Now that we have identified commercial customer opportunities in your market, the U.S. Lawns team will help you formulate a customized action plan to reach those prospective customers. By developing materials, strategies and campaigns targeted toward building brand awareness amongst your market’s gatekeepers and decision makers, you will be better positioned to secure more accounts.
As a recap, in the awareness stage potential customers are already aware of their need for service and you are working to make them aware that U.S. Lawns can fill that need. More than anything else, when selecting a service provider for landscape maintenance services, commercial property decision makers need confidence that the provider is capable of completing the required service while making them look good in the process. Confidence is established through a professional image that includes:
- Market reputation: are you focused on commercial customers or distracted by the needs of a residential customer base?
- The resources behind you: are you a small independent operator or part of something bigger?
- High-quality physical and digital marketing materials
While the market reputation and resources are conveyed through the U.S. Lawns brand name, U.S. Lawns also helps its franchisees establish a professional image through a suite of physical and digital branding elements that are covered by your monthly marketing fund contribution. These elements include:
- Access to high quality marketing materials through our print and marketing portal:
- Postcards
- Service cards brochures
- Presentation folders
- Branded Stationary/Letterhead
- Envelopes
- Business Cards
- The establishment and management of your online image with a suite of services provided by our Home Office team and our digital advertising partner, Integrated Digital Strategies:
- Your local “team” website that gives your business a formal home on the web.
- Localized search engine optimization efforts to organically boost your pages web traffic.
- Google My Business account to help drive customer engagement through search and maps
- Online reputation management and training inclusive of SMS texts, email and online review sites
- Organic posting and maintenance of your team Facebook page to establish a social presence
- Professional email newsletters that keep you top of mind with current and prospective customers
- Ongoing account management and support
By leveraging the U.S. Lawns brand and the marketing materials outlined above, our franchisees are able to quickly establish the confidence and credibility their customers require with a level of professionalism that is often lacking in the industry.
In the next article in this series, we will discuss how U.S. Lawns gives our franchisees an edge in the consideration stage with programs like the Direct Sales Dial-Up and Accelerated Territory Management.
