It’s never just about the product or the equipment. Residential contracting is a service business. Even when you’re selling products, it takes your quality installation services and repair services for homeowners to enjoy the benefits that these upgrades can provide.
If you’re marketing a new HVAC system, you’ll promote the operational and efficiency benefits the system will bring but also how your company will deliver those benefits, thanks to highly trained technicians. You will be marketing the added value of free, no-obligation estimates, convenient scheduling, easy payments or however else you’re sweetening the offer and reducing the risk, along with your team’s expertise.
Service is essential to the value proposition that separates you from your competitors. Your equipment may be the same as that in your competitors’ inventory, but your service is where you differentiate your company.
A focus on service gets you away from any temptation to compete for low prices – and compete based on value. Even if you wish to address your pricing structure, bundling services to add value is better than dropping prices to gain customers. A maintenance agreement that bundles two tune-ups with other added value is an example.
Service is also the way you can expand your offerings to help your customers be more comfortable, save energy, stay safe and secure and better enjoy their home. Electrical safety inspections, plumbing inspections, seasonal tune-ups and indoor air quality checks are among the opportunities that can get marketers an entry into the home.
Once there, you can demonstrate expertise, solve customer problems and begin building the relationship with a customer that calls on you again and again.
Service businesses are best built on trust, and all of your marketing efforts and customer interactions should build trust. As always, under promise and over deliver.