.webp?width=200&height=75&name=blue-ridge-heating-air%20(1).webp)
Every company makes mistakes, from sales and operations to marketing and advertising. Even when something goes wrong, however, there’s a chance to learn from it.
When it comes to promoting your business, we want to help you avoid some of the common pitfalls of HVAC marketing. These include mistakes we’ve seen plenty of times, as well as ways for you to not miss out on opportunities.
Here are some common HVAC marketing pitfalls to avoid:
One of the best and cheapest forms of digital marketing is through email. All you need is an email list (your own- do not purchase one!) and some sort of automated emailing tool like HubSpot, MailChimp or Constant Contact. From there, you just have to organize your messages, write your emails, and schedule them to send.
One mistake we see a lot of contractors make is not gathering a person’s email once they’ve made contact with them.
A lot of times, contractors think that if someone called in, they don’t need the customer’s email because they already have their phone number. This is wrong. Always ask potential (and existing) customers for their email address, and let them know it’s to send them reminders, information, and confirm appointments.
With an email address, you can send out marketing and educational information that you wouldn’t normally be able to call about.
Think of it like this: If you have a special on a new air conditioning system, are you going to call every person on your customer contact list to let them know about it? NO WAY!
But it’s incredibly easy to email someone individually or as a part of an email marketing campaign that goes out to multiple people. That takes way less time and money. Even better, by sending customers information about what to expect before you come to their home helps build trust before you ever see them eye to eye.
If you start this practice of gathering emails, you can develop an extremely effective email marketing strategy.
Remember: your best customers are repeat customers. Emailing them is a great way to stay in touch, and stay at the top of their list when it comes to their HVAC needs- or when they make recommendations to friends and family!
Most contractor websites have one Call-to-Action, or CTA. It’s usually just “Call Us,” or “Schedule Now.”
Obviously, these CTAs are essential for your website. But here’s the problem: The VAST majority of the people visiting your site aren’t ready to talk to someone from your company. They are there doing research and looking for answers to the questions they have.
By not speaking to these visitors, you’re losing the opportunity to turn them into customers.
If someone’s on your site just gathering information, they’ll simply leave once they’re finished. Then, you’ll never know who it was that visited or how to follow up with them.
You need a way to engage with these visitors.
Adding different CTAs around your site gives these visitors more opportunities to identify themselves and allow you to market to them after they’ve left your site.
Consider, for example, lower-level calls-to-action such as downloading a brochure or a coupon. This way, the visitor identified him or herself by exchanging their email for this offer. It often works simply because they’re not pressured to talk to anyone.
Now, you can market to them through email.
Remember, not every person who visits your website is ready to speak to a salesperson. So, give them some other opportunities to get some more value from your site and also identify themselves as a lead.
One key mistake contractors make when writing content for their site is not speaking to or educating the customer. We are in the age where we all search the internet for pretty much everything we need. You need to write for them.
But a lot of contractor websites speak contractor language and jargon. It makes sense to them, but it doesn’t strike a chord with the people visiting their site.
It’s important to make sure the people find what they are looking for on your site.
This means filling your site with educational information that not only answers the questions people are looking for but also speaks in a language that they understand.
Sure, it’s great to talk about BTU’s and SEER. But if the people reading about it don’t know what it means, how effective is that going to be?
Speaking about problems and solutions in a way that anyone can understand is essential to building great content that visitors will appreciate and enjoy.
For some reason, a lot of contractors don’t believe in using social media. Maybe they don’t like it, maybe they don’t understand it, or maybe they just don’t have time for it. Whatever the reason, it’s like leaving money on the table.
The number of people who use social media is growing every moment. Consider this: Facebook has around 214 MILLION users just in the United States. That’s more than 60 percent of the population.
Finding effective ways to use social media will help your business tremendously.
Social media is a great way to spread your name throughout the community. You can show people what your business is about without them ever having to come to your website. And, you can run paid ads that go directly to the customer demographics you’d like to target.
Ignoring social media because it seems annoying or not worth it is a huge mistake. But it’s never too late to make a page for your company and get started!
Sure, marketing is changing and swaying more towards a digital outlet. But, that doesn’t mean you should just abandon traditional marketing platforms.
Newspapers, TVs, billboards and radio are still important for your marketing campaigns. And, they can be tied into your digital strategy, too.
Not every one of your potential customers is using the internet for everything they do, and different forms of media can help you achieve your marketing goals.
If traditional media platforms have worked for you in the past, don’t give up on them simply to try new things. Instead, find a healthy balance between digital and traditional.
Using digital tools will also help you measure your success with traditional media.
For instance, you can run a newspaper ad with a unique URL, or website page. When you list a URL that’s only used for that ad, you can see how much traffic the ad generated by using that page’s analytics.This helps you cut out ineffective marketing campaigns.
But, you don’t want to abandon something just because it’s an older strategy. Instead, use the latest digital tools to measure all your efforts.
When you identify what’s working and what’s not, you can invest more in the strategies that move the needle!
We talked a little in that last section about ways to find out if a marketing strategy is working or not. Well, not doing that is a pitfall of any company’s marketing effort.
With the tools that digital marketing has to offer, it’s easier than ever to track lead sources and measure your campaigns.
If you don’t do any of this, you have NO idea where your leads are coming from. Maybe you have somewhat of an idea, but that’s not enough. Today you can, and should, measure the dollars you spend on marketing against the money your business generates.
Otherwise, you are setting yourself up to spend unnecessary money while also losing out on leads.
You should measure each campaign once it’s over to verify if it did the job. Then, adjust your marketing strategy to put the most money into the best marketing campaigns. If you aren’t measuring everything, you’ll never know what works best.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Comfort Media Group is the digital marketing company for growing HVAC contractors.
Tell us about your company and goals.
