Marketing a pest-control company can be hard and it relates to a lot of other home service business marketing – which we have done a ton! First avoid these common misconceptions:
❌ “My business sells itself, I don’t need to do marketing!”
📉 “I’m going to wait for a down-turn in the economy to get serious about this”
💰 “Because I’ve spent money in the past on marketing that didn’t go well, all marketing options must be BS.”
Check out this awesome podcast with our CEO and Austin Clark, CEO of Moxie Pest Control:
That being said – here are the things I’d strongly suggest if you’re just starting your business:
11 Pest Control Marketing Tips for Lead Generation
These tips are good for any home service business – but I’ve tailored the tips specifically to Pest Control, so A) You find this article, and B) you can implement the specifics of each strategy as quickly as possible.
1. Take complete ownership for your result, and start learning marketing – set up your Google Business Profile, fill it out completely.
Your Google Business Profile is the bedrock that all your marketing should be built on. When you fill it out, make sure every single option is filled out, and you’re comprehensive – even just with the description. Use every last word you can, and be descriptive with the keywords and categories you choose.
2. Ensure you’ve got consistent branding, set up social pages that look nice for the company, share on your personal social that you’d love to help!
Every old list of lead generation strategies promises the world around just setting up your social media pages and posting.
But if you’ve done this for awhile you’ll see – NO LEADS.
However – if you mix:
- Personal social media posting
- Promoting posts or doing targeted Facebook ads
You can have significantly more eyeballs and leads from your business. Just don’t get it twisted – it requires effort and connecting with people in your community regularly, and actually asking people to do business with you every once in awhile.
3. Share helpful content – short videos, how-to’s, common questions. Doesn’t have to be fancy, just be useful and be yourself.
Answer the questions you get in the sales process.
Go ahead, write down the top 7 questions you get in sales and then make a brief video about them – press upload.
Also – come up with 3 weekly series, for instance:
- Monday Motivation – where you share something encouraging.
- “What’s Wrong With This?” Wednesdays – where you share a problem with the industry, or a particular job from a competitor.
- Small Business Saturdays – where you interview other small businesses in your area.
I suggest sharing these on your personal profile, and always making your ideal customer the hero of the story – not your business.
4. Get a basic website at least, and Get on every local directory you can, but keep your name address and phone number consistent.
Wix, Squarespace and Even Google has a basic website option when you’re early.
Then hire a professional as your business gets more mature.
Get yourself on every single directory, and link back to your site. Make sure you create only listings with consistent name, address, and phone number – otherwise it can be bad for your Google visibility algorithmically.
5. Be aggressive about getting 5 star reviews and Google, then Do Google local service ads / Google guaranteed.
Reviews are everything. Utilize a service like Signpost, and heartfelt asks to increase your reviews every day.
Google Guaranteed is a very good Pay-per-lead option, I’d suggest avoiding providers like Angi who sell the same lead 5 times.
6. Put out yard signs, wrap your truck, have branded, eye-catching uniforms, and door-knock around customers houses you’re already working with.
Everything in the neighborhood, and that the customer sees is the first priority. Nail this stuff down before paying to have a digital marketing company do anything.
7. Treat every customer like they will refer you 5 times and many will.
Your customers are your best marketing.
If you get a bad review, answer nicely.
Really understand who your best customers are, and put all of your effort towards getting referrals from those people – and direct all of your marketing and efforts at them.
8. Consider hiring a more aggressive Google specialized team 🙂
Yes – this is what we do!
When it’s time, we’d love to help you get more leads from the 2nd best lead producer besides referrals.
- We have 20 people, all focused on Google + websites.
- We only serve contractors and home service providers.
- We are relentless when it comes to SEO, and tight when it comes to PPC (Google wants to spend more of your money, so it’s good to have someone managing your ads, stopping waste.
9. Keep going hard on social media, doing video content, and door knocking around jobs.
Whenever you find yourself coming away from the fundamentals, come back.
If you were getting business from social media when you first started, and your not now – what happened?
Stop looking for the silver bullet. Do the fundamentals consistently – and simply layer each new strategy on. Track your wins and double down on what’s working.
10. Get really into referral partners like other home service businesses, roofers, realtors and insurance agents
Sit down with them for coffee – 1 or 2 a week, and be kind. Always think about how you could get each referral partner, 2 closed deals a year – and strive for that. Let them know that’s what you’re looking to do.
More advanced: Make videos with them, make them look cool and promote them on your channels. They will share and be more excited to refer you in the future.
11. Be active on local Facebook groups, next door and use social media and content to attract great referral partners.
Tag referral partners in local Facebook groups, (the company + the owner/your contact), and try to refer out 5-10 other home service businesses on social media. Reciprocity – is the concept that they will feel compelled to refer your company in the future.
Are you ready to take responsibility?
It’s easy to blame your marketing agency, or someone else on your team – for not executing on your marketing goals.
But at the end of the day – that won’t make it more likely to not happen in the future.
- What do YOU control?
- How could you choose marketing partners better, or hire better?
- What can you make into a daily or weekly habit that will actually create new opportunities?
These strategies are just the start – but the foundational things, the bedrock you build the rest of your marketing campaigns on will often be the actual legit things you need to keep consistent on, no matter what.
Stay Consistent.
Stay Relentless.
Thank you for reading ’11 Pest Control Marketing Ideas to Generate New Leads’ and let us know how we can help you – if you’re ready to hire a relentless Google-specialized team!
