Getting regular, positive online reviews for your contracting business matters now more than ever. Why?

• Regular online reviews boost local SEO. For example, Google factors in customer reviews when generating local pack listings (the 3 or 4 Google map results that appear when a consumer searches for local businesses). In fact, one study found that reviews account for 15%of Google’s ranking of a local business.
• Online reviews also impact consumers’ decisions. About 86% of consumers read reviews when shopping for a local company, and they read an average of 10 before they feel they can trust a local business, according to Brightlocal.

Focus on stellar customer care.

The foundation for getting great online reviews is earning them. Build a company culture that empowers roofers to care for customers’ homes like they were their own. Do that by:

• Being open or transparent about challenges or problems that arise during the project.
• Keeping the jobsite as clean as possible during the project and leaving it as clean—or cleaner—than what you found it.
• Doing quality work and backing it up with a robust product and workmanship guarantees.
• Offering multiple payment options that make the project more doable for the customer’s budget.
• Sending a thank you gift, like a gift basket or gift card, after the service is done.

Claim your profile on review sites.

It’s worth the time to claim your company profile on review sites like Angie’s List or Yelp. In addition to allowing you to respond to feedback, claiming the profile allows you to provide correct information, like services, hours, and contact info.

Ask customers to leave reviews.  

Homeowners are as busy as you are, and even those who would want to leave a review may forget unless reminded. Build asking for reviews into your regular processes so it happens after every job.

Ways to ask include:

• Attach a card or note with review information to documents like the final walk-through checklist, final invoice, or other end-of-project materials.
• Include links to review site profile pages in email signatures, texts, or other electronic communications.
• Send out a separate review request after the project is completed.

Respond to positive reviews.

Acknowledging a review lets the homeowner and prospects know you’re engaged and staying on top of feedback, which conveys you’re a contractor who cares about customers.

Take action on negative reviews.

Look at a bad review as an opportunity to make the situation right and to show homeowners reading the review that you’re willing to make customers happy.

Reply to the review by acknowledging the customer’s complaint (Ex: I’m sorry you were unhappy with the workmanship.) Then, offer to take the conversation offline (Ex: Can I call you this afternoon to talk about a solution?) This takes the spotlight off the situation so you can work out a solution in private.

No matter what, keep the response professional. If the situation is heated, it might be helpful to have a colleague, friend, or family member give you feedback on your responses before you post them. Their outside perspective can alert you if your response comes across as short, rude, or nasty (even if that wasn’t your intent).

Never pay customers or people posing as customers for reviews.

Your reputation as a contractor matters. Don’t ruin it by paying for fake reviews or offering money for good reviews. Check out the FTC’s guidelines for reviews, which are designed to encourage transparency for consumers.

Now put that good reputation to work for you.  

Get the name you’ve worked so hard to build in front of the right people. Boostpoint is a software solution that places Facebook and Instagram ads in front of the homeowners most likely to be your next contracting customers. Get started with a free trial.

Do you want to generate more business? In this post, we’re going to cover how to best take advantage of Boostpoint for your local company from strategy to implementation so that you can build a brand that generates more business. 

Step 1: Create a Boostpoint Account

Go to app.boostpoint.com and register for an account. If you already have an account just login to your existing account. 

Step 2: Connect Your Facebook Business Page 

To connect you business Facebook page, go to settings and click the toggle switch and follow the prompts. Connecting your Facebook page allows Boostpoint to create ads on behalf of your page so that traffic is directed to your brand. 

Step 3: Add Billing Info

The next step is to add a credit card to your account. This is the payment method that will be used to bill your monthly subscription and your accumulated ad spend.

Step 5: Create a Campaign

Now you’re ready to create a Boostpoint campaign. The strategy we recommend is creating campaigns around areas you have recently completed work. For example, let’s say you completed 7 jobs this past week. The strategy would be the following

Target Area:

Add the addresses of these jobs into Boostpoint and select a 1-2 mile radius.

Ad type: 

Photo and video ads both have potential for quality engagement. With that said, context is key here. Put yourself in the shoes of the person looking at the photo or video and ask yourself if you would find this engaging? You can also choose to run both a photo and a video ad at the same time. I really recommend this method because is keeps your ads a bit more fresh when people see them multiple times.  

Budget and Schedule:

We recommend taking a 1% approach for finding the right budget for your campaigns. For example, if your revenue from a job is $8,000. Take 1% ($80) and put it back into marketing in that neighborhood. So if you’re creating a campaign with 7 addresses, your total budget would be $560. One of the benefits about this strategy is that your ad spend stays relevant with your total revenue. 

Content:

Creating engaging content is the multiplication factor when creating campaigns. Start with a Boostpoint template and then make it personal to your brand. Here’s a great article to help you generate some ideas.

Step 6: Analyzing

Once you have campaigns up and running you can analyze your results by going to your reports dashboard. 

Step 7: Repeat

This strategy relies on consistency to be effective. I  recommend keeping your campaigns as current as possible. The best case scenario would be to have your campaign started a few days before you complete work in a neighborhood or you could get in a groove where every Friday you create campaigns based off of how many jobs you completed that week.

Summary

My goal with this post is to present a framework not a rulebook. Don’t be afraid to experiment and to draw outside the lines to see what works for your brand and your audience. Happy marketing!