire, you get the tip ready to connect to another one.
People are, people will probably watch those just because it’s a, five second video and they want to see that whole satisfying thing. And yeah, that’s just an easy one an electrician could do, I think. Oh, definitely. I love how we’re talking, we can go so many fun things that the business owners could be doing on social media.
But I think another strategy if you really want to continue to Engage with your audiences. We did a previous episode on email campaigns and going off of your first example, you talked about with some discounts and stuff collecting emails, getting an email list and touching base with them on a regular basis.
Hey it’s, fall. You guys do you, want a your heater, your furnace inspection before, before winter comes offering a discount for that. If you really want to engage and grow your audience and. Customer, keep customer base, keep them returning to you. I was having a hard time saying that.
Having customers return to you, you want to engage with them on a regular basis. Because if you just do a job for them, and you leave them hanging, odds are they’re going to forget about you. And when they have another problem, they’re just going to go to the old Google machine and find another person.
You want to make yourself on the forefront of their mind and email is a great way to do that by sending out, even if it’s monthly, a monthly email, even if it’s biweekly, even if it’s weekly yes, a lot of times people might skim through them, but they’re going to, would they, if they’re continuing to see your name pop up on their email when they have another issue with their furnace or they need an electric electric or another electrician or something, whatever your business is, Your name will be on the forefront of your mind.
So email is a great way to continue to engage with them. Do you have any other strategy? I know we’ve talked about some of those discounts. How can, they use a discount when it comes to engaging with an audience using email? Yeah. Coupon to discounts should have an expiration date. FOMO.
Make sure that, make it a good discount and limit it to maybe the first 25 people that reply, right? Make it so people know that there’s a limit and then what’s going to happen is people who respond back, they might miss out on the discount, but they still might need the service. And it’s up to you if you want to give them that discount or not.
But that’s one thing I’d probably do too is engage your audience with. The probability of saving some money on the service you offer will also make you more profitable. No, most definitely. And I love the limited time offer. I love that because you make yourself feel. You want to make them wanting you, the best way to, the best way to make sale, best way to engage with your audience is leave them wanting more wanting something from you.
And by doing that limited time offer, that gives them the step to take that action right away. But Jeremy, we’ve talked about social media, we’ve talked about email. There’s so many different ways to, to engage with your audience. I guess we can wrap it up with our final thoughts. What can a business be missing out on if they’re not taking steps to engage with their audience?
Just knowing that your competition is probably going to be doing it right. In a previous podcast, we talked about who stole my cheese. Don’t don’t sit there and assume your clients will use you. Cause you shook their hand and you were nice. They have to remember you and engaging in your audience is probably the, one of the easiest ways.
To have them be to remember you next time or to, prompt them to use your business sooner than they need you for service with it, with an amazing value to it. If they’re, I was to say, if they’re remembering you on a regular basis, then they’re also more likely if their friend or family has similar issue, they need a plumber and they’re more likely to refer you as well.
So that’s also another reason you’re wanting to engage your audience because say on the forefront of their mind. They’re going to more likely refer you to their family and friends. And obviously we know the importance of a referral, but as we’ve tried to get across. Engaging with your audience is so important, and as Jeremy just said, if you’re not, if you’re not taking steps to engage with your audience on a daily basis, then your competition is going to beat you out on that and they’re going to, they’re going to get.
More phone calls, more referrals because of it. So make sure you’re taking the steps to implement ways that you can better engage with your audience as well. So we thank you for tuning in again to another episode of DM Shop Talk. And until next time, we hope you have a great day. Cheers.
