When it comes to marketing, tradies are in a unique position. Their business is not as high profile as other businesses, and yet they often have to compete with larger companies for attention. With the right strategy, however, you can quickly get ahead of your competition and grow your online business. In this article, I will share some of the most effective digital marketing tips and strategies that may work well for tradie businesses.
Basics First: What is a tradie business?
A tradie business is a company that offers services and products to do-it-yourselfers. These businesses help people fix, install or build things around the home, office, or construction sites. For example: They can be skilled electricians, interior designers, plumbers, and carpenters.
The term ‘tradies’ is more common in Australia and New Zealand. However, these skilled professionals exist everywhere. For example, in India, we have such professionals from Urban Company. And… In the US and the UK, we use the term ‘tradesmen’ for such skilled service providers.
Traders are in demand for their expertise, which means they don’t have much competition for customers. But with limited time available to market your business, you need creative ways of attracting more potential clients than your competitors who can offer the same service as you for lower prices. This is where you may want to consider the benefits of marketing automation to grow your tradie business.
10 Digital marketing tips for building a successful tradie business
It can be a daunting task to build a successful tradie business. There are many elements to consider when marketing your small business, and there is no one size fits all solution for every type of trade. However, some digital marketing tips can help you get started on the right track regarding online presence and visibility.
1.) Start with research
The first step to any good campaign is researching what will work best for your target audience and which platforms they’re using most often based on their location or age group. If you do not know where to begin, start with the most popular social media platforms for your target audience. Google’s own Keyword planner tool and Buzz Sumo are two good market research tools to start with. Also, don’t miss out reading my latest post on the 7 best keyword research tools for SEO in 2022 and beyond.
2.) Focus on creating relevant content
The next step in digital marketing is figuring out what type of content you want and to whom it has to be geared towards. At this point, you may benefit from starting a blog or a vlog. Figure out which blog posts or articles will be more engaging based on consumer needs and preferences.
This will take some trial and error at first, but once you find a topic that works for your business, put all your eggs into one basket, using this area as your niche. For example, if you’re running a plumbing company, you could create an article/or run a video series on your YouTube channel about fixing certain types of leaks from taps or pipes under the sink without any professional help required.
3.) Test drive social media channels
Use a few different social media channels and run promotions on each one, then keep the ones that perform the best. For example, if you are into construction and paints business, it is best to use visual channels like – Instagram or even Pinterest! You could post pictures of construction DIY hacks and breath-taking wall paints/textures to gain more followers and customers. So, you have to figure out which social channels work best based on your type of business and content. It will not only help you build the right engagement, but may also potentially help you land more gigs and orders for your business.
4.) Develop a social media strategy
Once you have figured out what works for your audiences on the most popular platforms, then it is time to develop a plan of action for each channel. Start tracking key performance indicators such as the number of posts per day/week or likes to measure progress over time.
This can help you determine how often your tradie business should post new information or messages so that followers don’t get tired of seeing the same thing all the time. Social media strategies go hand-in-hand with developing an editorial calendar to figure out when these updates will be posted based on holidays, seasons, or other timely events.
5.) Email marketing
Email marketing is still an effective way to reach your audience because not everyone is on social media. People are often too busy with work and family at the end of the day to pay attention to their Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram feed, so they’ll check their email instead when they get home from a long day. If you have created a blog or a YouTube channel to engage your customers, don’t forget to add an email subscription box so that you can capture the email addresses, effortlessly.
Regarding what to send in an e-newsletter, you could create short blurbs about new products in your store that people would be interested in buying and provide links, so they can buy them online without having to leave their inbox.
6.) Build relationships with influencers
Influencer marketing has become a massive trend over the past few years, so it’s worth investing time into building mutually beneficial partnerships with people who have an engaged social media following that aligns well with yours.
This could be someone like a local blogger or YouTuber who creates content relevant to tradespeople such as yourself. It might also make sense to work with a tradesperson influencer already established in the industry and who has an online presence.
7.) Invest in SEO
It’s essential to keep your website content fresh, adequately optimized for search engines (e.g., keyword research) so that you can rank higher when people use specific phrases or keywords to find what they’re looking for on Google, Yahoo!, Bing, etc.
When creating original blog posts/videos from scratch, it might be worth using tools that will automatically optimize them based on their best chance of ranking highly in SERPS. For example, SEMRush is one of the best tools that can help you drastically improve your SEO.
Investing time into SEO can have a massive payoff in the long run. While there are many ways to do your research and find what works best for you, it’s often worth investing in something like services from an experienced SEO consultant who has experience working with other tradespeople or small business owners.
It might be challenging to manage this alongside everything else in your day-to-day life, which is why outsourcing part of that workload can be beneficial.
8.) Run an informational webinar
One of the most effective ways to build relationships with customers is through educational content. One strategy that has been proven successful in recent years is running free, live-streamed seminars or webinars on specific dates and times where you can answer questions about certain aspects of what you do (list points).
This may work well if there are unanswered questions from potential clients who have come across your website but need reassurance before making their first purchase. It also helps them see just how much you know about what it’s like to run a tradesperson business, making them feel more confident in the relationship.
If you’re not sure what to talk about, give some thought to the top questions that have been asked by your customers (or potential customers) and create a list of topics with their answers from memory or alongside other sources like YouTube videos for reference.
9.) Improve your communication skills
One area where many tradespeople fall short is when it comes to using social media as part of their marketing strategy. It’s easy to post on Facebook now and again, but having conversations there will yield much better results than just broadcasting information that doesn’t convert.
Engaging with people online will help you learn about their needs and build connections, leading to new business opportunities in the future.
10.) Include testimonials or social proof
Including testimonials from customers is a great way to prove that your products and services work. Research shows that people are more likely to purchase when they see other people who have made the same decision in the past.
This is worth considering for any marketing strategy you’re going with because it will give potential clients confidence in investing their hard-earned money in what you do, too, without worrying about whether this is a legitimate business opportunity.
Photo credits:
Photo by James Kovin on Unsplash
Conclusion
Tradie business success is achievable for the right people and with a few simple steps. When planning your marketing strategy, the key takeaway is that you need to be doing something different than everyone else to stand out from the crowd.
If you’re unsure where to start, consider investing in an expert who knows what they are talking about because this could save you time and money down the line on acquiring new customers.
Fabulous article!
In my opinion, Content should be engaging, educational, or make the reader to feel something.