1st Choice Solutions East Texas, is new to the exterior washing business and offering services in Gilmer, Longview, Tyler and surrounding communities in East Texas.
We’re excited for our start-up and welcome advice on marketing tips, that have been tried and proven and/or tried and proven ineffective! All advice is welcomed 
Robert
I’d do some (a lot) more reading here before you make such a statement…people usually come to regret it. 
Seriously though, welcome and best of luck!
Welcome, I used to live in Dallas.
I’ve had good luck with Google and Nextdoor, steer clear of Angi and HomeAdvisor.
Thanks! I’m just learning about Nextdoor, seems pretty legit. Heard nothing but bad about Angi and HA. In fact, I was contacted by the “new” version of those two combined…called themselves "Angi Leads. I did a bit of checking and was not happy with what I discovered. Told them thanks but no.
Has anyone else had any experiences with Angi Leads?
Yes. Lots. It’s a scam.
If you have to pay a third party lead generator it is most likely not working out in your favor financially.
We’ve had a bit of luck with door hangers. It was actually kinda nice getting out and about and targeting neighborhoods that could best benefit from our work.
We’ve also done mailers, although yet to have any responses to any of those.
We’re working on some mailers targeting churches to help them spruce up their houses of worship for the upcoming holiday season.
We’ve visited some real estate agency offices and left pastries and business cards. Except for leaving some tasty donuts, our results have been a bit limited there.
Robert
My experience is that handing out or mailing flyers doesn’t work (of course it could be different for others). Almost hate to say it but once I got on Facebook, everything changed. Simplest advice is do a great job, go over and above, show up for estimates right away, be prompt on day of service, and give a good competitive price. Something simple like cutting back a little bit of brush or branches from the siding (which also makes the job easier) without charging them goes a long way in a clients eyes and recommendation. If it’s more than just a little bit, do it for a super low price (instead of what a landscaper would charge) and they’ll love you for it. I learned that I actually got a recent job from all other quotes a client got simple because I offered to cut some brush back for free (took about 15 minutes). Clean their mailboxes too as they can get all nasty. Don’t hesitate to spend a few minutes adjusting a sagging gate if able or something else minor that will only take a couple minutes. Take before and after pix and send them to the client too. It gets them excited about what you’re doing. Oh yeah, be completely honest. If you break something, tell them and offer to pay for it. I broke a garden gnome one time dragging a hose, man was I upset at my stupidity! Told them asap and they said no worries. Great customer service will win you name recognition and repeat customers quicker than anything!
Bold statement… “handing out/mailing out flyers doesn’t work” …
Perhaps some have had success with flyers, etc. and if so, carry on -lol! Not knocking it if it works, just doesn’t work personally for me based on experience. I imagine different locations may require different approaches but word of mouth continues to be my best marketing tool.
I’d say it’s flat out wrong…but depends on your meaning of “works”…
@JerseyJoe What was your ROI on it? How many did you do, how did you determine when/where they went out, and what was the format/design? All of these things dramatically impact ROI.
I will only accept “I put out 10k flyers, 2% response and 50% close rate… I only made $30k since 100 people got a $300 house wash”
DOESNT WORK!
I’m not sure I understand what you said/meant by “works.” For clarity, I don’t use flyers, etc. because it doesn’t work for me. Perhaps some do and it does for them as far as getting customers. If so, I can’t say it’s wrong for them, I just haven’t had any success so I don’t use them anymore. Social media seems to be the best marketing tool for me, may not be the same for all though.
The question was how did you know it “doesn’t work”…just a feeling? what are the numbers? What was your ROI on flyers (or more importantly the mailers), and how were they done?
The real question is what are YOUR numbers. How many hours a month do spend going through junk mail with any interest. Let’s play consumer.
Oh, sorry. I started with the $99 specials to a select group of houses (very dirty I might say) and had zero responses. Also have done neighborhood handouts in mailboxes also with minimal to no response. Listening to others I learned that most of what goes into a mailbox goes right into the trash (at least around here). Posted signs, most of which were stolen or removed. Was never a social media person but crossed paths with some who are in marketing who said I was crazy not to be on FB. Within a week of getting on, the calls started coming (little by little). I post a good amount of before and after pix and advertise weekly in about a dozen FB groups too. When I’m done a job I ask them to post on FB if satisfied and almost all do. I also have a group of customers who, when they see someone asking for PW on FB, always recommend me (and no, none of them are on retainer😂). I’m only a handful of years into the biz and so my line of repeat customers isn’t large every year like some of you who have been doing it for years, although I do reach out to each customer from 2 or more years ago at the beginning of the season to see if they need their house done and most say their houses still look great. As I imagine you could confirm (and as I’ve read from others here), as that repeat list grows over time, the biz will begin to self sustain itself. Takes time for sure!
I’m not my target customer base, so that point is irrelevant.
I’ve found a combination of yard signs, clip flyers, Google ads, 5-10 arounds (via send jim), and eddm (20000 mailers, 5000/month April/May/June/July) have worked great for me.
I completely forgot that most of you power wash guys are a bunch of rude dudes when it comes to internet talk.
I’ll just be bowing back out of these convos again.
Spoken like a true professional.
What a weak and fragile male. You sign up to a forum and can’t handle opinion and pushback. I would put those yoga pants back on and just observe from a distance. You’re not ready yet, too weak for forums.
Well, I can’t condone the attitude, but agree with the dude whole-heartedly on the marketing, Flyers to “a select group of houses” is never going to move the needle. It’s a numbers game. A small mailing for us is 10k. You have to know your ROI on each marketing avenue to speak on it with any conviction. Obviously you go all in on free/low cost stuff. Your friends were correct, you wre nuts to not be on FB if you’re looking to grow, but you also shouldn’t sell yourself short (if growth is your goal). Time in business isn’t the end all/be all. We’ve only been doing washing for about 5 years now…and growth-wise it’s going well.
I think you don’t want to get bogged down on the 1 thing that works…everything works, just at differing rates, at different times. As far as flyers/EDDMs, there are so many variables that determine if they work or not. We normally have solid design, heavy weight full sized mailers that land in the mailbox on Friday and we get a solid 8:1 return (which is actually pretty good for paid marketing statistically). When we ran them through SendJim to save time on our end, we got smaller lightweight cards, an couldn’t control the landing day (they hit boxes mostly on Monday from what we heard, which couldn’t be a worse day)…we got about 1:1 out of that…total failure. Do mailers work, sure. Do all mailers work? not if not done well, and at the right time. Even your FB posts should ideally hit at certain times of certain days of the week. If you’re looking to really do it well, then you need to look into and track these things.
