It’s likely a question that you may know the answer to without necessarily knowing the words to say so – answering why someone should buy from your carpet cleaning business.
Service marketing is among the most difficult in terms of products or services to promote. In the eyes of prospective customers, many services are commoditized, ours included. It’s easy to say “you should buy from us because we’re the best”. Run through the list of any of your competitors, and they will likely say the same thing.
“We give great customer service”
“We use the best products”
“We provide service with a smile”
Reading these, were you compelled by any of them? Of course not. So why should somebody buy from you? It’s important to reflect on this topic not just once, but to constantly be striving to make a compelling story for your brand and your business, and this differentiator can become a marketing tactic that can’t be easily replicated by your competitors.
Personally, I’m a fan of metrics and quantifying things. “We clean carpets the best” isn’t nearly as compelling as “98% satisfaction rate!” with a link to your Google My Business page for example, showcasing your glowing reviews from clients. Do you have a service guarantee of any sort? A warranty perhaps? These are the things that you should focus on communicating do your client, something that in and of itself will create the trust that you stand behind your work.
We’ve found that with many service-based clients, the buying journey of a customer is short-lived. Many people that are looking to hire a carpet cleaner will only visit one or two websites before making their decision to call to book. With a relatively low ticket price, many can’t be bothered to shop around if you are able to service them in a timely matter, for a fair price, and you answered the call. These three things seem simple but are often overlooked.
A simple exercise is to visit some of your competitor sites in your local marketplace. What are you doing differently than them, and be objective to yourself and your business. Are you offering many of the same claims as they are? Are they answering the question of why should somebody buy from them? Visit a few of their websites and take note of what you’re up against, and it may become clear that everyone’s saying the same thing!
A few other ideas that we’ve found that works well to communicate that may be overlooked.
- Do you service late? 7 days a week?
- Warranty or reservice guarantee?
- Don’t shy away from price point, but be clear with your value. If you’re going to charge someone twice what the other carpet cleaning companies in your marketplace are, you better have a very compelling reason other than “good customer service”, challenge your offering!
- Free in-home estimates?
- Natural based, chemical-free approach?
- CRB or manual scrubbing?
Think less of the usual marketing fluff about trying to make your business sound appealing, and think more about how you’d explain to someone in your elevator pitch why they should buy from your carpet cleaning business.
Whatever you decide, this will continue to be the basis of what you’re striving to do every day running your business and trying to drive better value for your clients, but present and prospective.