By David Crary
If you're like most green industry businesses, especially those just starting out, you don't have a lot of money in your marketing budget. Luckily, sometimes the best marketing tactics don't force you to break the bank.In fact, some of the best marketing ideas I've seen are of the guerrilla variety. First coined in 1984, at its core, guerrilla marketing uses creative, unusual, and engaging concepts to generate buzz and gain publicity.
Usually, the only expenditure that you need to create a great guerrilla marketing campaign is the creative brainstorming necessary to think of an original idea. Here are some general ideas to get you started down the road to an inexpensive guerrilla marketing campaign.
Volunteer locally – Volunteering is a great thing for your business to do. Not only does it help the community, it can bring your team together around a common cause. But even better, it can get you some much-needed publicity and connect you with people in your community who may need your services.
When you volunteer, make sure you use your branded equipment and wear clothing with your logo. It's also not a bad idea to bring schwag to giveaway to other volunteers – shirts, hats, can coolers – whatever you have with your logo on it. Let other volunteers sell for you as well.
Use yard signs strategically – I was talking to a customer of ours who printed 400 signs. All they said was “Sprinkler Winterization: $65”. He placed them strategically in public areas where his target customers lived. Sure, he lost a few signs during the course of the fall, but overall he determined that those 400 simple lawn signs, which cost him about $1 apiece to print, generated more that $10,000 in revenue.
The beauty of this idea is that, by targeting specific areas with his signs, this customer was able to build routing efficiencies into his irrigation business that made his inexpensive price a little more profitable.
Print an upside down ad – People expect ads to look a certain way. When they don't, they notice. A simple way to get your ad to stand out is to get your local newspaper to print your ad upside down.
Give away your services periodically – I know a residential snow removal contractor who frequently plows random driveways in areas he wants to gain business. He usually just removes the snow at the end of the driveway after city plows come through, then throws a bag of salt with his business card on their driveway. This single good deed – in an area he's in anyway – generates a new customer a fair amount of the time.
Don't be afraid to do a good deed for a customer's neighbor. You'd be surprised at how many of them will turn into long-term paying customers.
Send a personalized message – Want to get your customers' neighbors as your customers? Get creative. First, look up their names at your local clerk of courts office. Then, send them a personalized message by mail. If a holiday is nearing, send them a holiday greeting with a discount.
Have a contest – We recently invited people to take the 2014 Green Industry Benchmark Survey. It's an annual survey we conduct to see what folks in the green industry think about the upcoming year, how they did the previous year and what marketing and operational practices and processes work best. Everyone who completes the survey not only gets the nearly 30-page report we create from the survey results, but we also enter them to win an Android tablet. It's a small incentive, but I'm willing to bet it's why 70% of our respondents complete the survey.
So hold a contest. I've found that one big giveaway entices people more than a small giveaway. So give something big away – maybe a year's worth of lawn maintenance work – and tell your customers to tell their friends. It's a great way to build awareness of what you do.
Use smart graffiti – Now let's get something straight. I'm not telling you to graffiti up your neighborhood with paint. There are plenty of ways to use non-permanent graffiti to spread your message. Chalk on a sidewalk is a great way to leverage the power of graffiti. Chalk your logo or website address on a sidewalk in a target neighborhood. Or, if you know of a dirty building, clean the dirt to create your logo. These are by no means permanent, but can definitely help you gain exposure inexpensively.
Create a funny parody video – The other day I saw a very clever, funny rap video by a guy who maintains pools. It was really, really well done. It was funny, it worked in references to what he did, and it was going viral.
It's amazing what a humorous video or funny picture can do. So get your creative juices and words flowing and create your own rap video commemorating what you do.
Those are just a few ideas to get you started. But think outside the box. Be creative. You'd be surprised at how a little brainpower can be your biggest asset when marketing your small business on a tight budget.
Wondering what you may be doing wrong that's killing your business? Check out our free eBook, 33 Stupid Things Contractors Do (and How to Fix Them), today!
Service Business Marketing – Guerilla Marketing Tractics for Your Green Business