Do you have a Handyman business? As you know, handyman leads are one of the most challenging things for any company in this field, especially when generating them without using any type of business, service, or professional who offers to sell them or bring them much quicker.
If you’re starting, you’re probably wondering why they are so crucial, and the short and easy answer is that they are your clients. If you don’t generate leads, you will not close more deals, and your business will go bankrupt.
It is scary to think that after all your work and effort in making this idea possible, you end up losing everything due to how difficult it can be to bring those leads and get the deals you want and need. However, what if we tell you everything is about technique and hard work?
To help you achieve the main goal and save as much money as you can in the process, we will share a few options you can use to generate leads without relying on third parties or something similar (and we guarantee those will be qualified leads).
You Need a Professional Website
Many handymen believe they can do it without a website, are each one of them is mistaken.
A website is today’s business card and is a reference point for people who have heard of you and a starting point for people looking for a handyman.
You don’t need to spend a lot on website design if you are a local handyman. You can save money by using DIY templates that are either free or pretty cheap for anyone who needs them.
Editing tools allow you to design your site even, and no previous experience is required either. You don’t have to use a sloppy or outdated design and instead work around the modern and elegant ones you can afford.
You want your website to communicate what you offer, display any offers you have, and make it easy for people to contact you.
And don’t forget something crucial for any site: it must be mobile-friendly. You can expect the majority of traffic to your website to come from users on their smartphones.
Your website URL should be on all business cards, invoices, t-shirts, and hats. It can be linked from the local chamber of commerce and other directories.
This is your launchpad for lead generation and what you need before anything else if you want to beat your local competitors, and it just takes a little effort.
Manage Your Reputation & Reviews
Your best website offer or content is not enough to bring many leads and obtain the clients you need and want. It is probably the second method people would consider when it comes to efficiency despite the content, they take the time to upload.
Then, which one is the first? An online review is worth ten times more.
People today look online for handymen before hiring them. Often, they’ll find you on Google, Yelp, Top Rated Local, or HomeAdvisor, and check your review profile before going to your website.
It is important to have a positive profile on several popular review sites. How can you achieve this?
It all starts with the service you provide. Today’s home service businesses need to adopt a new mindset. No longer are you the person who does the job and nothing else.
Marketing is affected by everything you do, starting with handling estimates and how you invoice. It is imperative to complete work on time and in a professional manner.
You can’t leave this content to chance. It’s worth it to ask your best clients to leave you reviews while in person, with follow-up calls, and with follow-up emails. Include it in your business process, and it shouldn’t take you a lot of time.
Make sure you monitor your content and make sure your profile is complete on all major review platforms. You must respond to any requests if you are paying for leads through Google Local Service Ads or HomeAdvisor.
If you want to make it easy for your business to grow, consider making a page for testimonials only.
To build trust, you can use testimonials from your top clients to enhance your website content. These testimonials can be embedded on your website. You also have a back page with additional testimonial content.
Include a picture of the client if possible to increase credibility. You can’t go wrong with this option, especially when it is well executed and thought.
Manage Your Facebook Page
Many handymen and contractors in the area ignore Facebook, which needs to stop if they want things to change. Of course, this includes you.
Facebook offers many features that can be used to market your handyman business. Your page’s exposure is the same as having a website, and it’s also free to set it up.
Facebook Messenger and the recommendation feature are two of the key factors that lead to leads.
A post can be created to encourage people to tag businesses when they are looking for a handyman. This is a popular way to get local recommendations.
This request is sent to a network while making it. What is the result? People can tag a handyman page or any user they like or find great in the local area.
Messenger allows leads to send a message through Facebook. These messages are often job inquiries or hot leads that are ready to be converted into clients. This feature is easy to use, and replies are usually quick to receive for your leads. It’s possible to note the time in which you respond, but it is best to respond within an hour.
Facebook can be used to add personality to your services beyond these features. You can post helpful tips for home care, appliance, and tool advice, as well as updates about your services.
Create a Video About Your Business
Videos are a favorite of online users, and this is why you will notice that any type of video has more potential than other types of content.
Video conveys your message quickly and is easy to use on a smartphone. It also aids in your SEO efforts.
Make an introduction video to your services that give people good reasons to choose your handyman services.
Try to look at some videos that can help you understand the order of the process and how you can film yours.
As a tip, most videos provide a quick overview of the company’s work, what it is about, and how clients can reach them. Although you won’t have to spend money on making one most of the time, when you do have to, it will be worth the very small investment it takes.
