Looking for "customer" opinions

[sbolt19]

Ok guys, I'm trying to figure out the best place to put my advertising dollars. Where do you go when you look for a service provided contractor. Such as my case, I'm a general contractor, but it doesn't have to be in the construction industry. Where, in general, do you go to find out what you want to know about someone you hire? There should be a poll on this and if you can explain to me why you go where you do, I'd appreciate it. Do you ask your great aunt Tillie? Do you phone a friend? The BBB or does Siri make your decisions? I'm gonna give everyone 2 choices because I know that I usually go to 2 different spots to find out what I am looking for. If you choose "other" can you please let me know what your other choice is. Thanks guys, I'd appreciate it.

[landshark]

I first go to friends and family then to local websites, nextdoor.com and others.. usually friends and family lands what I need.

[Justin]

I start with friends and family, then move onto web reviews. I also rely heavily on club members for referrals or trades services since we've got lots of skilled folks in-house.

[Rox Crusher]

Our neighborhood has two great community / group FaceBook pages.

One is for general communications about the community and events or issues.

The other is a buying / selling / services group. No advertising but the word of mouth referral opportunity is great. People get in there and offer services and stuff.

Works pretty nice.

[akaFrankCastle]

I usually call a general contractor I know who also owns a Bronco. I then use the recommended person to get an estimate for how much it would cost to do it once. Then I stupidly hire someone else for half the cost and fire them for being incompetent. And then I hire the first person.

[hockeydad4-22]

Being in construction mysef, I generally know someone who does the work I need done. But when it comes to many of the finer things, like auto mechanics to work on my wife's car, I listen to folks who have had experience with said vendor, good and bad

[71 Broncman]

I'm in the trades as well. I would use a Contractor I have worked on a job with or word of mouth. I do use the good ole paper phone book sometimes too.
Mark.

[sbolt19]

Well, shoot, this isn't going to help me. I can't exactly pay everyone's friends and families to recommend me. So how do you guys advertise, gain new customers, etc.? I've got a FB page, got a decent (stress decent, it is better than some but not as good as others) website, what do you guys suggest to drive 1) traffic to both and 2) bring in some new customers? Gimme some ideas to chew on.

[hockeydad4-22]

Post up your FB page here. I will "like" it and share your posts to help get the word out. Do you work in the Denver metro area or just in the springs?

[Kinder]

^ that's a good idea, at the very least people will file it for later use.

[Jesus_man]

What about designing a web ad to place on local websites? I don't know how google does it, or how much it costs...

[kchaser]

Talk to a marketing specialist. My wife is one and I have seen it work. The good ones don't cost much and can recommend where to best spend your money and create a plan. Be careful, some marketing agents simply overcharge and under deliver.


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[Gunnibronco]

I have a marketing degree, and ran/marketed my stove, fireplace, spa, & billiard business for 10 years. I had my best luck with the yellow pages & a small ad in each paper, each week. Plus some big ads for occasional specials. But I realized my experience in Gunnison would be hard to translate to a larger market. People have very limited sources of information for the Gunnison valley. Plus my business ended in 2006, now the web has taken over.

Booths at remodel/home improvement expos came to mind. My friend ran a large landscape design company in OH, and he had good luck with these.

[sbolt19]

Thanks for the input guys, I do appreciate it. I also didn't want to come on here and say hey, please like my FB page because blah, blah, blah, so I appreciate you guys supporting me.

https://www.facebook.com/PikesPeakConstructionCompany

As for what I'm doing now, I've got a deal going with Dex right now where they offered me all my advertising dollars from print to be put towards digital and they boost me on the search engines. SEO style. They also gave me a larger ad in the book by doing this, I was paying for a 2x2 ad and they gave me a 3x3 ad for moving all my money into digital at no cost. As for my FB page, I don't do a lot of updating, promoting or anything else. I'm not a marketing guy so I'm not big on what to post. I've trolled competitor FB pages but they do the same as I do, post pictures when they remember to take em. But that is the extent of any type of advertising that I have done. I've been hit up by HomeAdvisor, Angie's List and various other lead generator companies but I'm not sold on them. You pay for the chance to bid? Not my way of thinking, but if I need to change, I will.

We don't travel outside of El Paso County, its the only area we are licensed to work, so anything we do has got to be down here. Ideally, I would like to increase gross numbers by 10-15% this year, and it seems like it might happen, the start of '15 has been good so far.

[D&D72]

I do word of mouth and internet. I rarely if ever rely on BBB they are just an entity any business can subscribe to (paid membership btw) if you don't make payments on time for your membership they will give you bad marks faster than any consumer regardless of your business.

[ClayJ]

I might ask friends if I have the time, but even if I ask friends, I'll google to compare the contractor/business/store/etc

Google is by far my go to place to find things.