So, do you feel any different? We haven’t spoken since last decade, so I wanted to check in on you and see if it’s hit you yet. When you flipped your Doug the Pug calendar over to January a few days ago, it meant that we’re officially as close to 2050 as we are to 1990. Nirvana is playing on Classic Rock stations and Forrest Gump is about to roll out a 30th-anniversary edition. What seemed like yesterday will soon be too old for middle-aged people to remember.

Let me ask you a question. When you look around at our everyday lives today, is this what you were expecting as a kid? You were probably way off, right? Looking back at people’s expectations from the past of where we’d be by now, it’s a little comical.

We landed a man on the moon 51 years ago, and I think if you would have asked any American back in the 60s what they pictured our society to look like two decades into the new millennium, you’d hear about robots, teleporters and flying cars. We’re supposed to be living The Jetson’s dream by now, right? I should be living in the sky, eating an assortment of pills as meals and having a sassy robot maid clean up after me. The original Lost in Space TV show aired in 1965 and was supposed to take place in… get this… 1997. "Danger, Will Robinson! You weren’t even close!"

Well, even though the fact I didn’t fly to work (unless you count driving a little too fast…) is disappointing, it is amazing just how far we’ve come with technology over a few short years. It’s only been a touch over one lifetime since Willis Carrier invented the first modern air conditioning system and had it installed in the first home residence. The system measured in at a compact and economical 7 feet high, 6 feet wide, and 20 feet long. Now we can barely imagine a home being built without one, and they have more technology inside than NASA’s supercomputers from a few decades ago.

Things are changing every single day, and they change quickly. Every few days it seems someone rolls out a new piece of technology or a program that can make life and business easier and more efficient. It’s hard… scratch that, it’s IMPOSSIBLE to know exactly what the future holds, especially when you’re trying to envision 2050, or even 2025… but we can make some educated guesses, right?

So, I’m not going to try to play Nostradamus and predict what the world will be like for your great-grandchildren, and please don’t cash out your retirement and “put it all on red” based on anything I say here. I don’t need that kind of pressure. But we can learn from some trends going on in and around the industry to be better prepared for what’s coming this year.

Three predictions I’ll make about the in-home trade industries in 2020.

#1- The economy is going to continue to be strong. Yeah, I’m just the marketing guy and I probably need to stay in my lane here. Admittedly I’m no economist, but I do listen to a lot of the financial gurus and they all agree on one thing. What we’re experiencing right now as far as workforce, new home construction, stock market trends, etc. is unlike almost any other period in the history of our country. What the economists don’t agree on, however, is when this will end.

In that, you’ve got a couple of pretty distinct camps. On one hand, you have those who think the bubble can pop at any moment, and they make an almost weekly prediction that it will. Keep in mind though, they predicted this upward trend would never make it through 2019, ‘18 or ‘17, yet it keeps right on chugging along. Then you’ve got the others who are overly optimistic and seem to think the good times will never end. I find it safer to be cautiously optimistic.

Forbes Magazine is forecasting that 2020 will be close to a mirror image of 2019 with healthy, sustained growth, then we should see the GDP surge again in 2021. I’m being overly simplistic here, but the train shows no signs of stopping right now, so ride it while you can. Especially for those of you in the Southeast; you are seeing record numbers of homes and businesses being built as the population is growing faster here than any other area of the country. Just up the road to the north of us in Huntsville, AL, the housing inventory (houses being sold vs. demand) is the lowest it’s been in 22 years. They simply can’t build houses fast enough.

I’m not one of those who is predicting this decade to be The Roaring 20s Part Two, but I just don’t think the Chicken Little’s need to be listened to just yet either. Be smart, diversify your income streams and invest back into your company, making it stronger while you have the extra cash flow because it will end eventually. The most dangerous thing you can do right now while the work is coming easy? Nothing.

Even the Roaring Twenties came to a screeching halt in ’29, and those who were smart with their bounty during the good years were the ones who survived into the 30s.

#2- The “Freon” phase out won’t be that big of a deal. Yet. This one doesn’t apply to our plumber or electrician friends reading this, but you HVACR guys have been watching closely for a while. Our good friends at the EPA have announced that R-22 can no longer be produced due to it being “O-Zone depleting.” And while, for the most part, homeowners are still unaware this is even happening, there has been almost mass hysteria on the industry side thinking that prices on remaining R-22 would skyrocket and be unavailable. We aren’t there yet.

According to the many industry sources, including The News, R-22 is still out there in mass supply for now, so the HVACR industry didn’t crumble at 12:01 on January 1, 2020 Y2K style. But, as mentioned above, the smart contractor is doing everything they can to get ready while things are still good.

This will still change the industry pretty dramatically over the next months to years as manufacturers quit producing systems and replacement parts that run off of R-22. Be the expert and use your marketing to educate homeowners about the changes that WILL be a big deal in the not too distant future.

#3- Print marketing is continuing its comeback. In all actuality, this one is not a very bold prediction at all, yet for a good portion of you, this will be the hardest of the three to believe. For some, it doesn’t matter how many statistics I throw out here to back up this claim, you’ll still choose to believe “old fashioned” print and mail marketing is a thing of the past. Do so at your own peril.

A quick Google search will show you that physical print marketing has been experiencing a renaissance over the last few years and is getting stronger year over year. Why? Because of online overload.

A website and online presence is a necessity in today’s market, and with the ease and cost-effectiveness of email blasts, it seems like the obvious choice. BUT, with open and delivery rates dropping steadily and more and more companies assaulting our inboxes daily, it’s almost impossible to market entirely in the digital world and survive.

Look around, you’ve seen plenty of proof in your own mailbox at home. Some of the largest companies in the world are returning to print. Amazon has produced a full Christmas catalog the last two years, while Walmart, Target and others are restarting their sales circulars. Even companies that were born entirely online like Uber and Airbnb are printing and mailing lifestyle magazines for brand promotion!

Ask yourself, would some of the largest companies in the world, WITH the largest online identities, be returning to print marketing if they didn’t believe that people’s physical mailboxes are the next great gateway to their wallets?

Emails can be caught in spam filters or deleted in mass and never even seen, but when your message is sent directly to the home, you’ve obligated the homeowner to something. Average email open rate: 15-20%. Average direct mail deliverability rate? 100%.

Picture this: with a direct mail postcard, even if the piece goes straight in the trash during the mail sort, your prospect has to look at that piece, your logo, your offer, and make a conscious decision what to do with it. At best you get a phone call. At medium, your offer goes in the junk drawer for later. At worst, you get in front of their eyes one more time, building brand awareness and the piece has the same marketing effect as a billboard on the side of the highway.

Contractors are typically a few years behind the curve in marketing trends, and are, on the whole, resistant to change. I know it’s hard to think of direct mail as being the “new, hip thing in marketing,” but all indications point to it being the secret weapon of a lot of Fortune 500 companies in 2020.

As I said, you can take every bit of this and argue with me on every point if you’d like, but this is my best educated guess of a few things you can bank on to shape your 2020. There WILL be things we don’t expect coming our way at some point this year, but the smart contractor is playing the odds, staying informed and seeking wise counsel from peers and consultants to stay ahead of the curve.

If you’d like help mapping out a marketing plan for 2020, we are booking one-on-one coaching appointments right now to help you get a handle on the months ahead. Call us at (800) 489-9099 or shoot us an email to [email protected] to get a spot. Or if you’d like to use one of these methods above to contact me and tell me how wrong I am, I’m always up for a good debate as well.

Here’s to a phenomenal 2020 for all of you. Let’s start this decade strong.