Seniors Are Your Target Audience
Overall, you can offer your handyman leads to anyone. However, it is a fact that most of the deals and work obtained for companies come from senior centers or housing areas.
It’s not difficult to understand why. These centers often house elderly widows who want a handyman to help them with minor jobs.
These clients also talk to one another about the work that has been done for any of them, which creates great word-of-mouth marketing. You might soon discover that everyone in a senior living facility is a client, thanks to this.
Ask the management or meet someone who lives in such housing. This is a great source for steady work that is often not too labor-intensive.
You should also consider marketing to the senior population as a whole.
Many businesses overlook the huge market of baby boomers. These people can be a vast market for handyman services.
Unique Story
There’s a good chance that you are not the only one in your industry (and you clearly aren’t). Competition is inevitable.
Your goal should be to be different from everyone else. Everyone has their own story, and each person is unique in how they got there.
Although lead generation for contractors might seem like a boring task, it is possible to add some flavor by telling your story.
You can make your contractor marketing more effective, especially if you are solely working for yourself.
Sharing a story needs to be authentic, and although you will eventually add some sauce to what you’re cooking to attract more people, the idea is to keep the story as natural as possible to avoid any misunderstandings or to reach the point in which anyone can notice it is fake when it isn’t.
Partner with property managers and rental owners
Rentals and property management companies are two of the most lucrative partnerships for handyman work. Handyman work can be found anywhere that people rent or sell their homes.
To meet local property managers, real estate brokers, and landlords, it’s a good idea to network. Ask for referrals from those you already know.
These keyword phrases can also be targeted in paid and organic searches: “rental handyman,” “handyman for property management.”
You should have a page on the website that explains how you handle rental/property management so people can trust you a bit more.
More information, as long as it is valuable, will always be a great idea.
Help Others
Our job is to find customers who can really benefit from our products and services. Google search opens up a whole new world of leads for people who are curious and asking the right questions.
On question-answer sites, you can find other people looking for information about your product or service. You can look at these sites: Quora, Stack Overflow and Github, LinkedIn Groups, Reddit, QApop, and any forum you can find that would be suitable for your participation and share of information.
These sites are not intended for direct sales. However, they can be used to establish communication channels with potential leads.
Spend the time to answer each question thoughtfully. This is your chance to establish trust and familiarity with your business. It is crucial to add value to each post and be helpful, not provide a simple answer that can be found anywhere on the Internet and without any sense.
You can add links to your website as long as you provide a detailed response. You can also add links to articles that expand on your answer.
Give the Gift of Creativity
To establish your authority in your field, go above and beyond.
Your users can access free content such as podcasts, videos, webinars, and apps, and any other that comes to mind.
However, when doing this to bring more leads, keep in mind that your content should:
- Have a significant value for your customers that will allow them to utilize the information or gift.
- Encourage readers, listeners, and viewers to use your products and services.
- Remember that 90% of your content should be helpful and 10% persuasive.
- You could try to create a supportive webinar or a guide to help them understand some parts of handyman work and tasks.
People will be more likely to use your tools and become your customers in the future if they feel confident.
Use Surveys
Marketing can feel mysterious and complicated, so don’t be afraid of it whenever this happens.
Marketing is a process that requires us to think about our target customers, their needs, and how we interact with them.
This doesn’t have to be guesswork. Surveys can be used to determine what your target audience values most and how you can best serve them.
Survey questions can help you gain a better understanding of your audience. You can use the information from your survey questions to optimize the other lead generation methods you have been learning so far and are included later.
You could, for example, conduct a survey to see if your customers would like you to produce more creative content that could be useful for them or if they prefer a certain type of content as well.
Ask your respondents to choose the type of content that would have the greatest impact on them. Also, what publication method do they prefer? This could help you target your content and generate leads.
SEO Is Always at the Top
Since over 83% of users use search engines like Google and Bing to find new products or services, search engine optimization is a proven strategy for lead generation for handyman firms and companies overall.
Therefore, it is impossible to ignore it or decide to skip it just because it results in a bit tricky in the beginning and later on. You need it, and this won’t change no matter what you do.
However, you must be wondering, what is SEO?
SEO can improve your visibility in search engines. For example, when you search for something on Google or any other search engine, it will supply a list of search results that have information regarding what you want and need.
This list usually has dozens (if not hundreds) of pages, but only a quarter of users decide to go beyond page one. This is when SEO plays an important role.
To generate qualified handyman leads, you must be on the first page of search results. With SEO, you can target some words known as “keywords” and phrases your target audience uses on these search engines.
