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Planting Seeds for Lead Generation

Guest post by: Michael O'Grady

Article Overview: Seed-planting practice can be used when talking to residential customers about work needed in future seasons. Making suggestions for maintenance work for the spring while it’s still winter is a lot like planting seeds.

Planting Seeds for Lead Generation

When I look out into my backyard, it’s great to finally see the grass covering up the gigantic holes that Rosie, our 100 lb. Bernese Mountain Dog, has dug throughout the winter.I'm starting to plant seeds for full growth by early summer. The most ideal time, however is early fall when the dry, hot weather is gone. This gives the seeds a chance to stay moist in preparation for the next spring season.

This same seed-planting practice can be used when talking to residential customers about work needed in future seasons. Making suggestions for maintenance work for the spring while it’s still winter is a lot like planting seeds. It’s just called something different: lead generation. Your recommendations are planted in the minds of your customers and will grow into a lead at just the right time. Right now, the “seeds” of air-conditioning replacement should be planted with your residential customers to generate spring leads.

Helping Service Technicians with Lead Generation

To help service technicians with lead generation, I make it a habit of riding along with them on heating service calls in the winter, plumbing service calls all year long and air-conditioning calls in the summer. My service technicians have become experts in the fine art of replacement lead generation when dealing with heating or air-conditioning issues. Generating leads on plumbing service calls are a little more challenging.

After snaking out a kitchen drain or replacing a bathroom faucet, transitioning into a conversation about a furnace or air-conditioning system can be difficult. It’s a difficult conversation to start, but it is necessary. It’s critical to your business to cross-promote your services whenever possible, and to not just rely on hand-out marketing materials and sticker postings on furnaces and air-conditioners.

To generate more leads, I’ve learned to take things one step further. I will show up at the home while my service technician is there doing a plumbing call.

Here’s a scenario: John the service technician is on a plumbing service call. I show up and say:

“I’m Mike, I wanted to stop in while John was here fixing your toilet and say hello. One of the services we offer our customers is a no charge evaluation of your heating and air-conditioning system. We look at age, condition and approximate efficiency rating. We can give you a plan for the future. You’ll know if and when you should upgrade your system with higher efficiency and newer equipment. I can do that while John is finishing up if you’d like?”

At that point, I’ve either planted a seed or generated a lead for replacement.

When is the best time to generate replacement leads?

The best time to have your replacement specialists generate leads is in the slower months, like March and April. I have found that 10 no-charge evaluations per-week, per-person will lead to 1 much needed additional installation per-week. For the 9 that don’t close right away, that’s 9 seeds planted for future replacement work.

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Article Tags: contractor selling, hvac leads, lead generation, sales psychol4ogy, selling to homeowners



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