5 Marketing Tips for Tradies

It can be difficult to know where to start with marketing your trade business and whether what you spend will return real results. A full marketing strategy will depend on your trade, target market and successful execution, but there are steps you can take now to achieve some quick wins and market your business without breaking the bank.

1. Industry partnerships

The trades market is very competitive with many quality businesses offering the same services. However, looking beyond your own trade can present a great opportunity. By building partnerships with other businesses in non-competing trades you can develop very fruitful, mutually beneficial relationships. You can arrange to refer work to each other and join forces to offer combined, value added services. If you’re a plumber, you could team up with a builder or electrician to offer customers all the services they need.

2. Facebook community groups

Both businesses and customers use Facebook Community Groups to share information and ask questions as well as selling and finding services. Being part of local groups can help you find prospects. This does involve a bit of an investment of time because it will be a turn-off for people if you just spam groups with your business details. You will need to build a reputation by genuinely engaging with people and using your knowledge to offer advice where you can. But who do you think they’ll choose when they have a job that needs doing? You might even enjoy being part of the group yourself!

3. Local advertising on Facebook or Instagram

There’s no denying that people spend a lot of time on Facebook and Instagram, so it’s a good way to reach new target customers. The benefit of both channel’s advertising platform is that it’s not just designed for the big boys and it can be a cost-effective way to target customers in your local area. You can target any type of Facebook or Instagram ad to a local audience; you just need to set your area in your targeting options. Both platforms are great for showing the visual outcomes of your work with photos or video, but Facebook is particularly good for showcasing your expertise by linking to your website for specials or case studies.

4. Customer referral

People generally place a great deal of trust in recommendations from their friends and family, and even from people they don’t know well who speak highly of a tradie they’ve used. This kind of social recommendation is very powerful so make it easy for your customers to help you with a recommendation by giving them your card and flyers. You might even want to develop a customer referral campaign to get more leads by offering an incentive, such as a gift or a discount to customers who deliver new business via a referral.

5. Extend referrals online

Those personal, customer referrals are a powerful tool that also work online. Think about how easy it is for people to check comments and reviews of a product from other customers, and how much a good review affects their buying decision. Over 90% of customers search online for the services they need, so your online reputation is a valuable tool. Online networks like Tradebusters Connect offer tradies the opportunity to be recognised by customers in their local area as a Top 3 Business Pick. Gaining five star reviews on Google Reviews will also help your website climb to the top of the search engine rankings, improving the chance of your site being seen first when people search for select keywords.

With these 5 simple marketing tips you should be on the way to growing your prospects with new leads, however if the thought of marketing your own business still leaves you feeling flushed, outsource the task to the experts so you can focus on what you do best!