An example we can give you is “handyman in Florida.” If you include these words in your website or any content you post and have available online, users in the area will find you easily whenever they search for handyman services.
You’re grabbing their attention by appearing on the first page and including the specific keywords or phrases based on what they are looking for. This is the first step that will take you to generate more leads since you can then convert them into clients.
PPC Advertising Can’t Be Omitted
Everything’s about maximizing your lead generation and appearing in the top results of search engines.
Well, PPC (pay-per-click) allows your company to appear at the top of search results and helps your company attract valuable traffic from your online competition.
Since over 40% of users click on the top ads whenever they search for something, you’re very likely to generate qualified leads and not only some passing by users.
PPC allows you to hyper-target your audience, and it is one of the most cost-effective advertising options in the market since you only pay when a user clicks on the ad you designed. You can have a return of your money (ROI) based on how much you’ve invested in the ads.
PPC campaigns allow you to convince your current and prospective clients that your business is worth the investment.
Focus on Content Marketing
Content marketing can generate over 50% more leads than any other traditional marketing you can think about, which is what makes it a popular and essential tool for finding handyman job leads.
What makes content so powerful?
Information is what a user seeks when they start researching a product or service. This means they want to know about you, what you do, and how you can help them as a handyman business.
Suppose you don’t have a clear idea of what you can do or must do. In that case, you can help these users learn early about a topic and educate them about the benefits of professional assistance, and this will make them more likely to hire your services or, at least, turn into leads.
Can’t picture it? Here’s an example.
If a user is looking to repair a crack in his wall, then your content could explain why reaching out to professionals to repair it is crucial and shouldn’t be taken lightly.
You can highlight the problems or consequences of shoddy repairs and how professionals help you avoid the situation from turning more serious.
You can show the expertise and quality of your company while using well-written content and adding to the previous topic. This can help you build trust with your target market and encourage readers to contact you or request a quote.
The key to making people engage with your content also lies in how easy it is to read your content on all pages. So, don’t use technical words and if you do, try to explain it in a few words so everyone can stay focused on the topic and not leave your blog post or article.
Content marketing can seem like a resource-intensive and time-consuming approach to lead generation for handyman businesses. Although it is, it truly pays off after hard work and maintenance of your content.
If you’re worried about not being able to keep up with how much this marketing demands, you can always rely on an expert or add someone to your team that will be in charge of this area alone.
Utilize Guest Posts
For your lead generation efforts, guest posts can provide a powerful combination of impact, ease, and affordability.
For mutual readership boosts, companies will often agree on an article exchange.
You can request or submit posts to increase brand exposure to new audiences. You can position yourself as an industry expert by posting thought leaders or yourself.
This is especially important for B2B marketing, where personal relationships are crucial to winning and retaining customers.
In one incredible example, Buffer co-founder Leo Widrich said he reached 100,000 customers by regularly guest blogging. Not only did this strategy stir up sales leads, but it quickly earned backlinks that boosted their website’s ranking and credibility.
Don’t Forget About Social Media
Social media marketing is a helpful tool you cannot forget regardless of the type of business you have. Although it doesn’t look like it, it can be very useful for handyman companies to generate more leads. If you don’t believe this, remember it is all about the approach and strategy.
Users can find out everything they need about a company through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and even Instagram. Depending on what they find and learn, they can decide to contact you or request your services.
If you think about it, over 70% of users spend at least 3 hours on social media every day. This opens you the alternative to reach them in their favorite spaces without much effort as long as you have a good marketing strategy for the platforms.
To give you an idea of what to do, share your content on social media to support your content marketing strategy. Engage with your followers by responding to comments, opening some surveys, and using the tools allowed in every media.
Your company can generate valuable leads for handyman jobs by properly using social media and increasing brand awareness.
These achievements will help your handyman business grow and reach its highest goals, like hiring a new employee or expanding into new areas.
Email Marketing Never Fails
Email marketing is a reliable strategy if you are looking to generate leads for your handyman businesses. Among all marketing strategies, it has proven to be one of the best when it comes to ROI.
You get up to $44 on ROI for every dollar you spend, and sales and leads are 50% more generated than using other strategies.
Many people doubt email marketing because they feel or believe the method is dead. However, it keeps working quite well, and people use their emails a lot more than you think (including us).
Are you unsure how to make the most out of email marketing as an effective lead generation strategy?
Use it when you have an audience that shows interest in your services but isn’t ready to purchase or turn into leads/clients
To engage, emails should offer useful tips and information that show your expertise. Include compelling calls to action (CTAs) at the end of all emails so you can allow users to contact you easily and without much effort.
Segmenting your audience is key to achieving the best results. You can create custom content for your audience by dividing them into groups, such as their preferred location or service.
Handyman Leads Will Knock Your Door
“I’ve been trying and doing all this, but it doesn’t work.”
The issue won’t be our recommendations but rather the strategy you’re building around your handyman business, and that’s alright.
Generating leads and qualified ones at that isn’t simple, and it takes some mistakes to see what ends up working for your company.
However, we’re confident that if you focus on the essentials of each type of marketing, use SEO correctly, and bet for other strategies that can work around your business and your research and review first, it isn’t necessary to fall into despair.
Instead, you will have many leads knocking on your door and finally allowing you to close the deals for your company to grow.
The Local Lead Generation Process for Your Handyman Business
All right! So, everything is about building properties and generating leads. But how does the process actually take place? Are there other steps I need to know?
The steps I mention below are what students from our local lead generation program follow to generate leads for businesses like yourself. So I’ll help you see what we do. And how if you join our program, you can simply generate leads for your own business (unless you want to start a side hustle and build a laptop lifestyle business).
Essentially, our lead generation can be divided into four steps:
The first is prospecting. You need to take the time to do market research on a niche (industry) and determine how many phone-driven businesses are there.
Keep in mind that this is local research as you need to know how many companies need leads. For example, you may search for “plumbing services Youngstown OH.”
You will find dozens or even hundreds of businesses trying to get themselves in front of the customers by ranking on Map Listings, organic results, and even Ad.
The second step, building. When you find a niche (plumbing, tree services, a software company, real estate…), you will need to start building your digital properties. You don’t need to be an expert in HTML or coding. It can be easy with the right tools.
The third step is now taking time to rank your lead gen website. With the site done, you need to work on SEO strategies and start dominating those Google search results. If you’re new to SEO, it stands for Search Engine Optimization.
To keep it simple, it consists of the entire process of growing a company’s visibility on search engines like Google and generating organic traffic. And remember this, local lead generation is part of the strategies.
Moving on to step four, once you rank the site, you will start getting your ROI and profits. You only need to rent it out to a local business interested in the leads the site generates. You can offer a couple of free leads to their move on with the actual pay per lead.
To review steps 1-4 above, I described it to a normal student who is building a lead gen business to help local service providers generate more calls. But replace the student with you as the business owner. And replace sending the leads to a business to simply siphoning the leads to your personal business.
By the way, fun fact, about 20% of our students in our local lead gen program are actually business owners who went through the program. And they use the skillsets we teach to generate leads for their own business.
An Example of Lead Generation: Home Advisor
You must be thinking, “if lead generation sounds so good so far, how come I haven’t seen any company?” That’s the thing; there are many out there. You just don’t know they are dedicated to it.
HomeAdvisor is one of the best examples you can find on the Internet as it is a top lead generation company that has spent millions building its brand but also earned even more zeros for this same reason.
They started small as everyone else but invested in building their brand awareness to make people who are looking for home services go to their website and find what they need. They are over 75% of people’s first choice when they need those services.
If you don’t get HomeAdvisor that much or need a refresh, users need to submit their information to request a service and get a professional or expert who can provide it.
HomeAdvisor’s job is to share your information, which makes you a lead, with local companies so they can contact you and offer the service you’re requesting. For sharing this lead information, HomeAdvisor gets paid by the companies. This happens for every single lead they send to multiple businesses.
Business owners who don’t have marketing skills or don’t even know how to have any online presence will always rely on those pages to list their services. They will save time and effort, but companies like HomeAdvisor can make them spend lots of money as leads aren’t exclusive (one lead is sent to multiple companies after all).
Using Facebook Ads aka Paid Ad Platforms: Do They Generate Leads?
They DO generate leads. If not, no one would use them.
However, you need to remember two facts:
- Paid ads or platforms can be expensive.
- They don’t generate “natural” leads.
Whenever someone sees or clicks in one of those ads, over 80% of them did it by accident or are trying to close/report it.
Why? Because they aren’t looking for those services. At least not at the moment.
What those ads do instead is interrupt their time on the platforms. Users aren’t there to find companies or businesses unless they are searching for a specific company’s user, and for that, there’s a search bar. This is why it is hard to convert them to actual customers who will show interest in the companies’ services. Also, you’re limited by a budget.
When using lead generation, everything is organic. You aren’t forcing others to pay attention to your business but rather being there when they need you. This is why Google’s organic traffic will always beat paid ads, and the reason companies continue investing in it, which is a lot cheaper as well.
What Is Local SEO?
Don’t worry… I didn’t get it at first either. Following the short explanation, local SEO focuses on scaling businesses’ visibility on search engines. However, this is only for those who serve their communities face-to-face.
What does this mean?
Experts and professionals like painters, plumbers, and dentists (but not only them) offer their services to their local customers. Why? Because they can’t deliver them unless they are located in the same area of their customers.
To make sure those businesses get more leads, you need to rank them locally by claiming the business listing on Google to place them on Map Listings. Local SEO also involves online reviews, citation management, and how you manage your entire online presence in the local area.
If you are going to bet on lead gen, you need to adapt yourself to today’s world: The Internet.
Keep in mind that although traditional channels and methods like billboards, warm calls, and pamphlets still work, they aren’t part of your tools. Whenever someone needs a service, they go to Google and search for it.
“Dentist in Miami” or “plumbing services in Orlando,” etc. And you can keep coming up with services or professionals people need and look for. Thus, you need to make sure you’re using Google to get the companies in front of their clients.
Users will always click on the first search results (those near the top), and many of them will be either Ad links (people paid to place their websites there), Map Listing, and then you get websites. Almost all of them are your goal and where you should always aim to place yourself.
Can My Handyman Business Utilize a Local Lead Generation Strategy?
If you want customers, you better know you need it. Following the previous explanation, lead gen is all about placing businesses in front of their customers, choosing them over their competitors.
Put it simply – it’s all about closing deals and having clients for those companies to make money. The main difference with the usual methods companies use for this is how lead generation approaches different channels to get them in the right place of the market to get customers.
Those channels are all focused on the Internet as most people are searching for products but also services across the net. The issue is that the Internet is way too broad, and businesses don’t know how to place themselves. They usually try, but they get one common result: losing money and time.
How Powerful Are Organic Handyman Leads from Google?
For companies looking for customers, it’s everything. For you? Pretty much the same. When you build a business with digital properties, you get to make thousands of dollars a month.
This isn’t a “get started today and get rich tomorrow” thing, but it is HIGHLY scalable, and ROI + positive results are guaranteed. Learning a fairly decent and very needed set of skills to create your digital properties and start ranking them on Google is required.
I have invested in several online businesses over the years, and if there’s something uncertain, whether you will get your ROI or not, even more than the actual profit.
However, this business moved my earnings from five figures a year to a month in ONLY passive income while sitting comfortably at home.
On my laptop. Anywhere. Anytime.
You can look at one of the first sites I built back in 2016, and it continues making me over $1.000+ every month. The best part is that I don’t need to touch it or the rest I’ve built over the years, just like this digital property.
What Makes Lead Generation SO Alluring?
Here it goes: you can work from home.
The main issue with regular business opportunities is how much you need to invest in staff, equipment, or rent to have a place to sell your products or offer your services.
We all know the hassles of traditional businesses that involve regular expenses, which are extremely high. Can you afford it? I don’t think so, and even if you can, is it worth it? Now, it isn’t only about the money. You also need to put in a lot of work, and it isn’t only during the first couple of months or years. Usually, it is as long as you continue running it.
You can save yourself those headaches and bone-breaking tasks and expenses with lead gen since it is more about generating leads with digital channels—mainly websites.
Websites can be VERY cheap to build, and with many tools online, you get to do it in a couple of hours instead of days. Any virtual or digital business is scalable and won’t need constant maintenance.
So, let’s summarize this:
- You save money in regular expenses with traditional and most online businesses as what you need is yourself and digital properties (websites).
- You can bet on passive income.
- There’s no need to hire more people to get started.
- You can generate leads in multiple industries, which allows you to work on any niche you want.
How Can I Get Started in the Local Lead Generation Program?
Anyone can start and learn. That’s the beauty of this business model. I knew nothing about SEO, Map Listing, and everything I’ve mentioned so far. It is all about learning the skills, gaining experience, and deciding to take the step.
Remember that this business model will never get old as business owners are always looking for leads. They need to do business and scale their companies. Why not do the same while helping others and still making money?
You can start with this local lead generation course highly recommended for anyone wanting to grow in the business. It is a close training that will take you through each step and make sure you are able to get your ROI, profits and take control of your life.
You will be added to an incredible lead generation family ready to help you 24/7 when asking questions on the group. Anyone is welcome who’s willing to put in the work. Click here to watch the lead gen webinar.